And now, a few decades and several tens of billions of dollars later, we have southern politicians with automotive manufacturing facilities in their backyards. And, for some reason, they’re not feeling a particularly strong desire to spend federal taxpayers’ money on bailing out Detroit. As The Atlanta Journal Constitution puts it, “For behind the philosophical back-and-forth over government intervention, scheduled to begin Monday in the U.S. Senate, is a cut-throat, economic reality: the South has ambitions of becoming Detroit’s rival. And a federal dollar that artificially props up manufacturing on the northern end of I-75 is a dollar that hinders the creation of new economic models downstream, some Southern politicians maintain.” Par example? “Georgia’s Kia plant is scheduled to open next November, employing as many as 2,500 workers. The site is located within U.S. Rep. Lynn Westmoreland’s 3rd District. Westmoreland, like other House Republicans, voted against the $700 Wall Street bailout. He’ll vote against a Detroit rescue as well – on the grounds that it would create a slanted field of play for the workers he’ll soon represent. ‘One of the things we have constantly said is we can’t compete with some of these foreign businesses because the government has intervened in those businesses, and it makes an unfair advantage,’ Westmoreland said. ‘What we’re doing here with the auto industry is basically the same thing.'” Fine words. And the way the AJC takes him to task is classic…

We’ve already reported that the White House isn’t keen on Democratic plans for a Motown bailout. As Automotive News [sub] reminds us, George W. doesn’t want the dems to appropriate the $700b appropriation earmarked for bailing out America’s financial system. As an alternative, the Prez signaled Pelso, Reid & Co. that he’s OK with the idea of “diverting” some of the Department of Energy’s $25b no to low-interest retooling loan program to bailout Chrysler, Ford and GM. Only the Democrats do not, I repeat DO NOT, want to be seen to be watering-down their commitment to encouraging forcing The Big 2.8 to build fuel-efficient vehicles. So… Nancy Pelosi told the press today that the U.S. automobile manufacturers need to restructure “to ensure their long-term economic viability.” Huh? Sorry, I got distracted. I mean, WTF does she mean by “restructure” and do we really want a politician deciding how Motown goes about it business? Right. OK. Nancy is digging-in, sticking with her TARP usurpation strategy. Here’s the money shot [via Bloomberg]:

Political analysts are having a field day with this bailout business. Do Democrats want the multi-billion dollar automakers’ rescue pack to fail along partisan lines, so they can blame the fall-out on Diego the Republicans– before there are no Republicans left to blame? Are the Republicans stonewalling the bailout because they’re against the bailout on principle, or because they don’t think it will work, or so they can blame the Democratically-controlled Congress? Or even, God forbid, the lame duck President? (Praise be to GM for dropping Washington into the legislative soup between regimes.) I don’t pretend to know what’s in the hearts of our elected representatives, assuming that this vital organ even exists within their cash-padded chest cavities. Anyway, the AP reports that White House “Spokeswoman Dana Perino says the Democratic proposal [to tap into the existing Wall Street bailout fund] would lead to partisan gridlock because the $700 billion rescue package was never intended to help automakers and shouldn’t be now. For that reason, she told The Associated Press that the White House is now actively asking Congress to accelerate loans it first approved in September.” WTF?

Dear Mr. Mulally, Mr. Wagoner and Mr. Nardelli:

I understand that your company has been lobbying the Department of Treasury and congressional leaders for additional financial assistance via loans or through inclusion in the Troubled Asset Relief Program. While I understand the economic turmoil that many American businesses face today, I think it’s appropriate to ask those who seek a bailout from the federal government to do everything they can to first cut internal expenditures, including and especially executive salaries and compensation packages.

I like Phil LeBeau. Sweetheart of a guy. He talks to TTAC’s Ken Elias on a regular basis. But I’m not so convinced about Mssr. LeBeau’s journalistic cojones. In the first post-GM quarterly statement TV interview with Rick Wagoner, LeBeau asked GM CEO’s the tough question: is there any point at which you say fuck that shit, we’re out of cash, I’m heading for Aruba, YOU file for C11? [paraphrasing]. But Phil forgot to go for the kill and/or (we hear) ask Wagoner to share some of his private stash. Now that the Detroit Bailout has become Germanicized (caps) and gets its own logo (the sure sign of sexual maturity for any story in the MSM), Phil is on the case– although not the case of the CEOs responsible for this Donnybrook…

