Posted on 11/10/2008 1:06:10 PM PST by Fred
As President-elect Obama prepares to enter the White House, he must ponder what to do about the world's trouble spots: Iran, Iraq, North Korea, the Caucasus. And, oh yes, Detroit.
On Friday, General Motors and Ford announced more multibillion-dollar losses in the third quarter; closely held Chrysler doesn't publicly report results. When GM, which seems in the worst shape, was 45 minutes late releasing its results, rumors spread that a bankruptcy filing was imminent. It wasn't, but the company says it could run out of cash in the first half of next year. Make that the first quarter if the current cash bleed continues. GM is lobbying furiously for emergency federal assistance, with Ford and Chrysler close behind.
Let's assume that the powers in Washington -- the Bush team now, the Obama team soon -- deem GM too big to let fail. If so, it's also too big to be entrusted to the same people who have led it to its current, perilous state, and who are too tied to the past to create a different future.
In return for any direct government aid, the board and the management should go. Shareholders should lose their paltry remaining equity. And a government-appointed receiver -- someone hard-nosed and nonpolitical -- should have broad power to revamp GM with a viable business plan and return it to a private operation as soon as possible.
That will mean tearing up existing contracts with unions, dealers and suppliers, closing some operations and selling others, and downsizing the company. After all that, the company can float new shares, with taxpayers getting some of the benefits. The same basic rules should apply to Ford and Chrysler.
These are radical steps, and they wouldn't avoid significant job losses. But there isn't much alternative besides simply letting GM collapse
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Sounded pretty good until this part.
The Obama Policy: If we bail you out, we own ya!
They need cheap oil. Everything else is garbage. This should have been pushed in MI by Palin.
The management team from Trabant is tanned, rested, and ready to take over!
UAW chief urges $25 bln in U.S. auto health care support (Union bailout-payback for $400,000,000)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2127523/posts
Why doesn’t everyone that filed taxes get shares in these companies?
My plan for the car companies:
If you decide to buy from an American car company, the gov. send you a check for $5k-$10k to help make the payments or for a down payment.
This would go a long way to moving their inventory and at least the UAW doesn’t get their hands on the cash.
yep...why throw good money at a company that’s held hostage by Unions. Their costs are more than their revenues...simple as that.
But the Unions OWN the Dems...so a bailout will happen.
i know. On this issue, the Union leaders and Corporate leaders are arm in arm.
“tear up existing union contracts...” Yeah, that’s gonna fly with the bi-sexual, muslim, crackhead in the White House.
Why would shareholders ever approve such a plan?
Under the WSJ - Big Government Bailout shareholders get d*ck. Under bankruptcy we might do better. And, they are not bankrupt yet.
I still say tough love. The management of the 1950s knew how to deal with this. Close everything for a few months starting immediately. Layoffs, layoffs, layoffs. Let the dealers sell out of invetory. Close over expenseive factories permanantly. Sell divisions off.
And, importantly, break the unions. Leave the most unionized workers on layoff until their contracts expire.
We need good old top-hatted capitalism here, and instead we have the leading (so-called) capitalist rag calling for confiscation of private property by Obama. What a joke.
At least in bankruptcy court: 1) over generous pensions can be reduced. 2) union contracts can be voided and 3) there is some hope that shareholders get something in the end.
Capitalism is harsh - it creates winners and losers. Liberals don’t like harsh; they want everyone to feel good. Airlines go bankrupt on a regular basis and we survive. Worldcom went bye-bye and the government said no to an Enron lifeline. We lived through it and became stronger. Medling by politicians does not all the market to cull the herd.
Capitalism on the way up, socialism/fascism on the way down.
The definition of a free-market is NOT a market in which every business in every sector always profits. If you are not free to both succeed and fail, then you are not free at all. Being big does not change that. $2 trillion in corporate welfare was enough of a mistake - let the automakers fail, let all of the union-infested companies go down in flames. The first to die can be cannibalized by those remaining; if gaps open in certain market segments, unburdened automakers like Toyota and Honda will be more than willing to fill them.
Distorting the auto market is exactly what will stifle innovation, lead to higher consumer prices (whether by taxes, regulations, or the fostering of corporate incompetence), and bring us that much closer to a socialist/fascist economy.
What a nightmare world we live in.
Company is run into the ground by stupid management.
They decided on products that no one wants to buy.
Why bail them out? How will this teach management to
make smarter decisions in the future?
How can the bailout process possibly be fair?
Who decides what lives and what dies?
No, however painful letting GM to its own future
is only fair to the future Henery Ford and Lee Iacocca
types out in the world.
Rewarding serial failure is stupid.
Let’s start a list of all the sectors of our economy that will be nationalized under Abamo:
1. Education (oops already is nationalized)
2. Healthcare (oops almost all of it is nationalized and with the Baby Boomers about to all go on Medicare, it will almost be complete)
3. Oil & Natural Gas (a la Hugo Chavez) and if the Feds control the oil fields in Alaska and won’t allow drilling, that’s a form of nationalization
4. Military (an example of rightful nationalization
according to the Constitution)
5. The Banking and Mortgage Industry
6. Automotive Manufacturing when their bailout comes
7. The State of California will be nationalized when they go bankrupt and we bail them out
8. The State of new York when they go bankrupt and we bail them out.
9. Could we nationalize the production of food (oh my mistake, we already have federal subsidies for farms)
What am I missing?????
Where is the authority in the Constitution for this? Thanks for playing.
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