I say we fund the auto company bailout with the accumulated wealth of the blood sucking corporate leaders that drove these businesses into the ground.

"Rick Wagoner has raked in $25 million in the last 5 years, while leading his company to a $72.6 billion loss since 2005. Alan Mulally, who became CEO of Ford in late 2006, received $28 million of compensation for four months of work in 2006. Ford has lost $24 billion since 2006."

You can't blame these losses on the housing bubble ...

start by sacking the ceo's and assorted cronies that couldn't see by the petrol powered car. giving all the big shot one idea losers money is only going to encourage them to come back and feed at the trough. use the workforce/structure that is there to design a car that will get you to the moon and back on a gallon of gas.

it's the kind of shit they could crack on mythbusters over a series.

...are for the little people.

Nationalize the auto industry so that it will be run effectively. All profits would then be Gov't revenue. This revenue could be used for some funding for universal healthcare. Doc Moore had it right. The auto industry could then be retooled to produce vehicles for mass transit--also purchased by the government. The business would be self-sufficient.

This would also insure that those groveling corporate bastards could never employ individuals that they would exploit. Government would provide better wages and benefits for workers also.

The American Public have repeatedly and overwhelmingly stated that they DO NOT WANT TO BAIL OUT THE AUTOMAKERS!!! Hell, the government is right now presiding over a "bailout" of the banking industry where the money is just "disappearing": with no oversight. Nationalization will only lead to incompetent management and a massive drop in productivity...for proof you need look no further than the incredible mess in Venezuela.
Maybe it's time this damn government started obeying the people they supposedly "serve".

having lived in Detroit for 62 years , I can certainly sympathise with anyone who is worried for their future , it willl all work out

just do'nt ever forget the benefits brought to EVERY American by organized labor

A reality show that sets up cops in a sting?

http://nevergetbusted.com/v2/node/176

Hope the charges stick. The cops are trying to charge the writers of the show with a crime in retaliation.

including those in the house and senate.

If the government was willing to give trillions to bailing out crooked, criminal bank and investment executives with no "trickle down" benefit to the rest of society, giving loans to the auto companies should not even been a matter requiring discussion. If these guys fail, we will rapidly enter a real and deep depression, because there will be rapid tsunami-like ripples throughout the nation and the economy. We are standing so close to the edge, that millions of additional workers out of work - where many of the lost jobs pay enough to finance not only the bare necessities of life but also allow a little surplus, would be the final push into the abyss. I am actually appalled that the Democrats put up the resistance that they did. If the auto companies survive, which now it looks like they will, let the stock holders oust the incompetent senior management and leadership. Those asshole former executives can stand in line for a burger flipping job, as far as I'm concerned. But, when it comes to putting millions of middle class workers out of work? Jesus..that should have been a no brainer. It isn't the fat cats who keep the economy rolling.

Part of the problem with auto sales is cyclic. In the boom times everybody and their mother bought new cars. But the default and repo rate on vehicles is not significantly higher than it's ever been. People just don't need vehicles now, especially if they are paying down the debts of a protracted spending spree. That will change, sales will eventually go back up...especially if the Big Three start getting their green act together. If millions of auto workers and workers in support industries are thrown out of work, it is only going start a viscious cycle. We really, really don't need to have that happening.

One of the things that disturbed me is how the conservatives are willing to let them all fail. Part of what bothers me about that is that the auto companies are still part of the industrial infrastructure that is needed for national defense. Military-Industrial-Complex issues aside, it is scary how much of the materials and equipment that are vital to national defense are no longer produced in the United States, and of that, how much is only produced by potential adversaries. I do not agree that there are banking interests that are too big to fail (and if there are, immediate divestiture is the fix for that). But I can see that there are industries that cannot be allowed to fail, regardless their size. The auto industry is one of them.

As an aside, since all of those gazillions of dollars that have been given to the banks have not reopened the floodgates of credit, which includes loans for new cars and trucks, maybe the thing to do is for the goevernment to either send checks to anybody wanting to buy a car, or to make direct, interest free new vehicle loans to anybody who wants them. There would be immediate positve ripples throughout the economy.

Ford is not in dire straights. They want what? 9 billion just in case?
Screw them. Let them cut back their racing funding. Let the CEO's and such take a massive pay cut. There is real money there.
GM and Chrysler. I was on the road lat weekend,and I saw alot of these types of vehicles. They can't be doing all that bad with so many cars on the road.

Now, The way I see it. The CEO's and chief exec's of all of these companies need to take a massive pay cut. All management should take a cut.period.
They can do away with all race teams to save money.
Honda announced that it was canceling it's formula 1 race team and was going to save over 100 million dollars.

Ok, lets say the union negotiates a deal that cuts benefits for workers. To save the company money, so it can stay afloat.
Will the consumer see a reduction in the prices of these vehicles?
I doubt it. I don't like the idea of giving these companies money.
But the idea of hundreds of thousands of workers and their families (resulting in millions) of people being screwed over by upper managements ineptness I like even less. In fact, that's unacceptable.
So I don't see us as having much of a choice.

Hundreds of millions of dollars. And that's just a drop in the bucket. Jeeezz, these people are idiots.

thing congress should demand from GM and Big oil before tax breaks and bailouts

1. Put Andrew Card in prison

2. Get the battery patent back from Chevron

Link

The Republican goal is to take money and power from the middle class transfering it to the upper class. This isolates the average person into a weak group and controls wealth and power. It is a very unAmerican philosophy.

from the bail out, than their common stock is worth combined... sort of illustrates why our business class sucks at life.

I guess that collateral, guarantees, oversight, and responsibility are for us common folk.

F*ck Frank and his buddies... I am not in favor of a bailout, which is the easy knee jerk reaction: We need a motherf*cking PLAN. Yeah it involves public money, but it also involves time and effort... these politicians just rather piss our tax dollars away hoping to put out the fire.