[Setec Astronomy]

I am a GM guy forever, and I have no sympathy for them (or the other "big two"). In the last 20 years (since the first round of CAFE requirements expired) I have improved the insulation in my house, bought high-efficiency HVAC and appliances (when they needed replacing), replaced lighting that remains on for long periods with high-efficiency bulbs, and generally done things bearing in mind that energy is valuable and the cost of it will only go up. Why? Because it is the right thing and will save me money in the long run.

In the meantime, the GM cars I have purchased have gotten bigger and less fuel-efficient (buying comparable models), although they got much more powerful. Honda is not hurting so badly because they did the right thing and for the most part kept their cars reasonably sized and reasonably powered, and I was reading refused to put a V8 in their big pickup.

GM, Ford, Chrysler and Jeep found many years ago that by gussying up their '60's truck designs by putting in carpeting, leather, and stereos, they could sell an archaic design that was exempt from fuel economy, safety, and emissions requirements (their Gross Vehicle Weight excluded them from those regulations, regulations which exempted heavy trucks because they were special purpose, small percentage of vehicles, but grew to 50% of the market), built on existing tooling, for $50K and make huge profits. This is just a bit too much like the Wall St. firms with their mortgage derivatives, which they knew were the "wrong thing" but were too greedy and there was too much money to be made.

IMO a large part of today's problems stem from the fact that our economy doesn't produce tangible goods in the way we once did. Our trade balance is horrible, and many of the most profitable companies deal in intangible goods (software, entertainment, financial). It's pretty hard to bootleg a car. One of the ways we could get out of our debt problem and our energy problem is from a robust manufacturing infrastructure that could make products that people wanted to buy that could be exported, and products that could make us more energy independent. We have ignored manufacturing and tangible goods and lost it first to countries with lower labor rates, and now because we have largely lost our ability to design unique or best-in-class products. One only needs to look at the new presidential helicopter which is being made by a European consortium; it is reputedly the best helicopter in the world, but if I was a congressman approving that, I'd have to ask "why doesn't the US make the best helicopter in the world anymore?" How can the president of the country whose manufacturing might and ingeniuty won WWII and put a man on the moon fly in a foreign helicopter?

But back to your original question. If we are going to bail out the Wall St. firms when their greedy executives got hoist by their own petard, then we should definitely bail out the auto companies, who at least represent an infrastructure that can be leveraged in a time of crisis (like WWII or NOW). Let's hope that the end result is the end of this callous big-company managment greed, and a return to the normal greed...lol.