GM and Chrysler, evidently having burned through the billions already given them, are back in front of Congress, asking for more bailout money. I'm proposing that we create a new measure of automotive efficiency, one that reflects current realities.
Let us hope that the partisan bickering over the details of the stimulus package doesn't derail the whole thing. I'm glad to see Obama using the bully pulpit more forcefully. To deride the stimulus package as nothing more than a huge government spending bill is silly; that's what a stimulus bill is. The whole theory is that government is now the agent of last resort--the only one left with enough money to get the economy up and running again. Economists from both sides of the aisle agree on this. The only ones who don't seem to understand it are the ones blocking the progress. This should not surprise us, given that their policies helped create this mess in the first place. Their mantra seems to be, if stupidity and arrogance got us into this mess, then why can't stupidity and arrogance get us out of it?
Republican opposition in the House to President Obama's stimulus package is stiffening under the direction of House minority leader John Boehner. Yes, the same guy who originally opposed President Bush's bailout. Given how badly that was managed, Boehner may well have been right in opposing it, but the alternative he offered up was so tepid and unrealistic that nobody took him seriously. I have no idea whether Obama's huge spending program will turn the economy around, and I doubt anybody else does, either. We're in uncharted territory. Boehner may again be correct in his dour assessment of the President's proposal. What I do know is, given their performance the last eight years, Republicans have lost all credibility on economic matters. To hear GOP leaders, who offered up vast helpings of budgetary pork (remember the farm and highway bills, to name two notorious examples) complain about unnecessary spending in the stimulus package is laughable. What do they offer now? The same tired litany of tax cuts and cuts to social programs. Given the catastrophic failures of their economic philosophy, I'll go with the new guy and his ideas for now.
Colorado's anointed senator is now on a tour of the state with the governor who appointed him. I still find the choice odd, to say the least. It certainly defies conventional wisdom, and bypasses any number of seasoned politicians with deep Colorado roots, not to mention established political campaign operations and staffs. Senator-select Bennet is starting from zero, and has only two short years to establish himself and build name recognition in the entire state. It's amusing in a way that he has to begin his political career with a re-election campaign. What better way than to assure folks on the West Slope and the Eastern Plains that he is, indeed, a Coloradan, and that he speaks their, uh, language.
This just struck me as funny. I was reading about the candidates for the Broncos coaching job, and I started to wonder if Pat Bowlen would surprise us with an unorthodox pick. At that point this cartoon popped into my head.
So far, it appears there's no constitutional way to prevent Roland Burris, disgraced Illinois governor Blagojevich's pick to replace Barack Obama, from taking his seat in the Senate. Why anyone would want to take the job under such an ethical cloud is a mystery. Burris will be a pariah in Congress, isolated and alone, with no committee assignments and no voice at all in the Democratic caucus. Perhaps he's content with taking the salary and perks that go with the appointment. What a sorry day for Illinois, the Democratic party, and the country.
I have mixed feelings about the failure of the bailout of the auto industry. On the one hand, it never made sense to me to give the money to the folks who have failed so dismally to build a modern auto industry. I worry that their reach in the economy is so great, though, that if they fail, the economy will plummet even lower, into a full-blown depression (if we're not in one already). Plus, when I hear Republicans who so vehemently opposed the bailout say that it would save unions, not people, I wonder if they have a clue what they're saying. Are union jobs not real jobs? Do union members not pay taxes? Has Republican dislike of unions turned into reflexively blind hatred? Is an industry too moronic to save itself being denied help by a Congress too dunderheaded to understand the consequences? Are we talking dumb and dumber here? Then again, congressional Republicans are finally ignoring their president. That in itself may be a positive sign. If only they'd done that from the start maybe we wouldn't be in this mess.
The Big Three is back before Congress, hats (with much smaller head sizes) in hand. This time, they handled the symbolic stuff a tad bit better. Instead of flying in three separate corporate jets, they drove, although they haven't gotten the hang of carpooling yet. And they all agreed to cut their hefty salaries. We don't know about bonuses or stock options. And this time, they have plans to downsize their industries, to make them more efficient, and to redesign their fleets for more fuel economy. That they came up with these plans in only two weeks is a miracle, given their inability to answer basic questions about their strategies for saving their businesses the last time they came begging. Somehow, I can't quite envision the same self-satisfied dinosaurs who presided over the years-long decline of the American auto industry being up to the task of evolving it quickly enough to make a difference now.
