The bureaucrats and politicians at GM and the bureaucrats and politicians in DC are carefully and politely carving up the cadaver that was once GM. The autopsy is being performed in Washington behind closed doors, perhaps in the Rayburn building. The scenario could play out like this: While GM executives sit out in the hallway, UAW bosses sit in secret sessions with Congressional Democrats, pounding the table and demanding that they and their union members be compensated for delivering the vote. Democrat party leaders scratch their collective heads, trying to figure out a way to put money in the hands of unions without rewarding automotive execs for sub-par performance. This is no easy task, even for experienced enablers of parasitic behavior like those on Capitol Hill.

Meanwhile, the remaining GM execs are in a huddle trying to figure out how to save their jobs or cobble together a nice golden parachute that doesn’t draw too much attention from the media, the unions or the clowns in Congress. Rick Wagoner’s exit package will be closely scrutinized. They’ve already thrown white collar retirees to the wolves - the government will likely take over the non-union retiree pension programs and slash pension payments and benefits. The media won’t report on it.

President Obama has, in his infinite wisdom as Supreme Leader, appointed a leftist social scientist as the auto czar. Not a car guy. Not an engineer or a corporate finance guy, but a socialist academic who’s never held a real job in his life. Edward Montgomery has never had to deliver a product on time, on budget, with repeatable quality and show a profit – not even an ice cream cone. There is no evidence that Edward Montgomery has ever changed the oil in his car, much less displayed any knowledge of automobiles or the industry. Instead, Edward Montgomery will become the most powerful automotive executive in US history so that he can preside over the ‘equitable’ distribution of money to the UAW and skilled trade unions. He’s certainly not interested in having GM or Chrysler throw off a profit, because he probably doesn’t even understand how that happens. Therefore, GM’s new board of directors, hand-picked by Mr. Montgomery, will probably be composed of radical environmentalists, labor union representatives, academics, ‘victims’ of corporate excesses and ‘community’ leaders. GM will become very much like the old Soviet Union’s state-run enterprises - cranking out sub-par goods at outrageous prices. In fact, the Democrats can probably still find some old, disgruntled Soviet apparatchiks that can show them how best to milk the system for all it’s worth.

GM and possibly Chrysler will be forced to build cars designed by bureaucrats and social activists. These vehicles will make the infamous Soviet-era Trabant look stylish by comparison. Of course, most Americans won’t buy them, prefering to pay a carbon-credit tax on a real car made elsewhere — like Japan, Korea, India or China. The Obama administration will then give these unwanted GM cars away to undeserving wards of the state, who’ll leave them lying by the roadside once they have a flat tire. And the American taxpayer will be on the hook for this entire mess.

But, it’s too easy to blame Obama and the Democrats for the mess. After all, they’re just taking advantage of a situation they didn’t create. No, that happened on Rick Wagoner’s watch, along with an entire gang of GM exec’s that just plain didn’t do their job. The UAW’s attitude is understandable to a degree - they can’t save GM even if their members worked for free. It’s not the union’s fault that GM management wasn’t looking ahead, that it wasn’t nimble enough to create a car company that could roll with the punches like a Honda or Toyota. Yes, the car business has been cruel to everyone, but Toyota lost $2 billion in 2008, while GM lost something north of $40 billion. Both firms sell about the same number of vehicles.

GM points to ‘legacy’ costs such as retiree benefits. Toyota has similar costs. Its labor force is actually older than GM’s and Japan also mandates similar retirement benefits for unionized auto workers. The money is distributed differently, but the numbers are similar. The same is true for German autoworkers who receive 80% of their working salary during retirement. And yet, both the Japanese and German automakers are in better shape than GM.

