Well, the House has approved the ill-fated bailout of Detroit, mostly along party lines. It is clear that the Dems are serious about paying back the big unions for their support in the election and that they want the American taxpayer to foot the bill for it.
The only good thing I can say about this is that my own Representative, Frank Wolf (R-VA) actually voted against this bill. Maybe because of the letters he recieved from people like me or maybe because he has looked back at the dismal failure of the Wall Street bailout and thought better of doing the same thing again.
Now, we have to stop the measure from passing in the Senate. According to Bloomberg:
| The House approved a $14 billion loan package intended to prevent a collapse of domestic automakers that would threaten millions of U.S. jobs. The 237-170 vote sends the measure to the Senate, where opposition is growing. ... Some Republicans said the measure would waste taxpayer money without saving the companies from collapse. The bailout “won’t save a single job,” said Representative David Dreier, a California Republican. ... In the Senate, Republicans said the bill lacked the 60 votes needed to overcome delaying tactics threatened by some members. Democrats have a 50-49 edge in the Senate. |
It's time to get going and write your Senators. Ask them to vote "Nay" on the automaker bailout. It is destined to fail as surely as the Wall Street bailout failed.
Besides, given that Congress has been running massive deficits and cannot balance a budget, can we really trust them to prevent the Big Three from going into bankruptcy? I am not the smartest man in the world, but even I know better than that.
You can access Congressional email directories on-line here:
Congressional Email Directory
Just click on your state and you will be taken a page with contact links for your Congressional delegation.
Here is a sample of what you can email to your Senator. Feel free to copy and paste it:
Dear Senator, I am writing this email to ask you to vote "Nay" on the automaker bailout bill which recently passed the House of Representatives (H.R. 7321). This bill is destined to be a dismal failure just as the $700 billion Wall Street bailout was a failure and huge waste of taxpayers money. It is already bad enough that our children and grandchildren are going to have to pay for these bailout failures. We need to stop this foolishness now before we begin saddling a debt on our great-grandchildren as well. The best thing to do for Detroit is to let them go into Chapter 11. That way, they can reorganize and retool. This will allow them to modernize as the foreign carmakers have done and Detroit can become competitive again. Right now, the Big Three have manpower costs such that they must pay over $70 an hour to build a car whereas other automakers can do the same job for $35 to $45 an hour. Bailing out Detroit will only prolong the inevitable and waste billions of taxpayer dollars in the process. As a final note, you should realize that hundreds of thousands of small businesses across the United States are in danger of failing, but no one is proposing to bail any of them out. Please apply that same standard to Detroit. Thank you. |
You can access the complete article on-line here:
House Approves Automaker Bailout, Sends It To Senate
John Hughes
Bloomberg.com
December 10, 2008
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