by Mark Silva
We didn't need Newton's third law to predict the reactions today to President Obama's action on the auto industry:
-- The Dow Jones industrial average was down about 250 points this morning, following word that the Obama White House had forced the CEO of General Motors out the door and had given Chrysler Corp. a 30-day ultimatum to marry Fiat if it expects any more federal aid. (Perhaps not so surprising after the 21 percent surge of the past two weeks, and the Dow, Obama suggests, is like a tracking poll.)
-- Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) called Wagoner's "firing" a "sideshow to distract us from the fact that the administration has no progress to announce today.
"The administration is hoping the media and the public will stay focused on Wagoner and fail to notice that negotiations have not progressed since December,'' Corker saidin an issued statement. "The administration is pursuing much of what we pushed for in December, but the delay of several months has increased the severity and sent billions of taxpayer dollars down the drain.
"With sweeping new power, the White House will be deciding which plants will survive and which won't,'' he said, "so in essence, this administration has decided they know better than our courts and our free market process how to deal with these companies... This is a major power grab by the White House on the heels of another power grab from (Treasury) Secretary Geithner who asked last week for the freedom to decide on his own which companies are 'systemically' important to our country and worthy of taxpayer investment and which are not.
"This is a marked departure from the past, truly breathtaking,'' the Tennessee Republican said, "and should send a chill through all Americans who believe in free enterprise. I worry that in one fell swoop we've lost our moral high ground throughout the global community as it relates to chastising other countries that use strong arm tactics to invade on private property rights."
-- Rep. John Dingell, Democrat from Michigan, had a decidedly different point of view: "The president has expressed his confidence in and his commitment to a successful restructuring of and long-term viability plan for General Motors and Chrysler.
"The road ahead is going to be very difficult and painful, although as the president said, there is potential for both companies to emerge from restructuring as stronger, more competitive companies,'' Dingell said. "I share the president's confidence in GM and Chrysler and will go even further and state that I steadfastly believe that both companies are on the verge of emerging from this dark period as industry leaders once again in sales, fuel economy, safety and customer satisfaction.
We must admit, we missed that note of confidence in Chrysler in the president's remarks today, but Dingell suggests:
"The message from the president is clear - there is a lot of work to be done yet.
"The changes at GM are already underway and there will be much more transformation to come,'' Dingell said in his statement. "With Rick Wagoner's departure at the helm of GM, the company will have new leadership and a 'fresh start.'
"Over the next 60 days, everyone at GM - from union workers and retirees, corporate executives, and bondholders - will face many challenges and high-hurdles,'' he said. "However, the progress that GM, especially in its contract talks with the UAW, whose members have already made tremendous sacrifices, shows the company is capable of reaching the demanding goals set forth for them by the Obama Administration.
"The path forward for Chrysler over the next 30 days and beyond is challenging to say the least,'' the Michigan congressman said. "I am, however, optimistic that Chrysler and Fiat can and will reach an agreement that will put the company on-track for viability with a new product line that gives Chrysler the aggressive boost it needs.''
Comments
Given Dingell's wife is on the GM payroll, was this a renewal of his wedding vows?
Posted by: Kenny Bunkport | March 30, 2009 12:43 PM
End of GM , reminds me of Hitler taking over German Industry.
Posted by: Inky | March 30, 2009 1:15 PM
Did anything really change? Some of the same guys making the decisions just changed chairs in the boardroom. Let's make a story about one guy while we postpone the inevitable that GM and or Chrysler are no longer a viable companies, allow the unions to fake concessions, screw the bondholders and pensioners but most of all us taxpayers who have lost all that bailout money. Obama could not announce another bailout because the American folks have had it with bailout mania, are angry, so he just bought some time to let things cool off. A couple of months from now they will try again. Union to big to fail or maybe political payoff? A lot of companies undergo reorganization successfully. Why have we lost confidence in our bankruptcy courts? Politics of disaster continues. Does anyone want more DC influence? Can anyone see how everything the government gets involved in is or becomes "toxic" (taxes, failures in regulation, housing, bailouts, spending, debt, trade, immigration, ad infinitum) except defense and I beginning to have doubts. Happy Monday!
