Look, it makes no difference to me how the Big Three auto bosses got to Washington. I would have been fine with it if they plane-pooled. Making a seven-hour drive from Detroit to Washington was kind of a slog. I guess that if they made the trip in hybrids, they found out how well their new products worked on a trip.
It’s satisfying to bash the auto companies. They want us to bail them out after they dragged their feet for years on developing vehicles that weren’t gasoline-dependent. Sure, they claim they started modernizing three years ago. That was only about 27 years too late.
Fine. But the current economic crisis certainly wasn’t all their fault. It wasn’t entirely the reason people aren’t buying cars. The financial services industry bears a large part of the blame, but as we’ve said in this space before, all of us enjoyed a prolonged period of avoiding reality. The auto companies were not first in line for the handouts, and the farther back you are in line, the harder time you have.
The problem is, the bailout money handed out so far to stabilize the economy has come with almost no strings. If you’re a college student, you get into financial trouble, and your parents bail you out, don’t you think they would demand to know how you were going to spend their bailout money – if they gave you any say-so at all?
I don’t think we should let the auto companies fold up. There are few things more American than the auto industry – we started it, and we should be leading it. But if any bailout money goes to the auto companies, even in the form of loans, it ought to come with serious conditions. Forcing the auto executives to drive instead of fly doesn’t accomplish anything substantive. While I’m the first to tell you that symbolism is important, it’s not substance.
There, now I’ve said it.
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