A Brief History…

UPDATE: The UAW has been putting out talking points. Here is a rebuttal of them

This morning the talk shows focused on the failed bailout proposal and, of course, the UAW and the Democrats are blaming “Republican hatred of unions.” I have previously posted my opinion about who is at fault and Megan McArdle seems to agree with me.

I’m hearing the truly bizarre argument that the UAW didn’t scuttle the negotiations; it was the Republicans unreasonable insistence that they cut their wages to levels comparable to that of their competition. After all, the UAW was perfectly willing to negotiate their compensation package–in 2011, when their current contract expires.

And I think that’s perfectly reasonable. We’ll just wait until 2011 to give them the money, then.

I couldn’t have put it better myself. Of course, the Democrats and their allies are lying about the opponents of the bailout.

On ABC’s “This Week” this morning, Paul Krugman repeats the left talking point that Senator Bob Corker led the opposition to the auto bailout because he’s the “Senator from Nissan.”

I saw Senator Levin say on Face the Nation that Senator Corker was OK but “The Republican Leadership” refused to compromise. The compromise was to allow the UAW to continue business-as-usual until 2011. There would either be no GM by 2011 or there would be another 200 billion in federal subsidies already paid out by then. GM has 52 billion in current debt obligations and is losing money every week. The UAW wants the British Leyland solution.

British Leyland, a car company that went through £11 billion of inflation-adjusted British taxpayer money, or $16.5 billion, in the ’70s and ’80s before going out of business. All that is left of the company now are memories of cars like the Triumph, and a painful lesson in the limited effectiveness of bailouts.

One word of warning for Obama and the Democrats: The British Leyland fiasco was nearly the last straw for the British people with the Labour Party. Two years later, they elected Margaret Thatcher’s Conservatives.

Tags: auto industry, BRitish Leyland, Democrats, GM, Michigan., Obama

This entry was posted on Sunday, December 14th, 2008 at 2:02 pm and is filed under Europe, financial, politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.