Today’s New York Times’ story on GM’s travails begins by highlighting the bailout bullet train– and then switches track. “Momentum is building in Washington for a rescue package for the auto industry to head off a possible bankruptcy filing by General Motors, which is rapidly running low on cash. But not everyone agrees that a Chapter 11 filing by G.M. would be the disaster that many fear. Some experts note that while bankruptcy would be painful, it may be preferable to a government bailout that may only delay, at considerable cost, the wrenching but necessary steps G.M. needs to take to become a stronger, leaner company.” Yes, it’s GM CEO Rick Wagoner’s worst nightmare: as TTAC predicted, momentum is growing for a GM C11. Obviously, any such suggestion depends on GM continuing to do business post-bankruptcy. And that’s a bridge [loan] too far for most MSM pundits.

That’s the day that House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank, D-Mass, will introduce legislation that will change the rules on the previously approved $700b financial rescue package so that America’s ailing automakers can stick their snouts into the federal trough. Yes, that Barney Frank; the same congressman whose oversight of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac lead to the relaxation of lending policies that pushed both quangos to the brink of extinction. (Not to mention Frank’s relationship with Fannie’s policy wonk Herbert Moss or campaign contributions from both organizations to the Congressman’s campaign.) Automotive News [sub] reports that it’s shootout at The OK Give ‘Em 25 Bil Corral.

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As commentators from all across the spectrum ditch their pom-poms and start to face facts, The Detroit Free Press is keeping it surreal by dedicating its nearly all of its ink budget to the cause of federal investments in the American auto industry. In fact, there’s so much bailout boosterism, it’s hard to know where to begin. How about the decision to run this CBS scare piece, complete with misleading, self-serving commentary by MI Governor Jennifer Granholm? When asked to justify a bailout of failed businesses, Granholm claims “one in ten Americans is employed in this industry.” Yes Ms Granholm, but “this industry” includes plenty of healthy firms who aren’t asking anyone for a bailout. Oh, but the “national economy,” “manufacturing sector,” and “energy future” (?) depend on a bailout, threatens pleads Granholm. You decide where her political career rates on that list of bailout-dependent priorities. Oh, but there’s so much more…

• The U.S. auto industry has been hard hit by the credit crisis.
o Carmakers can’t get credit to complete their restructurings and put new advanced technology vehicles into production.
o Customers can’t get credit for new cars and other purchases, and consumer confidence has fallen to an all-time low.
o Suppliers are losing business and can’t get credit to keep them afloat until the industry recovers.
o Dealers can’t get credit to finance inventory and other routine business needs.

Dear GM Dealer:

Earlier today, during a GM Dealer IDL broadcast, I provided you with a GM Business update and significant information about the vital role the U.S. automotive industry plays in the health of the country in terms of employment, annual economic output, exports, R&D investment and retail business. As we’re in the midst of the deepest crisis our industry has ever faced, GM’s priority is on seeking support from various U.S. government agencies and congressional leaders. We need your help now to ask government officials to approve an additional loan package to help us deal with our current liquidity crisis.

Automotive News [sub] reports that Georgetown University law professor Daniel Tarullo may be president-elect Barack Obama’s choice for U.S. Car Czar– should such a thing be deemed nceessary. You may remember Tarullo as a world-renowned expert in the design, manufacturer and marketing of automobiles worker bee for the Antitrust Division of the Justice Department. No? Special Assistant to the Undersecretary of Commerce. No? Chief Counsel for Employment Policy for Senator Edward M. Kennedy. No? Assistant Secretary of State for Economic and Business Affairs. No? Deputy Assistant to the President for Economic Policy. No? Assistant to the President for International Economic Policy. No? Jeez, you really should get clued-in here! Tell you what, read Tarullo’s testimony to The Subcommitee on Security and International Trade Finance, Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affair’s hearing on Reforming Key International Financial Institutions for the 21st Century. And then tell me Tarullo isn’t a car guy, if you’re still conscious. Meanwhile, I want to have a little rant about the dangers of creating a Car Czar…

