Auto and other bail outs

A friend sent me this article on the auto bail out. I disagree with a lot of things this guy has to say. Aside from being a car company shill, his logic seems flawed to me. He says:

"Loan assistance from the federal government that tries to control the companies too tightly, that forces them to bring to market vehicles that the public may not want, might simply assure that they fail somewhat later rather than sooner."

I have news for you, Mr. Nerad. The public wants fuel efficient vehicles. You don't see them bitching about airbags, do you?

He then says:

"Instead of simply limiting foreign imports or adding federal taxes to fuel costs to give consumers an incentive to buy more fuel-efficient vehicles,the government instituted byzantine regulations that required American manufacturers to build (or at least market) fuel-efficient cars just so they could continue selling the cars and trucks they were already known for."

Excuse me? Nerad seems to be arguing that limiting foreign imports would have given the American public an incentive to buy more fuel efficient cars. Why? This is wrong on so many levels. First, those fuel efficient cars he's talking about were only available as imports back then. American cars weren't fuel efficient. So if you couldn't get the fuel efficient import car, how were you going to have an incentive to buy a fuel efficient car?? There's no incentive created there. And since you couldn't have bought a fuel efficient car anyway, you would have bought the American gas guzzling boat. How on earth would making that boat people's only option give the American car company any incentive to build anything else? This is exactly what the American auto makers wanted - less competition, so they wouldn't have to offer fuel efficient cars.

Secondly, adding federal taxes to fuel costs would have had the same effect. Americans would have bought more fuel efficient cars, surely - and since only imports were really fuel efficient at the time, it would have increased sales of foreign cars! Which actually happened anyway, and the big 3 didn't respond.

What's funny is that later in the article Nerad argues that the foreign automakers' voluntary limitations on imports helped create "strong dealer networks" and "windfall profits" for foreign auto companies, and in turn hurt the U.S. manufacturers. But in the quote above, limitation on foreign imports IS EXACTLY THE THING HE WAS ARGUING FOR. Which is it, Jack? You can't have it both ways.

As to the second part, about forcing U.S. automakers to offer "other" cars "just so they continue selling the cars they were already known for, this is terrible logic again. First, if automakers didn't want to offer new brands, they could have made their "well known" brands more fuel efficient. Simple. Second, they weren't "forced" to do this just so they could keep selling their famous models. That makes it sound like the govt. stepped in and put this heinous condition on them willy nilly. Nope. They were going under, and guess what they were going under from? Selling their "well known" (but shitty) cars.

The driving argument behind all this seems to be that American car makers needed time to catch up to the foreign companies in order to be able to offer fuel efficient cars. I wonder if they're "geared up" yet? BECAUSE THEY'VE HAD 30 YEARS. Is that enough, or should we wait a few more decades?

Blaming the American car manufacturers' woes on govt. regulations from 1980 is downright silly. American cars suck, bottom line. Every argument he brings up can be countered by one sentence addressed to domestic auto makers:

BUILD A BETTER FUCKING CAR.

Anyway, here's another article on why at least one of the big three shouldn't get a bailout, for another reason - they already have all the money they need.

And a few more facts about corporate greed to make your blood boil.