Posted by: bubba Porter | March 30, 2009 1:58 PM
Oh Inky stop it. We're at war for oil.
We need some blankety blank fuel efficient cars.
Posted by: we also need our unions, tho | March 30, 2009 1:58 PM
Wait, so Corker first says that Obama is pursuing much of what he and other Republicans pushed for in December but just delayed, and then proceeds to disagree with it? Sounds like someone's trying to have it both ways and is just playing politics.
And Inky: you need to look up Godwins Rule before you open your mouth again.
Posted by: Joe | March 30, 2009 2:17 PM
Inky, bringing Hitler into this is pathetic. Go to your room!
Posted by: Flo | March 30, 2009 2:34 PM
Not sure about Godwin.
My brother was a guest of Hitler at Stalagluft III.
Adolf casts a rather long shadow.
And seems to have a number of followers right here in USA who surface from time to time.
So some passing reference to him might well be in point.
Didn't Krupp and Baron Thyssen promote Hitler? I'm not sure he "took them over".
Posted by: ornery | March 30, 2009 2:39 PM
I just don't know what is worse. Having the government remove a CEO.......or the fact that a CEO for NINE YEARS has taken his 25 million dollar salary and lost a third of his market share in sales and 98% of the companies stock value.
Posted by: bill r. | March 30, 2009 2:39 PM
Inky, bringing Hitler into this is pathetic. Go to your room!
Posted by: Flo | March 30, 2009 2:34 PM
Flo better study up on your history.
Posted by: Inky | March 30, 2009 3:47 PM
Inky, bringing Hitler into this is pathetic. Go to your room!
Posted by: Flo | March 30, 2009 2:34 PM
Flo better study up on your history.
Posted by: Inky | March 30, 2009 3:47 PM
Don't rush to conclusions Flo. Inky no doubt has his history books out as well as his protractor, secret decoder ring, and ouija board working on it right now. After all...if the republicans can brandish enough words like Socialism, Communism, Hitler....than they seem more patriotic calling for failure for America.
Posted by: bill r. | March 30, 2009 4:11 PM
I don't think there is any similarity, Inky. Companies requesting govt. bailouts can expect conditions attached.
Posted by: Flo | March 30, 2009 4:43 PM
"Inky, bringing Hitler into this is pathetic. Go to your room!"
.
Posted by: Flo | March 30, 2009 2:34 PM
.
Seriously: Why is what Inky said pathetic? When the government stops being the rule maker and/or referee, and actually starts becoming a player in the market, it is time to start worrying. What we are now seeing is unprecedented on this scale. Dragging Hitler into the picture by way of illustration may have been a bit of a stretch, but not by much.
Posted by: John W. | March 30, 2009 5:40 PM
Chrysler and Fiat (Fix It Again, Tony; Feeble Italian Attempt at Technology); how is that going to work?
Fiat has tried to sell cars in this country twice in my memory, left with its tail between its legs both times. GM paid $2 billion to buy into Fiat (I was in Italy at the time, and the Italians were delighted that GM was going to save Fiat) and another two billion to get shut of Fiat once they found out what the company was about. How is a Chrysler-Fiat marriage going to be any better? It's kind of like two one-legged guys holding each other up!
Posted by: DaveB | March 30, 2009 5:52 PM
Flo,
.
Go bakc and look at how many times the flatliners compared conservative to Nazis or Hitler.
.
Posted by: Terry | March 30, 2009 7:44 PM
That explains a lot, Terry. Not. You go back and look if you have time to waste.
Inky should explain how this compares to Nazi Germany, because it does not. It's a big stretch, John W.
Posted by: Flo | March 30, 2009 9:31 PM
Flo,
.
So you denounce all those references your fellow flatliners made comparing Bush and Conservatives to Hilter or Nazis?
Posted by: Terry | March 30, 2009 10:16 PM
* * * * *
Posted by: Flo | March 30, 2009 9:31 PM
.
Go and read "The Road to Serfdom" by F.A. Hayek and discover how it is not a big stretch.