Detroit News columnist Daniel Howes is just coming around to the idea that Detroit’s automakers are about to collapse, bringing about the reckoning that any open-minded journalist could (and did) see twenty years ago. And Danny’s pissed. At us. “It’s easy, sitting behind a keyboard, to type, ‘no one’s too big to fail’ or ‘let ’em file Chapter 11′ or ‘serves ’em right.’ It’s especially easy if you and yours don’t have to endure directly the jobs lost, tax revenue gone, pensions halved, health care benefits denied, dealerships closed, supplier lines shut down.” Is this how Detroit thinks of its current predicament? Fortress Detroit? That they’re somehow blameless victims in all this, and America actively WANTS them to fail? Apparently so. “But autoworkers, salaried employees, retirees, even executives, are people, too. The nasty Schadenfreude heaped on this dismal situation says more about those doing the heaping than those who go to work each day, do their jobs and play by the rules.” Danny goes for an “if… then” close…

Unbelievable, The Wall Street Journal has an editorial that positions the paper four-square against a federal bailout for Detroit’s beleaguered automakers– and then wimps out. First, the “not with our money you don’t” bit. “A bailout might avoid any near-term bankruptcy filing, but it won’t address Detroit’s fundamental problems of making cars that Americans won’t buy and labor contracts that are too rich and inflexible to make them competitive… In fact, the main point of any taxpayer rescue seems to be to postpone a day of reckoning on those contracts. That includes even the notorious UAW Jobs Bank that continues to pay workers not to work. A Detroit bailout would also be unfair to other companies that make cars in the U.S. Yes, those are “foreign” companies in the narrow sense that they are headquartered overseas. But then so was Chrysler before Daimler sold most of the car maker to Cerberus, the private equity fund. Honda, Toyota and the rest employ about 113,000 American auto workers who make nearly four million cars a year in states like Alabama and Tennessee. Unlike Michigan, these states didn’t vote for Mr. Obama.” Hey! Place nice! Anyway, you get the picture– if only because we’ve been painting it for the last three years. But there’s a sting in the tail…

I’ve received a few emails upbriading the site for OCDing on the bailout story. My only defense: TTAC has covered this story for well over three years. We are the clear path through the blizzard of bailout B.S. being bandied about by bailout backers. While we glean our info from the usual suspects, our editorial eye is fixated on the details and implications that other outlets miss, ignore or bury. For example, this Automotive News [sub] story reveals the fact that the cappi di tutti cappi di automobili left their sit-down in Nancy Pelosi’s Washington office “through a hidden exit from the office suite of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid sometime around 6:30 p.m. Security personnel kept reporters at a distance.” THIS is how OUR politicians spend OUR tax money? In closed-door meetings with a coven of craptastic carmakers? OK, no surprise, but it’s clear the important questions are not being answered– if only because the principles involved are literally sneaking away into the night. So, anyway, here’s the latest teat-sucking scenario…

“DOE would like to invite you [ED: who shall remain nameless] to participate in a conference call for industry stakeholders on the new Interim Final Rule for the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program issued this evening. The program was authorized by Section 136 in the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007. The FY09 Continuing Resolution authorized up to $25 billion in direct loans. The press release is attached. The Interim Final Rule is posted at http://www.atvmloan.energy.gov/.” Interim Final Rule? Yeah, that sounds like the feds alright. Anyway, while I scan the pdf myself, I once again invite TTAC’s Best and Brightest to cast their collective beady eye on this doc, which was allegedly going to take over a year to produce. I guess it pays to have high friends in low places. Right. Let’s get stuck in…

The Detroit Free Press finally gets it. “GM’s report Friday will be so dismal that the federal government will be forced to decide whether the U.S. auto industry will survive, people familiar with the situation told the Free Press.” Don’t be fooled by the “people familiar” routine. This is the Freep’s editorial team acknowledging GM’s acknowledgement that they’re fucked. Without federal aid, they’re done. The fact that Mssrs. Wagoner, (GM) Nardelli (Chrysler), Mulally (Ford) and Gettlefinger (UAW) are meeting with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi today, the day before GM announces its Q3 bloodbath, is hardly a coincidence. Nor is the unprecedented timing. For the first time in recent history, both GM AND Ford will reveal their respective meltdowns on the same day. The basic idea is simple enough: if the news is bad enough, SOMETHING MUST BE DONE! Throw in Barack Obama’s victory and you have a perfect storm of federal teat sucking.

