Should the US bailout the big three automakers?

[Ronbo]

These compaies were to big to fail...

Which is exactly why they should have told the UAW and the feds (collectively) to pack sand and go ahead and shut down a few plants.

The losses would have been minimal compaired to what they're facing now.

Ah well, three months and billions later GM is prepping to file bankrupt. Chrysler will follow a month later...

I find it amazing that a company can sell a half million cars a month and can't keep the doors open. I however am not stunned by the fact that the government failed to fix it.

[What'saCobra?]

Particularly, given the frame of culture, political posit and lack of ANY hands-on experience of our current government, it is simply not possible for it to FIX anything.

It can only re-distribute things, after taking a minimum of 30-35% deduction for "handling charges" of the bureaucracy as it is transferred... This much robbing of Peter to pay Paul is going to make a lot of sore Peters. And rich Pauls. Who will then be taxed, but not pay.

Their specialty is waste, fraud and abuse. Woe is us.

FORD stock looks better every day, at least in comparison.

[Dan40]

The Government is loaded with brilliant businessmen and women that will save GM.

They GAVE GM $$$14 Billion in exchange for a tiny stake in the company. GM's market value today is $1.18 Billion. So we overpaid by more than $$$12 Billion, SO FAR! And we don't even own a large percentage.


AIG, our brilliant Gov. business geniuses gave them $$$$300 Billion for a 36% stake in AIG. Their market value is $2.39 Billion. So we paid 125.5 TIMES what irs worth and now "own" 36%.

With brilliant business moves like those, HOW can they not save GM???

And I heard today that the Gov. has given Microsoft, Millions of Stimulus Dollars, and everybody knows how much MS needs more money.

Am I missing something?

[imagine2frolic]

Would be nice if we could do away with both the Democrat Party and the Republican Party and maybe then we could straighten this country out.


Read this slowly.

Absolutely the funniest "joke" ever......."ON US !!!"

Let it sink in.
Quietly we go like Sheep to slaughter.

Does anybody out there have any memory of the reason given for the establishment of the DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY ...... during the Carter Administration?

Anybody?
Anything?
No?
Did ' t think so !

Bottom line . . we ' ve spent several hundred billion dollars in support of an agency ... the reason for which not one person who reads this can remember.

Ready???????

It was very simple and at the time everybody thought it very appropriate...


The Department of Energy was instituted on 8-04-1977




TO LESSEN OUR DEPENDENCE ON FOREIGN OIL.


Hey, pretty efficient, huh?????


AND NOW IT ' S 2009, 32 YEARS LATER ... AND THE BUDGET FOR THIS


NECESSARY DEPARTMENT IS AT $24.2 BILLION A YEAR




THEY HAVE 16,000 FEDERAL EMPLOYEES AND APPROXIMATELY100,000 CONTRACT EMPLOYEES



AND LOOK AT THE JOB THEY HAVE DONE!

THIS IS WHERE YOU SLAP YOUR FOREHEAD AND SAY ' WHAT WAS I THINKING? '


Ah yes, good ole bureaucracy.



And NOW we are going to turn the Banking System & the Auto Industry over to them?




God Help Us !!!

SCARES THE HECK OUT OF ME!........i2f

[Dan40]

I'm laughing thru my tears

Dan

[Tom Kirkham]

http://meganmcardle.theatlantic.com/...king_publi.php

[Tom Kirkham]

King Obama is having problems with GM

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124035637935940943.html

[Don]

If someone( s ) would comment........

A con on GM or Chrysler going into bankruptcy is the outstanding payments to dealers for warranty work would cease and the dealers would then be subject to the terms of the bankruptcy for payment. During the future days, weeks & months the dealers will be hesitant to perform warranty work, further complicating the customer relationship with GM and the dealers.

Correct or ?

[Dan40]

Originally Posted by Don

If someone( s ) would comment........

A con on GM or Chrysler going into bankruptcy is the outstanding payments to dealers for warranty work would cease and the dealers would then be subject to the terms of the bankruptcy for payment. During the future days, weeks & months the dealers will be hesitant to perform warranty work, further complicating the customer relationship with GM and the dealers.

Correct or ?

That's the bad side of the coin. In bankruptcy, the union workers would take serious pay and benefit cuts. That will please them so much that there won't be any warranty work necessary. They will all do their work to perfection.
Unless the coin has a bad side and a worse side........................

[What'saCobra?]

JUNE 1, 2009 http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124381203054570397.html
What I Learned as a Car Czar
By ION MIHAI PACEPA

History shows government and automobile manufacturing don't mix.

[Long cut/paste that was identical to the link removed...per previous Lounge rules. Jamo]

--------------------
Lt. Gen. Pacepa, the highest ranking Soviet bloc official granted political asylum in the U.S., is the author of the memoir "Red Horizons" (Regnery, 1987).

