What universe do these people live in?
In the run up to the 2004 election, gas spiked upwards...Soros and other manipulation certainly. Then, after Katrina in 2005, these dimwits are suprised that people are buying more economical models? Hello, Mcfly! Of those 28000 layed off, start with the people responsible for model selection.
It is hard to predict the future. Certainly the US consumers did not do that well as they bought gas guzzlers.
However, it is not that hard to be prepared and the car companies should have had competent small cars ready to roll out and they do not. It takes years to design a car and the domestics are not ready. They were not prepared.
Meanwhile Toyota and Honda make sub $15K, 40MPG cars that have waiting lists.