John Snow was the U.S. Treasury Secretary under President George W. Bush, from 2003 to 2006. Snow is now drawing a paycheck– the size of which dwarfs all but GM CEO Rick Wagoner’s imagination– for shaking-down Uncle Sam on behalf of Cerberus’ Chrysler play. As you’d expect, Snow is wasting no time in pursuit of your tax money. “Cerberus Capital Management LP Chairman John Snow said Wednesday that president-elect Barack Obama and his treasury secretary need a bipartisan plan to counter the worst economic downturn in about 50 years. ‘What we need is to make sure that a vital industry like autos… which is such a big part of the overall economy, doesn’t lead us into a deeper and harsher downturn,’ Snow said in an interview on the CNBC cable channel. ‘The collapse of the auto industry at this time would be devastating for a new president.'” Note: president. Not American workers. And I’d like to take this opportunity to remind TTAC’s Best and Brightest that Cerberus claims income of over $100b per year from its various businesses. OK, right. Where were we? Changing the subject slightly, how about GM’s “welcome” to the new prez?

Less than 24 hours after Senator Barack Obama won the race for the U.S. presidency, Bloomberg reports that Motown’s mauled mavens will step-up their campaign to suckle on the milk of federal tax money. “GM, the biggest U.S. automaker, must get government aid because ‘time is very short,’ said Roger Altman, the former Treasury official advising the company in its merger talks with Chrysler LLC. ‘The consequences of a collapse by GM or all three could be very severe.'” (As opposed to slightly severe.) Step 1: change the terms of the Department of Energy’s $25b worth of no to low-interest loans. Retooling? Fuck that shit. “The industry’s agenda for the new president will be topped by intensified calls for an immediate disbursement of $25 billion in low-interest loans signed into law by President George W. Bush Sept. 30. While the money is supposed to be for the development of fuel-efficient vehicles, automakers argue it should be freed up to meet current capital needs.” Step 2: get a slice of the already-approved banking bailout bucks. “Sympathetic lawmakers also have been calling for auto lenders, if not the manufacturers themselves, to get some of the $700 billion bailout fund set aside for financial institutions.” Do you really have the stomach for this stuff? Read on…

Tonight. On World’s Most Extreme Detroit Apologists… Move over Jerry Flint! Forbes’ ancient and once venerable scribe thinks GM CEO Rick Wagoner hasn’t raped stockholders by pocketing more than $100m in executive compensation. But The Detroit Free Press‘ Justin Hyde and Brent Snavely are willing to go even further. While their most recent mega-apologia predicts the end of Wagoner’s misguided management, the writers are happy to give the floor to analysts who suggest that Wagoner’s done- and is still doing— a great job. “Erich Merkle, an analyst from Crowe Horwath LLP, said Wagoner inherited years of bad decisions from previous managers that have limited his options. ‘You almost need to put Roger Smith on the hot seat, and I know he’s dead,’ Merkle said of the CEO who led GM from 1981 to 1990. ‘They were setting the company up for disaster later down the road. The business model that was created and the way that the contracts were structured were such that they were just not economically viable.'” Mea culpa be damned. And you can be damned sure that Merkle isn’t the only one blind to Wagoner’s cataclysmic effect on GM’s business…

Here’s it comes. Here it comes. Here comes Detroit’s nineteenth nervous breakdown. Will it be their last? Obviously not. But just in case you thought there was a hope in Hell that GM won’t transform itself into American Leyland, sucking taxpayer cash into a black hole for years to come, the Detroit News’ reporter/cheerleader Alisa Priddle presents “Analysts: Big 3 woes imperil U.S. economy.” Otherwise known as rapper 2 Big 2 Fail’s ode Obama’s Your Mama. Priddle assembles the usual chorus of backup singers. “Every direct job at an automaker in the United States creates five more jobs, said Sean McAlinden, chief economist and vice president for research for the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor. Two of the five are related to suppliers or dealers; the other three are spinoff jobs at businesses where auto industry workers spend their paychecks… By contrast, one Wall Street position creates a total of about 2.5 jobs, yet Congress expedited aid to the financial services sector this year.” Yeah, fuck them banker bitches and their $700 bil. “Declining auto sales have contributed to the nation’s economic downturn, but that hasn’t diminished the industry’s importance, said Charles Chesbrough, senior economist for CSM Worldwide in Northville, an automotive market research firm. ‘We won’t see a turnaround in the economy as a whole,’ he said, ‘until we see improvement in the auto industry.'” As Mad Max said, “If it’s all the same to you, I’ll drive that tanker.” Hang on; what’s this? A dissenting voice?