Source: $14-Billion Auto Bailout Plan Headed Toward Death in Senate

[bk1983]

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The proposal to loan $14 billion to Detroit's struggling automakers collapsed late Thursday night but the Big Three may get some money anyway.

Bush officials warned wavering GOP senators that if they didn't support the legislation, the White House will likely be forced to tap the Wall Street bailout to lend them money, two Republican congressional officials told CNN earlier.
This is a noteworthy change since the White House and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson have previously refused to use bank bailout funds to help General Motors (GM, Fortune 500), Ford Motor (F, Fortune 500) and Chrysler LLC.

The sources asked not to be named because of the sensitivities of private conversations.

The White House negotiated a deal with Democrats to give Detroit a short term $14 billion loan with strings attached, including a so-called "car czar" charged with helping the companies draw up restructuring plans.

Most Senate Republicans opposed the plan as too weak in terms of focusing long-term viability for the U.S. auto industry.

As part of their full-court press to urge skeptical Republicans to back it, they made clear that if Congress didn't act, the White House would have to step in to save Detroit from collapse with funds from the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), according to the sources familiar with the conversations.

Bank bailout funds could be used for Detroit - Dec. 11, 2008

 

[DavidS]

According to sources close to CNN, if no compromise is reached some of the Wall Street bailout will be used to assist the Big 3..

You mean the one that Bush said no to? It's BS. Wishful thinking by Cooper and Bash. If Bush wanted to baillout GM and Chrysler, he already would have. He would've given them $25 billion months ago to help GM and Chrysler merge. Bush doesn't want one penny used. The $14 billion was going to be from the $25 billion to make the cars more green.

 

[bk1983]

You mean the one that Bush said no to? It's BS. Wishful thinking by Cooper and Bash. If Bush wanted to baillout GM and Chrysler, he already would have. He would've given them $25 billion months ago to help GM and Chrysler merge. Bush doesn't want one penny used. The $14 billion was going to be from the $25 billion to make the cars more green.

Yes the one Bush originally said NO to..

As untarnished as his legacy already is, I am sure he doesn't want to add the failure of the auto industry in the US to the list..

 

[Article 15]

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A $14 billion emergency bailout for U.S. automakers collapsed in the Senate Thursday night after the United Auto Workers refused to accede to Republican demands for swift wage cuts.

The collapse came after bipartisan talks on the auto rescue broke down over GOP demands that the United Auto Workers union agree to steep wage cuts by 2009 to bring their pay into line with Japanese carmakers.

Majority Leader Harry Reid said he hoped President George W. Bush would tap the $700 billion Wall Street bailout fund for emergency aid to the automakers. General Motors Corp. and Chrysler LLC have said they could be weeks from collapse. Ford Motor Co. says it does not need federal help now, but its survival is far from certain.

The White House said it was evaluating its options in light of the breakdown.

$14 billion auto bailout dies in Senate: Financial News - Yahoo! Finance

Does anybody know exactly how big of a pay cut they were asking them to take? The article says it would "bring their pay into line with Japanese carmakers" and I was wondering if anybody had some hard numbers ...

 

[DavidS]

Yes the one Bush originally said NO to..

As untarnished as his legacy already is, I am sure he doesn't want to add the failure of the auto industry in the US to the list..

Again if Bush wanted to do it, he would have done it ages ago and we could've avoided this whole song and dance. Any loan to GM and Chrysler will delay the inevitable. Just the other day GM posted a huge ad saying they were sorry for letting their quality standards down and that they should've done better but they didn't.

Here's a perfect example of how horrible GM is:

The Chevy Volt which is a completely electric car would've debuted at $50,000 MSRP and had a $10,000 dealer markup. In a market where the lower and middle class were struggling earlier this year and may very well struggle next year with gas prices, how the hell are they going to afford a $60,000 car? Plus, the car is so valuable, the insurance company will place high premiums on it. You're talking about $1250 a month with a good interest rate, plus $750 a month in insurance. $2000 a month. That's a hell of a lot more than a lot of poeple's mortgages. We are how many years into this oil crisis and Chevy has yet to come out with a hybrid that actually give good gas mileage??? Their Malibu Hybrid hasn't come out yet and their Tahoe, which is their largest SUV only gets 21 mpg highway in the hybrid mode. It's ridiculous. How long did it take Chevy to catch up to safety standards??

I'm sick and tired of it. Ford is fine. Toyota is fine. Honda is fine. There's your big 3.

 

[bk1983]

$14 billion auto bailout dies in Senate: Financial News - Yahoo! Finance

Does anybody know exactly how big of a pay cut they were asking them to take? The article says it would "bring their pay into line with Japanese carmakers" and I was wondering if anybody had some hard numbers ...

Funny I dont remember these southern republicans asking for a pay cut of the wall street executives. Funny when asking for $14 billion, the blue collar workers must take a pay cut to get the help, yet wall street got $700 billion with no demands for pay cuts..

