Big change, just in the past week! Thank you all! (That's not "Y'all.")

Tennessee Republican Senator Corker is gunning for the UAW, but the UAW already has provided gigantic concessions, not just recently... over the past couple decades.

He and his fancy-haircut Confederate pals are insisting on their circa-1969 cartoon Neocon preconceptions. The real world passed them by decades ago. They are starting a new Civil War, just because they can. They are not leaders.

Where are their retirement savings? Are they buying cannon-ball and bayonet stock? What was the name of that Athenian demogogue who took over after Pericles died? The guy who ran Athens into the ground? What did a Classical Greek Southern accent sound like?

The subsidies that go to foreign automakers are not from the federal government but state governments trying to lure jobs to their states. It's not the big 3 are intrinsically ineligible for these subsidies, but rather because they can't because they already have factories in the north (and union contracts for that matter). Every industry is exposed to these type of competitive attacks, and I don't like any of them. They only serve to move jobs rather than create new ones. Everyone would be better off being a little less provincial (intra and extra US)

That said, the the problem of the big 3 is not a problem of subsidies. Their problem are far deeper, resulting from year of mismanagement. The other fact is that we may have to accept that it longer makes sense that the U.S. have three automakers given the global economy. Might two be enough? I imagine the surviving two might emerge stronger. There's clearly not enough demand for thee automakers, but two could fill that need profitably. Isn't that better than just spiraling down the drain?

Some of the most outspoken GOP senators against giving government money for the Big 3 also have large foreign auto manufacturing plants in their home states lured there by healthy subsidies. I'm sure this is just a coincidence.

You are absolutely right. It has nothing to do with mileage standards. The Big 3 could start producing nothng but the Toyota Prius tomorrow and they would still lose money. UAW employees make $40/hour plus another $15/hour worth of sweetheart (no deductible) health benefits to stand on an assembly line and attach the next windshield using a robotic arm. It's ridiculous and so is the idea that millions will be out of work if they file Chapter 11. Let's not forget that pratically every one of the U.S. auto parts suppliers filed for bankruptcy a few years ago - the world didn't come to an end. These companies continue to operate while they reoganize. They are given the opportunity to get rid of union contracts that make no sense.

The subsidies that go to foreign automakers are not from the federal government but state governments trying to lure jobs to their states.

As if you know anything about it.

Ever hear of a federal corporate tax break? That's a subsidy. There's three or four major categories just at the federal level.

Next time try doing some research.

UAW employees make $40/hour plus another $15/hour worth of sweetheart (no deductible) health benefits to stand on an assembly line and attach the next windshield using a robotic arm.

UAW line workers start at $15 an hour. A lot less than you're being paid to disseminate disinformation, but then, Toyota and the state of Alabama do pay some people very well.

OK, so I'm watching the big 3 thing going on. Then, today via http://digg.com I came across this article at Forbes by Dan Gerstein: http://www.forbes.com/2008/12/09/chrysler-cerberus-bailout-oped-cx_dg_1210gerstein.html

The article refers to its ownership, the Cerberus is looking for a handout to "salvage Cerberus' investment in Chrysler"--nothing about the company...UNBELIEVABLE!!!

But nobody ever expected the whole economy to collapse in a matter of weeks. We thought we had a couple more years, and we have been on track for a great comeback.

The Neocon Republicans caused/allowed our spectacular instant economic collapse. Not the auto companies.

Sounds to me like our first mistake was not letting the southern states go back in the 1860s. Now we have southern Republicans systematically destroying the entire US economy mainly to give foriegn automakers in their own district a competative advantage. It isn't really even helping their own States. If they are run just like Japanese companies in the tech industry these plants pay no State or Federal income tax whatsoever because they recost foriegn made parts every month to ensure that the assembly plants themselves never turn a profit. Add to that the fact that they pay much lower wages with fewer benefits than union shops and all you have there are parasites syphoning wealth out of dumbass southern states that are too clueless to notice. Can you say Walmarting?

I'm sure this is just a coincidence.

It's no coincidence at all. Toyota and BMW both get federal tax breaks and "job-development" grants, courtesy of southern Republican senators.

So far I've counted 48 separate initiatives like these. US workers are paying the government to turn them into wage slaves - not counting the programs subsidizing actual job exports and imports of foreign workers.

Americans are woefully ignorant about these issues. People riot would riot over them in Europe, but Americans are mushrooms, kept in the dark and fed bullshit.

...that the Repugnant Party has been completely hijacked by a slavish devotion to an anti-union, pro-CEO, small government, take care of the big donors while screwing the little guy ideology.

I mean, after a thundering beat-down in the general election, the embarrassment of the circular firing squad taking place in the right wing media thanks to barely-coherent types like Limbaugh, Malkin, the wackos behind the "produce a birth certificate now or vacate the office" conspiracy lunacy, and the ongoing belly laugh that is Sarah Palin...after all that, don't you think the GOP leaders would be saying, "Hey, maybe this has all been a repudiation of what we stand for and how we conduct our affairs in the public forum. Perhaps we'd better reinvent our party."?

Apparently not. Apparently, the Republitards would rather settle scores and spew more rage. Well, guys who are hoping for a reversal of fortune in 2010, America is watching. Rahm Emanuel is keeping score. You think anybody's going to forget who dropped a turd into the pool when one of the country's biggest employers was about to take down one million jobs, all while you were throwing cash bouquets to AIG and Citigroup?

Keep digging, GOP. Two more years of shoveling and you might just reach Hell, where you can join Jerry Falwell and Dick Cheney, aka Satan.