Mitch Albom * Free Press Columnist

[Jo McDonald]

 

  He raises all the questions I have thought of
and wondered why we haven't heard it long and loud.  It
seems like a grudge against the Big 3 and no one is
responding.
Why can't our Washington elected officials believe in
us???

If I had the floor at the auto rescue talks...

BY MITCH ALBOM
FREE PRESS COLUMNIST
OK. It's a fantasy. But if I had five minutes in front
of Congress last week, here's what I would've said:

Good morning. First of all, before you ask, I flew
commercial. Northwest Airlines. Had a bag of peanuts for
breakfast. Of course, that's Northwest, which just
merged with Delta, a merger you, our government, approved --
and one which, inevitably, will lead to big bonuses for
their executives and higher costs for us. You seem to be OK
with that kind of business.

Which makes me wonder why you're so against our kind of
business? The kind we do in Detroit. The kind that gets your
fingernails dirty. The kind where people use hammers and
drills, not keystrokes. The kind where you get paid for
making something, not moving money around a board and
skimming a percentage.

You've already given hundreds of billions to banking
and finance companies -- and hardly demanded anything. Yet
you balk at the very idea of giving $25 billion to the
Detroit Three. Heck, you shoveled that exact amount to
Citigroup -- $25 billion -- just weeks ago, and that place
is about to crumble anyhow.

Does the word "hypocrisy" ring a bell?

Protecting the home turf?

Sen. Shelby. Yes. You. From Alabama. You've been
awfully vocal. You called the Detroit Three's leaders
"failures." You said loans to them would be
"wasted money." You said they should go bankrupt
and "let the market work."

Why weren't you equally vocal when your state handed
out hundreds of millions in tax breaks to Mercedes-Benz,
Hyundai, Honda and others to open plants there? Why not
"let the market work"? Or is it better for Alabama
if the Detroit Three fold so that the foreign companies --
in your state -- can produce more?

Way to think of the nation first, senator.

And you, Sen. Kyl of Arizona. You told reporters:
"There's no reason to throw money at a problem
that's not going to get solved."

That's funny, coming from such an avid supporter of the
Iraq war. You've been gung ho on that for years. So how
could you just sit there when, according to the New York
Times, an Iraqi former chief investigator told Congress that
$13 billion in U.S. reconstruction funds "had been lost
to fraud, embezzlement, theft and waste" by the Iraqi
government?

That's 13 billion, senator. More than half of what the
auto industry is asking for. Thirteen billion? Gone?
Wasted?

Where was your "throwing money at a problem that's
not going to get solved" speech then?

Watching over the bankers?

And the rest of you lawmakers. The ones who insist the auto
companies show you a plan before you help them. You've
already handed over $150 billion of our tax money to AIG.
How come you never demanded a plan from it? How come when
AIG blew through its first $85 billion, you quickly gave it
more? The car companies may be losing money, but they can
explain it: They're paying workers too much and selling
cars for too little.

AIG lost hundred of billions in credit default swaps --
which no one can explain and which make nothing, produce
nothing, employ no one and are essentially bets on
failure.

And you don't demand a paragraph from it?

Look. Nobody is saying the auto business is healthy. Its
unions need to adjust more. Its models and dealerships need
to shrink. Its top executives have to downsize their own
importance.

But this is a business that has been around for more than a
century. And some of its problems are because of that,
because people get used to certain wages, manufacturers get
used to certain business models. It's easy to point to
foreign carmakers with tax breaks, no union costs and a
cleaner slate -- not to mention help from their home
countries -- and say "be more like them."

But if you let us die, you let our national spine collapse.
America can't be a country of lawyers and financial
analysts. We have to manufacture. We need that
infrastructure. We need those jobs. We need that security.
Have you forgotten who built equipment during the world
wars?

Besides, let's be honest. When it comes to blowing
budgets, being grossly inefficient and wallowing in debt,
who's better than Congress?

So who are you to lecture anyone on how to run a
business?

Ask fair questions. Demand accountability. But knock it off
with the holier than thou crap, OK? You got us into this
mess with greed, a bad Fed policy and too little regulation.
Don't kick our tires to make yourselves look better.
  ---------------

Contact MITCH ALBOM at 313-223-4581 or
malbom@freepress.com. Catch "The Mitch Albom Show"
5-7 p.m. weekdays on WJR-AM (760)

[pam]

Well the Detroit 3s last hope is Presiident Bush..........probly ought to start plannin the funeral huh?

Everybody has been predictin a depression......here it comes...Did anybody hear the mayor of Lansing this mornin? Dude called a spade a spade didn't he?

[redcliffsw]

The government is not supposed to be regulating the economy and deciding who survives and who does not. 
Stimulus?  How do they know so much - only because some of us want to believe that stuff and "get the money"? 
Already seems like there's a lot of 'em on the receiving the gov't checks.

Hopefully, there will be no bailout.

I'd rather read "Not Yours To Give" than to hear these guys talk themselves into going along with a bailout.

http://www.fee.org/publications/notes/notes/notYoursToGive.asp

[jerry wagner]

The government is not supposed to be regulating the economy and deciding who survives and who does not. 

I see, having reviewed the constitution, which I already knew by memory, just to make sure, where does it say that Congress can't appropriate funds or regulate interstate trade and commerce?  Furthermore, doesn't it have the power to enact laws when necessary and proper to ensure proper execution of these authorities?

I'd rather read "Not Yours To Give" than to hear these guys talk themselves into going along with a bailout.

http://www.fee.org/publications/notes/notes/notYoursToGive.asp

I wouldn't.  This reading of the constitution by this individual is exceptionally narrow minded and would ensure a functionless-government.  However, should you agree with this interpretation, despite the fact that to list all of Congress' powers would partake of a prolixity of a legal code and could scarcely be embraced by the human mind, that is your choice.

[redcliffsw]

Perhaps your memory of the Constitution is not the same as that intended by the founding fathers.

I'd rather be "narrow-minded" by rejecting the choices of socialism.
 

 

[redcliffsw]

............. today's Americans have given them unlimited powers.

http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=29839