 

[DiveCon]

Funny I dont remember these southern republicans asking for a pay cut of the wall street executives. Funny when asking for $14 billion, the blue collar workers must take a pay cut to get the help, yet wall street got $700 billion with no demands for pay cuts..

they were wrong then, and right now, but not the way i think they should have been right
they should have opposed BOTH

 

[bk1983]

Again if Bush wanted to do it, he would have done it ages ago and we could've avoided this whole song and dance. Any loan to GM and Chrysler will delay the inevitable. Just the other day GM posted a huge ad saying they were sorry for letting their quality standards down and that they should've done better but they didn't.

Here's a perfect example of how horrible GM is:

The Chevy Volt which is a completely electric car would've debuted at $50,000 MSRP and had a $10,000 dealer markup. In a market where the lower and middle class were struggling earlier this year and may very well struggle next year with gas prices, how the hell are they going to afford a $60,000 car? Plus, the car is so valuable, the insurance company will place high premiums on it. You're talking about $1250 a month with a good interest rate, plus $750 a month in insurance. $2000 a month. That's a hell of a lot more than a lot of poeple's mortgages. We are how many years into this oil crisis and Chevy has yet to come out with a hybrid that actually give good gas mileage??? Their Malibu Hybrid hasn't come out yet and their Tahoe, which is their largest SUV only gets 21 mpg highway in the hybrid mode. It's ridiculous. How long did it take Chevy to catch up to safety standards??

I'm sick and tired of it. Ford is fine. Toyota is fine. Honda is fine. There's your big 3.

What Bush wants to do and what he may have to do are completely different. The job loss possibility is to monumental. Fox news is also reporting that the White House has notified GOP senators that opposed the legislation that money from the $700 billion TARP will be used if congress fails to act.. I guess we have to wait and see..

 

[BaronVonBigmeat]

Why do conservative republicans hate American workers? They praise those who rob and loot at the top, even apologize for them, but when it comes to Americans they become hard nosed social darwinists.

Wait a second, you're the one who wants to give billions to failed corporations, but it's the conservatives who are apologists for the CEO's? What? Conservatives generally want to let incompetent companies fall flat on their faces, taking their CEO's and shareholders with them.

How do you deal with the cognitive dissonance? One minute it's "rawwwrrrr down the kkkorporations", then the next it's "oh wait let's give the huge evil corporations giant infusions of taxpayer cash".

Your plan is the one that will hurt american workers. For every one job you save, you will destroy two others with taxes. Or at least reduce some other workers living standards even further. Yes china and japan subsidize certain manufacturers--but they do so at the cost of weakening whatever industries are being taxed.

 

[Article 15]

He and other Republicans said wages and benefits for employees of Detroit's Big Three should be renegotiated to bring them in line with those paid by Japanese carmakers Toyota, Honda and Nissan in the United States.

Hourly wages for UAW workers at GM factories are about equal to those paid by Toyota Motor Corp. at its older U.S. factories, according to the companies. GM says the average union laborer makes $29.78 per hour, while Toyota says it pays about $30 per hour. But the unionized factories have far higher benefit costs.

GM says its total hourly labor costs are now $69, including wages, pensions and health care for active workers, plus the pension and health care costs of more than 432,000 retirees and spouses. Toyota says its total costs are around $48. The Japanese automaker has far fewer retirees and its pension and health care benefits are not as rich as those paid to UAW workers.

Auto industry bailout plan dies in the Senate - Autos- msnbc.com

 

[Lycurgus]

Chris Dodd stands on the floor and makes threats as the big 3 bail out goes down!

This idiot should be thankful to not only still be in office, but, to not be under facing legal proceedings. What a worthless politician.

No doubt they will get the money at some point, but, good for those who voted no!

 

[editec]

Welcome to day one of the second great American depression, folks.

We'll see how many libertarians are left after five or six years of an economy in total free fall.

Come to think of it maybe we won't.

A lot of us might not be online a year or two from now.

Yeah, folks, it can get that bad, believe me.

 

[NOBama]

According to bloomberg and what I'm watching on c-span right now, they've reached an impasse on the bill and it's going to head to a vote and be rejected by the senate very very soon tonight. if that happens... if the bill is rejected... holy shit watch out below.

Yep, saw it on the late news. Get ready for all the "the sky is falling" posts today. Maybe all those letters, we the people, have been sending to Congress had an impact after all. I doubt it, but just maybe.

 

[Lycurgus]

Whenever I see this hurry up and we have to rush it through shit, to me it means a good old fashioned American Screwing!

 

[DavidS]

For the life of me, I can't understand why they wanted to adjust the wages of workers!! REPUBLICANS?? That's downright socialism - government setting wages for the private sector!

 

[sealybobo]

Yep, saw it on the late news. Get ready for all the "the sky is falling" posts today. Maybe all those letters, we the people, have been sending to Congress had an impact after all. I doubt it, but just maybe.

You don't know what you just did to yourself. Middle class people like you have been sticking it to yourselves now for 30 plus years. Started when you let Reagan bust the air traffic controllers union. Now the guys keeping us safe when we take off and land are low wage workers. No longer is it a professional career job. And why not go along with letting them break the unions. You and I aren't in unions, so what do we care? Besides the fact that all the things you think are your right, like benefits/dental/days off/good pay/overtime/workman's comp/pensions. All those things, Unions got for you.