The blame is to be shared equally by GM management and UAW/skilled trades union bosses. On the part of GM management, a chronic shortage of vision and leadership allowed the company’s bureaucracy to bungle forward, oblivious to the realities of the marketplace.  On the union side, the UAW and the skilled trades unions did their level best to create work rules that hampered productivity and ballooned the cost of tooling up for a new vehicle. They were adamant about preserving jobs in order to protect that flow of dues into union coffers. Too bad it backfired on them. GM’s senior management was too timid to confront the unions and demand more cooperation. Much like the state and federal government, union bosses could not grasp the fact that more productive union workers would make the car companies more profitable and they would in turn build more manufacturing plants. Those plants would need more workers. Instead, union bosses dug in their heels and insisted on increasingly unproductive work rules and procedures that hamstrung automakers and gobbled up available cash.

Why would the unions do such a thing? It would seem short-sighted and self-destructive. Because, union workers and union bosses were firsthand witnesses to the bad decision-making emanating from GM’s executive suites. Those decisions cost them jobs and opportunities. When a new product fails, like GM’s infamous Pontiac Aztec, management doesn’t get laid off or fired. Assembly line workers do. When GM’s board of directors approves investment in a new vehicle line, executives aren’t called on the carpet when it doesn’t sell. Instead, white collar and blue collar workers are asked to make sacrifices and the auto suppliers are told to cut their prices. The automotive industry as a whole has been making sacrifices for the better part of two decades. GM’s senior management has not.

So, when GM is on the ropes, executives shouldn’t expect too much help or sympathy from the UAW or the supplier base, even though the fate of both are closely tied to the failing giant. On the political front, GM has bellyached for years about the unfair trade advantages held by imported brands. Those arguments began to fall apart when imports set up manufacturing facilities in the US while GM continued to move jobs overseas.

It’s likely that GM will go the way of Hudson, Kaiser, Studebaker, Rambler and the venerable Hupmobile. There’s nothing griven in stone that says a corporation must live forever. Big corporations are like miniature civilizations. They possess their own culture, social pecking order, rules of etiquette, ways of doing things. And like any civilization, they have a birth, a period of vibrant growth, maturity and finally, a decline followed by death or dismemberment. Younger, more aggressive corporations feed on the remains. In the end, GM’s demise may give rise to smaller, nimbler carmakers that can remain competitive in the world markets. Propped up by government, GM will simply remain a huge and costly socialist experiment, draining the country of resources that could be put to better use. Steamships and the Pony Express are gone, along with buggy whips and hoop skirts. As unpleasant as it may be in the short term, maybe it’s time for GM to ride off into the sunset. In this case, the pieces will be of greater value than the sum of the parts.

The fact that Congress has even bothered to bring to a vote the matter of AIG bonuses should signal loudly that the Golden Age of Parasites has arrived. Senator Chris Dodd denies inserting language into the mystery-shrouded economic stimulus package that was so quickly passed by both houses of Congress. The White House denies prior knowledge of the bonuses, even though staffers admit to it. Treasury Secretary Geithner himself crafted some of the foundational language of the bailout arrangement while George W. Bush was still in office. And now, every congressional aide’s best friend, Barney Frank,  is screeching that a 90% tax on those bonuses is justifiable. The parasites can now take away anything from anyone. Screw contract law. Screw constitutional guarantees. Screw the Bill of Rights. They can take what they want when they want it with the full backing of an ocean of parasites that now comprises the voting public. Mobocracy has arrived, cheered on by the media.

It’s revealing that only 44 protesters showed up to take a bus tour of AIG executives’ homes, even though every one of them was paid by A.C.O.R.N. with our tax dollars to do so. A crushing mob of reporters and cameramen from around the world showed up to document the circus. At the same time, hundreds of tea parties were being staged around the country to protest the Democrats’ uncontrolled spending and yet nothing has been reported on this groundswell of conservative activism.