[Keithc8]

Well I would say that we should learn from History. This is just what Obama would like to happen, for the government and the union to end up with GM. Just another move toward sociolism which is what he is all about.
I thought in America you had just as much right to fail as you did to succeed. But not in the new America where everyone wants to depend on the government. The government can not do anything right much less run a car company. This move by the government is illegal but nothing can be done about it. The bond holders are the ones to get screwed, now lets see if any other companies can get any bond money now that the government has done this.
This is just the start of the down fall of our country. Way to many lazy and stupid people live here now. They will not let the bears eat the stupid people any more and keep them weeded out. Just my 2 cents worth.

[Wayne Maybury]

I found this article to be very interesting but it is quite long.

Wayne

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?p...d=ao0Me6MBXFAY

[Ron61]

Wayne,

Now that it is official and GM is declaring bankruptcy and the Govt. and Canada are taking over, are you going to get your share of it? So far today I have read 3 different articles on it and they agree for the most part but I did notice some differences in just what each seems to think is going to happen. I guess between the Govt. the union, and GM Canada or whatever they are going to call it, there will be a new type car developed and that will then replace everything. I just wish the dam unions weren't so greedy and they could have resolved this without the Govt. getting into private business.
On a smaller note, the city of Redding is now firing more than half of their employees because the union thinks it is better to have most of their people out of work than to forgo their big pay raises and benefits. This area would easily qualify as a poverty area now and the union can't see that it is better to have a job and make a living than to have no work and lose everything.

Ron

[What'saCobra?]

Don't be. BO is only trying to return all the big company's to their "rightful owners". He will let us know what kind of car to order through the media.

Don't worry about the law, he owns it.
Don't worry about the press, he owns it.
Don't worry about the judges, he owns them.
Don't worry about the TV media, he owns them, except for FOX.
Only talk radio has a chance in correctly informing perhaps 30 or 40 million people a week about what is really happening, but they will not believe it because the other media will not publish any confirmation of the facts.
Until it is too late.

Take a big breath and suck it in. We've earned it.

Prepare for 2010. Some of us will not go quietly...

[Jamo]

Whatsa

I removed the long cut/paste. Use links only. This has been discussed numerous times.

Do not respond...

Lounge Czar

[427sharpe]

Originally Posted by Dan40

That's the bad side of the coin. In bankruptcy, the union workers would take serious pay and benefit cuts. That will please them so much that there won't be any warranty work necessary. They will all do their work to perfection.
Unless the coin has a bad side and a worse side........................

Uhh..I haven't seen any 'serious pay and benefit' cuts, but I do see the union ending up owning 20% of the new (taxpayer funded) company while secured bond holders get fu**ed.
And after BoBo and crew get done, I am sure the union boys will line up for more handouts/strikes/etc...
I suppose you have seen the 'brains' behind this whole operation...a 31 year old fresh out of grad school who has never held a job in his life.

[Jamo]

Originally Posted by 427sharpe

Uhh..I haven't seen any 'serious pay and benefit' cuts, but I do see the union ending up owning 20% of the new (taxpayer funded) company while secured bond holders get fu**ed.
And after BoBo and crew get done, I am sure the union boys will line up for more handouts/strikes/etc...
I suppose you have seen the 'brains' behind this whole operation...a 31 year old fresh out of grad school who has never held a job in his life.

You're seeing what I'm seeing. The bondholders...the folks that invest in the industrial machine that creates jobs in this country...were shafted big time. Where in the hell does DC think they're going to get investment capital in the future?

...tax dollars.

[What'saCobra?]

A friend tells me that the grad student didn't finish the grad program. Sort of like AlGore's great intellectual reputation being soiled by his failure to finish divinity school.

How are those infernal combustion engines disappearing from the market for ya', Al? Only 1-3 years to go and they should be all gone.

Just like Al's global warming theory.

And Al? Still cuttin' coupons from the old man's Arm & Hammer (or was that sickle and hammer) bonds?

[427sharpe]

While BoBo can bully the banks (beholden via TARP), he will make the most of the opportunity. Is it any wonder that the Treasury is so reluctant to take back funds from the banks? Treasury knows that when the banks are in the open, BoBo and his crew have a LOT less leverage on the business markets. Of course, they can still play with the Required Reserve Ratio...make the banks susceptible to takeovers with the whisk of a pen to confront those pesky capitalists. These are dark days, and it aint midnight yet

[Wayne Maybury]

Originally Posted by Jamo

You're seeing what I'm seeing. The bondholders...the folks that invest in the industrial machine that creates jobs in this country...were shafted big time. Where in the hell does DC think they're going to get investment capital in the future?

...tax dollars.

While the bondholders got screwed, what about the old shareholders? They really got shafted. While much of the old stock was held by institutional investors, some was held by everyday people that invested their retirement savings in GM. Those investments are virtually worthless.

The buring question is what now happens to Ford? The governments have bailed out GM and to a lesser extent, Chrysler. Does this now not put Ford at a disadvantage when it was the only one that deserved to survive?

Wayne