"Establish a new fund that will enable the government to back warranties issued by G.M. and Chrysler."

Let Obama guarantee warranties! I'm tired of guaranteeing everybody else's freakin paycheck, job, bonus, and future. Who's guaranteeing mine?

The average UAW workers makes about $100,000 a year with overtime! Do you really think they regard themselves as "blue collar?" Hell, no they don't. And they vote Republican more than then vote Democrat too, by the way. Let the GOP bail them out.

Some dude approached me for spare change yesterday. I told him to see Obama. He's passing it out left and right I'm sure there's a few quarters left for him.

Looks like the rich and the very poor benefit the most from the Obama-Rama Economic Mess.

In the future we'll be based on hemp and sunshine. Industry is evil.

that the President who is ramping up in Afghanistan (and keeping gays out of the military) needs GM and Chrysler. Chrysler owns Jeep, a huge military contractor and GM gets billions in military contracts.

Losing these 2 companies would mean that our nation would become dependent on other countries for our military vehicles. That could never be said about AIG and Citi.

after Chrysler damn near ruined Daimler, they now want to try destroy Fiat?

Somebody should take them over, and destroy that desastrous corporate culture and replace it with something that actually works.

and it extends not just all the way into Washington, but into the new administration as well.

The big NAFTA "free" traders, Summers and Rubin, And their boss, slick Willy, sold us the line that we would indeed lose jobs with the enactment of NAFTA, but that they would be offset with new jobs that would arise after government supported training.

Training for what?, we can now fairly ask.

As for free trade, the term is a mockery of itself. Try to export an American made product into our trading partner countries and see how far you get. They have erected, make that contrived, countless trade barriers that make it impossible, so that now, the only solution is to respond in kind.

Making matters worse are the Japanese auto manufacturers who claim fairness by making cars in the U.S. They contrive (successfully) to export profits, making their U.S. operations free of U.S. corporate income tax. They do this by mandating that all drive trains and drive train components be made in Japan. The Japanese parent sells the components at grossly inflated prices, thus exporting profits from the U.S. operation back to Japan, without having to pay corporate income tax. Nice little scam, and D.C. is fully aware, but apparently unconcerned. If you think D.C. is concerned, tell me who has spoken out about this scam. Name one. I'm waiting.

all obama has to do to save gm and chrysler is to eliminate the unions and their wages and benefits which are nearly double the total compensation that toyota, honda and nissan workers receive in America. the toyota, honda and nissan workers also don't deliberately sabotage their cars when they have a dispute like gm and chryler workers do.

at gm the unions decide what cars get built and for how long each year. they and all their families get medical benefits for life. they have better perks than congress. the $70 per hour pay that many detroit auto workers receive which sounds high does include all of their benefits and perks.

for never having to make a decision in their entire lives, the workers at gm and chrysler have it far better than any auto executive. we should just let our auto industry simply vanish and let them be replaced by a better solution...toyota, honda and nissan.

This is political payback, plain and simple. So far, obama has done very little,( but backtrack), he promised to do if elected. I realize he's only been in office a short while, however, he's showing himself to be just another shallow politician with every day that passes. He's made some bone-head mistakes I never expected. Also, would someone tell his wife the First Lady nor her children should be emblazoned across the tabloids every week. Please

"Sell GM to a chinese automaker"

Wouldn't this necessitate the US switching from blue book values to the little red book?

It would be a win-win situation. The chinese automaker will get GM's technology and market access. GM will get to survive another day and also potentially have a piece of the chinese market. In January more cars were sold in China than in the US for the first time. It's a harbinger for things to come.

Take the aircraft industry or the shipbuilding industries. We should let them fail too. And the food industry - who cares?

Seems like there could be some kind of synergy (sin-energy?) worked out between the auto makers, who for decades fought increasing the mileage standards on vehicles, and the oil companies who continue to reap record multi-billion dollar profits as a result of not increasing the mileage standards.

Just saying.

The union and GM spent too much time negotiating, playing cat and mouse, while their business went down the drain. The market we live in moves too fast to be spending enormous amounts of time negotiating. Unions need to change also, or they will be gone. Time is money, most companies can't spend time pulling people away from their jobs so their union representatives and management can go sit down for hours and hours, days on end, to "play games" while their business is on hold.

If "nothing good" means solid, dependable, well-designed cars that compete with asian brands, you're probably right.

When we see the the revival of the US auto industry it will be new car companies on the cutting edge, not these dinosaurs.

This is the best coverage I have seen so far. Notice he admitted that the failure of leadership extended to WASHINGTON.

In a fair world, one that rewards actual production more than mere manipulation of money, we'd be hearing this from Obama:

"We cannot, we must not, and we will not let our financial industry simply vanish," he said. "But we also cannot continue to excuse poor decisions. And we cannot make the survival of our financial industry dependent on an unending flow of tax dollars. These companies -- and this industry -- must ultimately stand on their own, not as wards of the state."

See? I changed just 2 words and it is sounds sooo much better, and right too.

How can this blinding double-standard escape anyone??? True, the US auto industry has not covered itself in glory, but hey, at least they do make something, rather than just loot other people's wealth. And they employ regular folks and pay them a living wage.

This is simply awful.