It’s difficult to fully explain the motives of TV network programming executives, editorial directors, news writers and reporters. Some of it can be characterized as pure envy and malice — the mainstream media have assumed a rather pompous and sanctimonius position on social justice and economic opportunity without really delving into the causal relationships driving the disparity in income and social advancement. But then, that’s too difficult. It would require getting an education beyond ‘journalism’ or ‘communications’ which is as useful and intellectually challenging as ballroom dancing or basket weaving. No insult intended to the latter. It might require reporters, editors, columnists, newsreaders, producers and all of the other unionized (that’s right, they’re unionized) media ‘professionals’ to actually work hard and think before they open their yaps. It’s much easier to descend into pure envy and malice - the stock in trade of unions in this country. Hey, it worked for the unions.

But the primary reason that media outlets are effectively propaganda machines for the Left is that they’ve been intentionally been purposed to do so. Much like the contagion of leftist thinking that has demolished independent thought on college campuses, the Left has worked hard to spread its infection into the field of journalism. It’s an aggressive form of journalism, where the ‘reporter’ or ‘anchor’ insert themselves into the story, insult or attack their subject, then apply ‘context’ and ‘analysis’ that follows the party line. The strategy has worked extraordinarily well. Ask Sarah Palin. Where there are gaps in the all-out assault on American principles and ideals and those who uphold them, George Soros fills in with hundreds of bloggers funded through his many front organizations. 

Democratic politicians, media boobs and their wealthy patrons are playing with fire. They don’t understand that if the mob gets loose, at some point they too, will become targets. Even Karl Marx understood this. Obama and the Democrats think they can control mob impulses and turn them to their political advantage, much like Mussolini or Hitler did early on in their despicable regimes. History has proven them wrong. Either the actions of the mob descend into utter madness, or the politicians attempting to control the mob become dictators. This should not be America’s fate.

Otto von Bismarck, the Iron Duke that unified Germany in the mid-1800s once said that the average citizen who upholds the law and enjoys his sausage wouldn’t want to see how either is made. The same can be said of parasites who’ve harmed this country and its citizens. Using the institutions of democracy - the right to vote, the right of free speech and assembly, an open legislature, an impartial judiciary and the separation of powers, the parasites and their champions have short-circuited the safeguards put in place by the writers of the Constitution. And they were provided cover by a biased and agenda-driven media cabal.

Enemies of the American way of life have been at it for some time and have refined their craft to an art form. They comprise a large part of the Democratic Party and its patrons, themselves top-tier parasites. Everyone thinks parasites are those who simply don’t want to work or are looking for a free handout. Actually, top-tier parasites work very hard for their piece of the action. What makes them parasites is that their reward is so gigantically out of proportion for their efforts.

Think of the lawyers who ‘represented’ taxpayers in every state against Big Tobacco. Who made billions? Certainly not the states who brought suit against the tobacco companies, nor those sickened by or dying of smoking-related illnesses. Individual lawyers charged the states they were representing as much as $39,000 an hour for their services, based on the percentages they exacted from the awards paid by Big Tobacco.

Then there are the union bosses who live off the dues collected from industrial workers for whom they provide so little in the way of promises made. By the way, if you’re an influential liberal, you can serve on the boards or regional councils of a few non-profit liberal political action committees and collect a stipend from each. It’s possible to earn $200,000 a year for part-time work. Not bad by anyones’ standards.

Lobbyists. Consultants. Academics. The list goes on and on. Well-educated. Smart. Well-connected. It’s like a club. Except, you the taxpayer don’t belong. Only your paycheck does. You have little say about how the money is spent or who gets that money. Unlike a private charity, you can’t dictate where the government spends your money, even though our Constitution absolutely grants you the right and privilege to do so. Your concerns and misgivings about where this country is headed will be dismissed as stupid, regressive and possibly racist. You can’t possibly know as much as the liberal elite. Don’t question their motives or their results. They know what’s best for you.

