Comments on: Ruby-Sachs: Big 3 Bailout Fails

By: J

Tue, 16 Dec 2008 07:46:25 +0000

Yor happy huh? Well Remember how happy you are when countless families, Mothers, Father, Brothers, Sisters, and maybe even a few Life partners are out on the street because they have no jobs. I agree with you, to hell withthe Wall Street bail out but saving the big three would save countless down home blue coller Americans who have no other way to support their family.

Bravo and once again do take solace in your happiness.

By: Melissa G

Melissa G — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 07:29:34 +0000

I am happy that the Federal Government refused to bailout the automakers. I wished they would have done the same with the banks.

Giving tax money to the same greedy and currupt corporate managers who created this mess is NOT the answer.

Letting these types of businesses fail and allowing new businesses to be created and fill the market void is the answer.

I do believe that the government should protect innocent workers who had no say over all this greedy decision making. This would include protecting pensions.

By: drewski

drewski — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 05:13:01 +0000

If there is no bailout, official unemployment in Ohio will probably be well over 10% by Easter, in Michigan 12% or higher. That’s assuming that at least 2 of the 3 stay alive somehow. If any one collapses, I would expect unemployment to be as much as 15% in Ohio and 20% in Michigan. This matters to the rest of the country. First, unemployment is undercounted, and the true un- and underemployment rate has been estimated at running 50% higher than official numbers in good times. Ohio runs out of cash for unemployment benefits at the end of January. Ohio has already petitioned Washington for a loan to cover this.

Senator Corker of Tennessee is about to get a very angry letter from me. I’m a native Tennessean. My family benefitted from TVA. My father, my mother, my father’s two brothers, and my mother’s brother all worked at the plants in Oak Ridge or at ORNL. We didn’t pay for the Interstate highways that helped Nashville boom. Now, Senator Corker wants to lay blame at the foot of the UAW. He can kiss my ass, because Tennessee and all the rest of the South have been milking Uncle Sam since the Depression. States like Ohio paid. My family are far from poor, and it’s largely due to money that came from richer states. All that money helped bring Tennessee into something resembling the 20th century.

Why bail out the Big 3? It’s not about giving them a free pass. It’s the fact that, not only will those of you outside the Rust Belt wind up paying, but there’s a very good chance many parts suppliers will go tits-up too. But they supply the Big 3–yeah, and they also supply Nissan in Tennessee (soon VW too), Toyota in Kentucky, Benz in Hellabama. No parts means no Nissan, no VW, no Benz. Everybody suffers. So either we Americans suck it up and keep and rebuild our manufacturing, or we let it go and let ourselves depend on foreign companies for all our manufactured goods. We will be a vassal state.