Well, the way I look at it it's either today or a few months down the road with the taxpayers out ~$14 Billion. Although I don't think drawing comparisons to the Great Depression is at all warranted (yet at least).

If you are concerned about the long-term success of these companies, bankruptcy looks like the only option.

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Yea, this is getting scary.

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The GOP just wanted to finish the job Georgie boy started by bringing this country to its knees. If there is anything the Republican party is good at, it is showing everyone every conceivable way to screw things up. I give them credit for that.

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You're right... its the Republican's faults that 3 privately owned corporations were so horribly mismanaged that they needed to come to the government for "bailout" money.

These companies deserve everything they are about to get. I can't wait till we have someone besides good ole' George and the Republicans to blame for everything from out car battery being dead to our car companies being run into the ground.

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Since, of course, the right course of action is to spend money we don't have.
But think of the jobs, right? Once these companies go bankrupt, all of these factories will be sucked in to a black hole and we'll never see those jobs again. No, their assets won't be bought up, and there is no possible way that the workers could go back to work on the exact same assembly line. That's just not possible.

Wait a second, we can afford this! All we have to do is go to the Chinese national treasury and apply for a 0% down Alt-A loan. We can easily afford the entry teaser rate.

ugh....

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I love all of these Republicans who complain about 15 billiion to save our auto industry but didn't utter one word about wasting 1 trillion in Iraq in a war that was based on a pile of lies. Typical.

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CH 11 bankruptcy does not mean they go out of business. It does not mean everybody loses their job, although some may depending upon how the restructuring goes. It means they restructure while they continue to operate. The airlines do it all the time.

In fact, over time, this could be good news for GM and bad news for Ford, provided Ford stays out of bankruptcy. If GM restructures correctly, they will come out of bankruptcy stronger, with some new structural advantages Ford will not have, since Ford will have never proceeded through bankruptcy.

Of course, if customers refuse to buy from GM because of fear, then Ford will clean up the market and gain marketshare.

In a sense, I am glad this fell apart. I don't like the idea of the government telling companies how to run their affairs, including what telling them what the workers wages should be. The wage issue is what caused the bill to fail.

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Mulally may already have accomplished enough restructuring to avoid a Ch. 11. I think that Ford saw the abyss in time, and mortgaged the whole shebang to have enough money to make it across to the other side.

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I think GM will go first. Nardelli & Co. will grovel at Carlos Ghosn's feet for a merger or buyout, which probably won't be too hard. After all, if Nissan wants to stay in the full-size truck market after 2010, they need the Ram.

Ford will probably be OK, but less so than they would have been with the ability to draw on the credit line they had asked for.

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Several things will happen:
1. All Michigan reps. and sens. lose their jobs.
2. YAW blames Washington
3. The Auto industry panics, sells all their unused stock at a loss to raise cash.
4. Ford pulls through fine, Dodge and Jeep pare down, Chrysler dies, Saturn Dies, Pontiac dies, Buick and Caddy merge, GMC dies, Chevy lives
5. plants begin to de-unionize
6. The Volt, Dodge EV, and more Ford Hybrids go into production
7. 2025: Big 3 become semi-solvent, Toyota begins losing marketshare

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So, you believe that the US Senate should tell Americans how much money they can make?

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The UAW did kill it! They played a HUGE role in bringing GM and Ford to it's knees by their unrealistic contracts (I could care less about Chrysler).

The government isn't telling anyone how much to make, but fair is fair. If you want to set your own salary, get a college education and wear a white collar. No disrespect, but in all fairness, their work does not justify their contracts in the least bit.

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UAW - keeps bleeding GM. All other stake holders else agreed to take over 50% cuts but the UAW wont agree to take a cut in 2009 to get equal pay as Honda, Toyota, and other auto workers.to to get equal pay as

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That's right! Keep demonizing the unions. If it weren't for them, us Blue Collar folks would be working 12 hrs. a day, 7 days a week, for a paycheck that would require the U.S. government to raise the Welfare benefit amount by a significant margin and allow all who are not White Collar to receive Food Stamps!! How moronic is it to think that White Collar folks would have THEIR jobs long without Blue Collar folks to work their butts off and bring home the bacon? The fact is; we don't want to work the hours they do in Japan or China. We don't want to work for the wages they do in these countries. Not because we are lazy, but because this is America, where a better standard of living is expected. Why should we be forced to become like a third world country in order to keep our Auto Industry? It makes no sense to me other than the fact that the class warfare is alive and well, thanks to the Republicans; Not the UAW!

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