Visit www.howobamagotelected.com for an eyeful of unnerving and infuriating video clips that unmistakably demonstrate the extraordinary influence the electronic media have over elections, the voting process, voter awareness and the functioning of our democracy. The people interviewed in this clips were not morons. But it was astounding to witness how precisely the media cabal can attenuate negative information about Obama or Biden while amplifying erroneous or negative information about Palin and McCain. Please note that Palin takes precedent over McCain. Without her, McCain wouldn’t have captured 45% of the popular vote and Obama would have been voted into office by an apparent landslide. It’s not that Obama was a sterling candidate, even though the media lavished attention on his candidacy and hushed up the questionable aspects of his history and character. It’s simply that John McCain was such a horribly bad candidate. Palin rescued the hapless boob from a horrifying defeat that would have sent the absolutely wrong signal to America and the world. That’s why the media cabal was so intent on destroying Palin, because she kept Obama from claiming an overwhelming mandate that would have empowered him to plunge this country into socialism. As it stands now, some Republicans might even summon up enough courage to object to he more extreme measures proposed.

The parasites and their champions are fully aware that a voter-proof Democratic Party will protect their gravy train. Over the past 125 years, the Democratic Party has come to exemplify the most unsavory aspects of the democratic system, where power and votes are brokered and sold. The Democratic Party has perfected the power-dependency duality of patronage politics. And so, the Democrats felt perfectly justified to thwart the will of the people, put up a dangerously incompetent and ideologically suspect demagogue for President, and gamble with the future of this country for their own short-term gain. This is not an isolated incident. This is the overarching goal for the Democratic Party - they want to make themselves voter-proof. By doing so, they enrich and empower their exclusive constituents: labor and teacher unions, government at all levels, trial lawyers, environmental extremists, government contractors and yes, unbelievably - Wall Street. Surprised? You shouldn’t be. Many of the Wall Street honchos are Democrats because their personal philosophy goes hand in glove with the mindset of other top-tier parasites like union bosses and trial lawyers. After all, as an investor or retiree, you’re just a mark, a source of commissions and fees. This accumulation of money by unions, trial lawyers and wealthy liberals allows the Democrat Party to buy its way into office and then ‘redistribute’ taxpayers’ hard-earned money to friends and political allies. Don’t think that the media cabal won’t ask for real money for being instrumental in getting Obama elected. That’s the way the game is played. Too bad most Americans will never know.

Champagne corks are popping in Detroit’s most exclusive clubs and watering holes. George W. Bush, anxious for a positive lift at the end of his presidency, skirted Congress and even his own Treasury Secretary to dole out taxpayer funds to money-hungry carmakers. For the moment, GM’s chairman and his hapless crew can hold on to their jobs, while across town Chrysler’s crippled top management breathes a sigh of relief. The $14 billion dollars is a stop-gap, a temporary plug for a sinking ship. Imagine what that $14 billion could have done in the hands of thousands of small entrepreneurs and business owners. But, that’s neither here nor there. The management and non-union staff of the domestic carmakers aren’t really going to benefit much from the handout. Neither will George Bush’s legacy or the American taxpayer.

Given that labor unions will be the single largest beneficiaries of the auto bailout, UAW president Ron Gettelfinger acted like a typical union ingrate when the handout was announced. He figuratively spat in George W. Bush’s face, defiantly announcing that the union will sacrifice absolutely nothing in exchange for the money. This in spite of the fact that Bush’s gift merely suggested some concessions. Gettelfinger went on to say that his union would revisit the deal once Obama and the new Congress were installed. This isn’t suprising. It’s not even outrageous by union standards. It’s a cancer that’s been growing for decades. And with Obama in the White House and Democrats controlling Congress, the UAW and its sister unions are poised for a comeback.

The unions have in fact given up absolutely nothing, while asking everyone else, including their own members, to make sacrifices, however modest. It’s important to understand that the union organization itself is a separate entity. UAW president Ron Gettelfinger’s salary and benefits are not being threatened. Neither are those of union local presidents, union administrators, benefits planners, money managers and other union employees. The dues-paying ‘members’ are employees of the carmakers, not the union itself. And they do need to be reminded of that occassionally. It’s not the UAW or the AFL-CIO that created their manufacturing jobs. It was a for-profit corporation.

