Polls show that a majority of Americans oppose taxpayer dollars being used to support the Detroit 3 bailout. The bill is facing oppostion in the Senate, and it is not clear whether it will pass, even with administration support. In my dreams, America...

I don't think government is the answer to the problems, and government intervention is likely not going to help correct the roblems within the industry. I think in the end some people will lose their jobs, some people will lose their business, but just handing the industry billions of dollars isn't going to make them actually evaluate and reorganize in a way that fixes the problems.

A breakup could mean smaller companies, more specialized makers, and plants running ... even if they aren't be-everything-to-everybody. Take Saturn for instance. I thought they had real possibilities as GM's "small car brand." For a variety of reasons (including pressure from Saturn dealers an other GM dealers) they made Saturn what everyone else was .. an "everything" brand. Small cars, minivans, suvs ...

Another way to look at it is that in the early 20th century the US had many, many, auto brands. They were amalgamated into the big 3 titans. Maybe some disamalgamation is in order.

The creative part of the destruction should be right-sized US brands.

Could you expand on that, odograph? I'm not sure what you mean or how it relates.

But still we have the globalization story beneath it all:

Sony to Close Last US TV Factory

Television manufacturing is scheduled to end at the plant by February 2009 after which Sony will supply the U.S. market from its factory in Baja, Mexico. The plant will close completely in March 2010 when the TV and Blu-ray Disc repair and U.S. east-coast logistics operations are also ended.

It would be a good story if quality US jobs came out of a bankruptcy restructuring ... but we seem to be taking a gamble that US workers will maintain their elite position on their merits, rather than simply historic access to health, wealth, and education.

As I see it the problem we are facing is that for the last eight years our economy hasn't been creating enough jobs and the jobs that have been created have been very dependent on the government since many of them have been government jobs or jobs in the government's handmaiden industries, education and healthcare. The number of jobs created has barely kept up with natural increase, if that.

This year alone nearly a million and a half net jobs have been lost. We haven't created that many net new jobs over the period of the last twelve years. What mechanism will enable us to create that many new jobs?

Is their an actual plan, idea, or hallucination of how the Big 3 will ever return to breaking even much less make a profit?

I refuse to support an auto bailout when the CEOs, in times of life-and-death for their companies, wasted all that time driving to Washington D.C. They should come back to the Capitol by public air, demonstrating the seriousness of the occasion. Or maybe they should crawl from Detroit on their hands and knees.

They should have shown real commitment... and bicycled.

I don't know; all I know is Congress seems to be attuned only to the theatrical presentation of the request for tribute.

Add the two together, and you get the true hourly compensation of Detroit’s unionized work force: roughly $55 an hour. It’s a little more than twice as much as the typical American worker makes, benefits included. The more relevant comparison, though, is probably to Honda’s or Toyota’s (nonunionized) workers. They make in the neighborhood of $45 an hour, and most of the gap stems from their less generous benefits.

Doesn't seem like bad work,