And take notice that Alabama has all the foreign car companies there, so they stand to win if the Big 3 loses. Take notice that it's Republicans on their way out that voted against the loan. And remember, they didn't mind giving the foreign car companies BILLIONS of your tax dollars inviting them to come to their state. So it doesn't make sense not to give the Big 3 AMERICAN car companies the money they want. They will at least pay the money back, with interest.

So it's all about busting the unions and lowering our wages even more. And still you feel safe from this ever happening to you. Or you feel safe from this affecting your job. Fine. But many of you are wrong.

This is the Robber Baron's flooding the market with cogs. You and I are cogs. When they have more cogs than they need, then they can pay each cog less and they'll have to pay you even less in the future because it's all about maximizing profits. No hard feelings. Suckers.

 

[del]

You don't know what you just did to yourself. Middle class people like you have been sticking it to yourselves now for 30 plus years. Started when you let Reagan bust the air traffic controllers union. Now the guys keeping us safe when we take off and land are low wage workers. No longer is it a professional career job. And why not go along with letting them break the unions. You and I aren't in unions, so what do we care? Besides the fact that all the things you think are your right, like benefits/dental/days off/good pay/overtime/workman's comp/pensions. All those things, Unions got for you.

And take notice that Alabama has all the foreign car companies there, so they stand to win if the Big 3 loses. Take notice that it's Republicans on their way out that voted against the loan. And remember, they didn't mind giving the foreign car companies BILLIONS of your tax dollars inviting them to come to their state. So it doesn't make sense not to give the Big 3 AMERICAN car companies the money they want. They will at least pay the money back, with interest.

So it's all about busting the unions and lowering our wages even more. And still you feel safe from this ever happening to you. Or you feel safe from this affecting your job. Fine. But many of you are wrong.

This is the Robber Baron's flooding the market with cogs. You and I are cogs. When they have more cogs than they need, then they can pay each cog less and they'll have to pay you even less in the future because it's all about maximizing profits. No hard feelings. Suckers.

air traffic controllers earn between $50K and $140K+ per year. you might want to pick a different occupation to show the evil effects of "union busting", ace.

Air Traffic Controllers

 

[editec]

So it's all about busting the unions and lowering our wages even more.

True Dat, blood.

Those who don't get it mostly have not yet felt the lash of FREE TRADE.

They'll get it when some third worlder is writing code instead of them, believe me.

They'll get it when so many Americans are out of work that the lights go out for all of us because there aren't enough people left to keep the system going.

Their shortsighted class arrogance is going to come back and bite them on their treasonous asses soon enough.

They all profess to love America, but they hate their fellow Americans.

tick tock,

Everything people like me have been screaming about on these boards for years is coming to a head, now.

People like you and I Sealy will be proven right, but we won't be taking much pleasure from having been proved right, will we?

We're all in this together, amigo.

Even the people who currently think we're socialists or communist or whatever they're telling themselves, are going to get it soon enough.

Be kind to them.

They were lied and lied and lied to, and it's not really their faults that they couldn't evision what the net results of the lies they bought into would really be.

We're all in this mess together, folks.

Sooner or later most of you are going to realize what a nation really is.

It is NOT just a buch of individuals, who happen to be in the same nation, its an interactive interdependent system that MUST take care of ALL the plaeyrs in it.

 

[sealybobo]

air traffic controllers earn between $50K and $140K+ per year. you might want to pick a different occupation to show the evil effects of "union busting", ace.

Air Traffic Controllers

airline is seeking a 30% pay cut under its attempts to bring operating costs more in line with its competitors.

Delta Air Lines pilots offer carrier 9% wage cut. | Transportation > Air Transportation from AllBusiness.com

Do they make that much Del? Great. Got a problem with how much they make?

What do you do and how much do you make? I have a problem with how much you get paid. If we cut your pay 30%, the company can sell their products to us for cheaper. Let's all vote on who gives a fuck about Del's job. I bet you'll be the only one who thinks you are worth what you make.

Stupid worker bees. Arguing to lower workers wages. God damn ignorant house slaves. Or jealous. One of the two.

 

[del]

airline is seeking a 30% pay cut under its attempts to bring operating costs more in line with its competitors.

Delta Air Lines pilots offer carrier 9% wage cut. | Transportation > Air Transportation from AllBusiness.com

Do they make that much Del? Great. Got a problem with how much they make?

What do you do and how much do you make? I have a problem with how much you get paid. If we cut your pay 30%, the company can sell their products to us for cheaper. Let's all vote on who gives a fuck about Del's job. I bet you'll be the only one who thinks you are worth what you make.

Stupid worker bees. Arguing to lower workers wages. God damn ignorant house slaves. Or jealous. One of the two.

pssst, air traffic controllers don't work for the airlines, ace.
i have no problem with how much they make.
were you bounced on your head a lot as a child?
do you continue the practice?
you should consider stopping; it's having a deleterious effect on what passes for your intellect.