One can always condemn the unions for their reprehensible behavior and the fact that union leadership encourages the rank and file to work as little as possible for the highest pay rate possible. But, the blame for that union attitude rests squarely with GM, Ford and Chrysler management, as does pretty much everything else that ails the auto industry. It’s the short-sighted, self-serving and chaotic management style of this insular and clannish business community that’s wreaked havoc with hundreds of supplier companies, the lives of thousands and now threatens the greater economy.

At the height of the bailout crisis just days before the Bush announcement, GM management ordered its EDS supplier to prepare a company-wide email blast that all bonuses and raises for 2009 would be cancelled. Once the Bush bailout money was announced, that email blast was cancelled. In other words, the taxpayer money would allow GM to continue with business as usual. One would think that given this is taxpayer money, those bonuses and raises would be curtailed as a responsible measure to safeguard the public’s interest. No way. That’s not how Detroit works.

GM and Chrysler will burn through the money that the labor unions allow them to keep in about 60 days. They will return to Washington for another Oscar-winning performance. One would think these captains of industry abhor the notion of groveling in front of Congress for money. Nothing could be further from the truth. Don’t assume that these guys are entrepreneurs or capitalists. They are neither. These auto execs are bureaucrats and politicians as skilled as those facing them in Congressional chambers. They don’t have the vision, the guts or the leadership skills to pull these automakers out of the mess they themselves created. They have the savvy and decision-making skills of a potted palm. And the American taxpayer is going to make sure that they, along with their union counterparts, enjoy the ride.

Appearances are deceiving. It may look like Republican senators are unwilling to help fellow Americans keep their jobs and save an ailing industry. That’s how the mainstream media outlets play the story. Inconvenient facts like Ted Kennedy abstaining or that a nearly equal number of Republicans and Democrats voted against the measure are ignored. Americans don’t need to know that. They only need to know that rich and elitist Republicans voted against it. George W. Bush, a virtual recluse soon to be evicted from the White House, is scrambling around for a few spare billion. In the end, the automakers will get their money. Democrats will declare victory. Union members will continue to hate George W. Bush, dutifully following their leaders. The media will continue to bash Republicans even though most of them wanted to see a successful bailout bill.

But then, what about the money? $14 billion or $36 billion, the number really doesn’t matter, is basically a transfer payment to the UAW and skilled trade unions. GM and Chrysler execs will take a small cut for distributing the money in the form of paychecks. Union employees of GM and Chrysler will accept those paychecks, pay 35% in federal, state and local taxes, and then cough up another 4% to their respective unions. Who exactly benefited from this? Why government at all levels, of course. Taxpayer money given to the automakers comes back in the form of income, excise and sales tax paid by auto workers. Secondly, the union is guaranteed its income in the form of dues and management fees for retirement contributions and benefits taken from auto workers’ paychecks. And then, of course, auto execs can expect a little something under the Christmas tree this year for their heart-wrenching performance at the hearings.

The bailout money won’t be used to make the automakers more competitive, more stylish, more valuable or more environmentally friendly. The bailout will allow automakers and the labor unions to continue on as before, except that the government is now covering part of the horrendous operating losses. In order to be ‘responsible’ with taxpayer money, government bureaucrats will demand operating efficiencies from the car companies. And in response, the bureaucrats running those car companies will announce major cost-cutting programs designed to squeeze money out of everything and everyone.

Who gets hurt? Those who can least afford it. Stockholders have already been hammered, including GM retirees who held onto GM shares as part of their retirement programs. Banks and finance companies that have extended credit to GM and Chrysler are in a constant turmoil, re-stacking the loans and turning over paper so they don’t have to officially call in loans or notify the government that both firms are falling down on their obligations. GM and Chrysler employees who don’t belong to a union will take an awful drubbing. Many have already lost their jobs. The ones who remain are having an equally tough time. Just because GM and Chrysler have shed 20% of their white collar workforce over the last two years doesn’t mean that the work goes away. Designers, engineers, technicians, middle management and various specialists are working 50-60 hour work weeks, shouldering the load of their departed colleagues. Some are routinely working 80 hour weeks, frantically trying to keep ahead of a growing workload.