Posted by: John W. | March 31, 2009 2:12 AM
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/03/30/gm-ceo-rick-wagoners-20-m_n_180774.html
And the GM chief walks away with 20 million.
Posted by: lochnessmonster | March 31, 2009 7:16 AM
Terry, I am not a "flatliner" so I have no "fellows" to denounce. But use of Hitler comparisons is lazy and shallow. It might apply to Cheney, though; certainly moreso than in this case. Stretch away, John.
Posted by: Flo | March 31, 2009 8:08 AM
It is lazy, however, this one does have some similarities in the way the Germans nationalized their industries in the 1930s.
.
My point is, the left throws the Nazi and Hiltler word around here a lot more than the conservatives.
.
We see laziness on your part by calling Cheney a Nazi.
Posted by: Terry | March 31, 2009 10:44 AM
* * * * *
Posted by: Flo | March 31, 2009 8:08 AM
..
Flo:
.
Please read “The Road to Serfdom,” by F.A. Hayek. In it, Hayek documents how socialism crept, step by step, into the German political and social systems from the 1880’s until the rise of the Nazi State. You will also learn how this socialism suited the Nazis’ plans because it involved collectivization of the population around a strong central government. It also involved either the nationalization or heavy handed control of industry by the state. Hitler himself declared that industry had to be subservient to the needs of the “Volk” (i.e. the People) in much the same way that the Auto industry and Banks are being made to kowtow to the government. Hayek makes a compelling argument that strong centralization of government, socialism dispensed at the hand of that central government, and the nationalization or rigid control of industry by the State inevitably lead to, and indeed require, a strong central leadership of the kind Germany produced in Hitler. If you can’t see any of this going on today, then you must be wearing your rose colored blinders. It seems to be a popular political and fashion statement today.
Posted by: John W. | March 31, 2009 1:53 PM
I understand the theory of the book, John W. But it is too much theory and premise, and there is little to suggest we are on that road today. Not every baby born white turns out to be a Hitler.
Posted by: Flo | March 31, 2009 3:38 PM
John W, if you think Obama's plans are comparable to the Nazis' plans, then it's your blinders we should be concerned about. Maybe some other example besides Germany would be more satisfactory; or does Hayek not have any others? There's a difference in motive.
Has clarifying the distinction between fascism and socialism really added to most peoples' understanding of what the Obama administration is doing? All this does is drag the specter of Hitler into the conversation. And the problem with Hitler was not his industrial policy--I mean, okay, fine, Hitler's industrial policy bad, right, but I could forgive him for that, you know? The thing that really bothers me about Hitler was the genocide. And I'm about as sure as I can be that Obama has no plans to round up millions of people, put them in camps, and find various creative ways to torture them to death.
Posted by: Flo | March 31, 2009 3:54 PM
“ . . . and there is little to suggest we are on that road today.”
.
Posted by: Flo | March 31, 2009 3:38 PM
.
That is where you are wrong. The rapid tendency toward a strong central government, the trend toward collectivization of the population in everything from social security to health care, and the ever increasing intrusion of the federal government into the market - and now as a player rather than a rule maker or referee - are all very strong signs that we are on that road today. You just don’t care to see what is plain.
.
Worse yet, people today tend to view the government as a positive instrumentality to solve every social ill, rather than the necessary evil as the Founding Fathers viewed it. In which case, there is little reason to believe the trend toward greater centralization and concentration of power will ever abate. The contrary is true. People are clamoring for the federal government to do everything for them. We have the precise mind set as a nation for fascism to rise. And lest we forget, the fact that one may view the current government as benign or even benevolent should not blind anyone to the truth that worse powers can take the reigns of all this power we are concentrating in one place. If we had a Duh’bya once, we can have one again.
Posted by: John W. | March 31, 2009 4:15 PM
A bit of European style social democracy isn't all bad, John W. If you're worried about fascism, then stay alert and prevent it. If they start building concentration camps, let me know. But don't hurt yourself stretching.
Posted by: Flo | March 31, 2009 5:50 PM