But those who suffer most and will suffer even more are the automotive suppliers - their shareholders, bondholders, managers and employees. And it’s the employees that hurt most. Unlike the major automakers, employees of auto suppliers are in a constant state of retrenching and readjusting their standard of living - downward. When auto executives demand better pricing for a tire, a piece of plastic or a radiator, the money comes right out of the pockets of supplier employees in the form of pay or benefit cuts, and/or working longer hours for the same net pay. If the supplier employees are themselves union members, the blow isn’t as severe, but the hurt is then pushed disproportionately onto unskilled, non-union employees. This is happening not because auto supplier managers are exploiting their workers. It’s that after a decade or more of cost-cutting demands from automakers, there’s no place else to go. Every ounce of fat has been squeezed out of these supplier companies.  Ironically, these supplier jobs are the ones that Washington claims to be protecting, along with automaker jobs. What will in fact happen is another round of pay and benefit cuts for supplier employees, or the plants close and the jobs move overseas.

The managers running the auto supplier firms aren’t doing much better than their employees. Fifteen years of aggressive cost-cutting and brutal global competition has left many auto suppliers in a fragile state - razor thin margins, shaky balance sheets and little, if any, working capital. The Detroit 3 have foisted the costs of their poor decision-making and inefficient business practices onto their supplier base, which is groaning under the load. The net result is that a single bankruptcy of a major automotive supplier can stop the flow of critical parts and supplies to an auto assembly line, shutting down production. If there are no vehicles to sell, there is no cash flow. No cash flow means nobody gets paid. Everything starts to unravel.

But there is a bright spot in this dark and dreary situation - only, it’s not in Detroit.  Ask any automotive supplier to name their most profitable, stable and problem-free account, and they’ll whisper the name of a Japanese, German or Korean manufacturer with plants in the US. Yes, the transplants are staying afloat and they’re fostering the kind of business relationships that allow their suppliers to do so, as well. Even in the midst of an economic free-fall, they’re doing better than their American competitors. Hhhmm. How could that be?

His Anointed Self Obama is now pledging to spend $1 trillion to ’stimulate’ the economy in 2009 with additional spending bills heaped on top of an already bulging, pork-laden 2009 budget that quietly passed earlier this year. That would put government spending in 2009 at roughly $5.5 trillion, or 4 times the ‘normal’ bulging, pork-laden budget that sails through Congress. That kind of money could rebuild every road in America, re-string every power and telephone line in the country and even build a few dozen new nuclear power plants. But that won’t happen. There will be a few signature projects, all of them failures, and the rest of the money will disappear down a rathole, leaving only debt service for taxpayers to fund well into the next century or four.

Our government is on the brink of insolvency. Obama, Pelosi, Reid, Schumer, Frank, Dodd and the rest of the socialist elitists controlling Congress and the White House will bankrupt this country. And, they don’t care. The more misery that exists, the more fodder they have for ratcheting down on those who suffer, blaming the rich and the Republicans for the mess the Democrats alone created. What a perfect setup: Lie to the American people. Make them suffer even more. Blame the uninvolved. Grab more power. It’s the Democratic way.

And what do conservatives and Republicans (not necessarily the same) do about this? Nothing. Instead of rabble-rousing the way liberals and socialists have, they hold back. They discuss. They write letters. No, that just won’t do any more.

President Elect Barack Obama has been tiptoeing around his campaign promises lately, carefully rephrasing his words and restating the problems he once sought to vanquish just by being Obama. There is little doubt that he and his cohorts in Congress will drive the country deeper in to debt with spending programs intended to reward his union supporters (please refer to earlier posts). That means infrastructure and school building projects that involve lots of union members and bureaucrats. This will be packaged up as an economic stimulus package, but that’s eyewash at best. In fact, it’s an outright fraud that our grandchildren and their children will still be paying off in the next century.

The best possible economic stimulus would be to enact a tax holiday - two months where no tax of any kind is collected. All the money is kept, and spent, by those who earned it. It’s an idea that’s been circulated previously and it would most certainly work better than anything coming out of Congress or the Office of the President-Elect. Which is why it will never happen.

Automakers are back in DC begging for money. Multimillionaire CEOs are compelled to grovel before narcissistic martinets filling the seats of both House and Senate hearing rooms. It’s a hoot. Ford CEO Mulally actually drove to DC. What an incredible waste of the man’s time. That noble gesture probably cost Ford Motor Company $10 million in delayed executive decisions and key milestones. The reason a gunslinger like Mulally can ask for a $36 million salary is because he makes billion-dollar business decisions every day. And he can’t be wrong, unlike the fools browbeating him from their bully pulpit in congressional hearing rooms.

Clowns like Barney Frank and Chris Dodd demand that senior management either vacate their positions or take a pay cut. Wagoner, Nardelli and Mulally offer a token pay cut. The automakers present plans for deep cuts in employee salaries and benefits for their non-union workforce. The UAW’s Ron Gettelfinger announces salary and benefit cuts for union employees. But what will remain unasked is what are the labor unions themselves giving up? Will Ron Gettelfinger and his cronies take a pay cut? Will they increase the co-pay on their own health insurance? Will there be any pay cuts or pink slips at Solidarity House? Will they at least stop showing up at labor-related events in stretch limousines? How about putting that posh union resort on Black Lake up for sale?

Democrat politicians don’t have the cajones to ask these questions. The labor unions own them. The labor unions funded them and put them in power. So the charade will continue. The productive part of the automotive industry - executives, managers, white-collar and blue-collar employees will feel the pain. The parasites - unions, politicians and bureaucrats - won’t feel a thing.

The $25 billion in taxpayer dollars granted (not a loan, but a gift) to US carmakers is not actually intended to keep these companies afloat. Rather, this is a payoff to labor unions for their unwavering support of the Democratic Party and its near-total sweep of Congress and the White House. The $25 billion, and the next $25 billion and whatever follows is largely earmarked for union workers, their health benefits and their pensions. And, it keeps union bosses flush with money from dues and ‘management fees’ derived from handling medical benefits and pensions investments. Very little of that taxpayer money will be used to develop new transportation technologies or enhance current vehicle technologies. And no, it won’t be used to develop high-mileage vehicles.

Because nearly everyone in America suffers from long-term memory loss, it’s important to understand what’s going on in Detroit and the impact this is going to have on the rest of the country. Two years ago, GM was able to shift its pension and benefits liabilities to the United Auto Workers, which gladly accepted this enormous responsibility. Ford and Chrysler will follow. Why? Because the UAW knew that if Democrats were in power, it would have no problem shifting these liabilities to the federal government and have all Americans chip in to cover their operating expenses and salaries. They’ve succeeded. Their plan has been executed to perfection. Now, it’s just a matter of cashing the checks from Washington.

In case this doesn’t make any sense to the reader, one must understand the perverted logic behind it all. It’s quite chilling. Union bosses actually don’t give a damn about the carmakers or the workers they claim to represent. They care about themselves and the union organization. They are perfectly willing to put the carmakers out of business and screw their own members out of pensions and benefits as long as the union continues to flourish. They can run the pensions into the ground, knowing that the Obama administration and a Democrat-controlled Congress will continue to bail them out until the cows come home. Sound familiar? It’s similar to what the parasites on Wall Street did — run their businesses irresponsibly, knowing that the government would be forced to make them whole at the taxpayer’s expense. It’s called moral hazard, a term everyone in America should get really familiar with. Look it up on wikipedia.org