They should because if they are denied my mommy and daddy are out of jobs and I'm stuck paying their bills because I'm the oldest daughter.



End.

Let me get this straight. It's rational/moral for you to be selfish, even if its damaging to someone, as long as its in the name of you pursuing happiness. It would be really awesome to see how well a society of people who think like this would operate.

It is the families that get lost in all of this...whole cities have already been decimated by loss of jobs in the auto area over the years(i.e. Flint). That is why I am still on the fence about this issue I don't think hard working people should be punished for the sins of a few greedy people in upper management who made some very poor decisions.. I honestly feel for you and wish your family the best...

But if we do bail them out we'll only be setting them up to fail again. I think people are going to end up losing jobs no matter what. It sucks, but it's the truth.

Its not that we're setting them up to fail, its just that IF they are bailed out this time, the Big 3 will have no incentive to change their policies, readjust their priorities, or restructure themselves in such a way which would be more satisfactory to the rest of us. They'll just keep asking for money every time they screw up from here on out if the government indulges them now.

So yeah, jobs are going to be lost either way: a short-term solution like a bailout will only make the inevitable long-term collapse even more disastrous.

If we bail them out and they use the money to start pushing smart and efficient cars they won't fail. This wouldn't be prolonging the inevitable. The problem is unless there's strict regulation and oversight that won't happen and seeing how well taxpayer money has been handled in the past...it'll pretty much be a disaster. It's a frustrating situation because neither option is good unless someone sits there and tells the auto industry what they need to start doing and what kind of cars they need to start making.

I think the Congress finally got slightly cynical because of the catastrophe that was that wall street bail out. I rarely agree with conspiracy theorists but Naomi Klien's shock doctrine is looking more and more accurate. If you don't know what that is she has this idea, the shock doctrine, which basically states that there's a partnership between big business and government (going way beyond lobbyists and politicians being in certain people's pockets.) She thinks what goes on is the government purposefully ignores problems and then there's a disaster and then business steps into fix the problem at a huge profit. I mean the people in charge of this had been in charge of some of these businesses, Paulson and and Kashkari for instance had both been very involved with Goldman Sachs and they demanded they be given this money no strings attached and with no regulation. So I can understand congress being very nervous about giving out anymore money. However millions of people will lose their job if the auto industry isn't saved and for political, social and economic reasons you can't let that happen. If you have that many people unemployed, most of whom will have no skills to take into other jobs you'll have a very long term problem with no simple fix.

It's very hard for me to wrap my mind around what Congress is doing with this and how they're acting. They willingly gave away seven hundred billion dollars to the financial industry and they wouldn't even consider the auto industries plea until they drove to DC from Detroit. Yes, flying in separate private jets was frivolous but these people offered to work for a dollar a year so I don't think they're as cash hungry as the financial industry in the slightest. I frankly question the intelligence of congress in their bailing out. Do they even know what the financial industry does? Because we know they don't think to even track the money they give out. They'll bail out the people who make paper transfer speculating on the future value of large groups of car loans but they won't bail out the people making the actual cars? Now cars are actually real and even the ones that are sold can be useful. Yes the auto industry's business model isn't just bad it's stupid and yes they lose two thousand dollars per car they sell but Wall Street lost seven trillion dollars without selling anything.

I don't know, I'm completely on the fence on this issue as well. On one hand I do not want to see millions of people laid off because that would just be horrible. On the other hand I don't trust congress with bailing out businesses nor do I trust the businesses to use the money efficiently. Not only that it seems like every company is asking for money now. I kind of think they should go into Chapter 11 and that would be a better way to deal with this...they just haven't been responsible and they haven't made a car worth buying in a long time.

We just gotta push it back a few years so my father can retire. Its just more convenient for me. Would that be a good argument to present to the senate?

There were 500,000 jobs lost in November in 2008...I heard that last nite. That is an astounding number. In the United Stated that is. I live near Wichita, KS and it is an aircraft industry town. Many of my friends and acquantances have lost there jobs...It is getting a little scary.

lol yeah present it to the Senate all you want and see how effective that is in getting Congress to sign the check. BASIC CIVICS PEOPLE, COME ON!

If you bail out Wall-Street with 300B

This is a no brainer.

I do think they should be bailed out, I imagine the social fallout of letting them go down would be enormous. I'm pretty sure the business will change direction, they are a company trying to make a profit, they might be wilfully short sighted, but if their business model is haemorrhaging cash then they will change it.

You know, you keep throwing the word rational in people's faces, but it's only rational in the context of your philosophy, which most people find absurd.

Alright premise 1. Morality is that which makes you happy. Would you then say senseless murder is moral as long as happiness is derived from it? Now what if someone else derives sorrow from senseless murder? We now have two contradictory objective truths. How can that which is objectively true not apply to someone or something in the same realms and dimensions as that which it applies to?

Aside from that, so far it seems that we're using the word to mean the same thing in a different way. You're just using an objective form for that which is subjective. So I ask how can an abstract idea be objective? How can something that doesn't exist within the same realms or dimensions as us be quantifiable and/or measurable by a scientific standard? The brain waves and chemical reactions that occur when you decide that something is either morally good or bad can be measured, but the actual morality of it is something that can not without a set standard. No such universal standard exists.
Premise 2. Morality can be rational. If something is only rational sometimes than it is capable of being irrational. How can something that is objective ever be irrational? A table is always a table. It is never rationally a table or irrationally a table.

Likewise, back to my previous example of senseless murder. If you believe that senseless murder is sometimes rationally moral and sometimes not chances are you have some form of multiple personality disorder and should seek mental help.

Since you seem to promote this ideaology it is rational to conclude that you probably suffer from a mental disability.

Yeah we're all ignorant sheep Obama followers who don't know anything about his policies and his stimulus package and economic plans actually consists of printing money.

Probably because I cared more about addressing the arrogant and stupid half.

I think its a decision that should be made (as all future bailout decisions should be) on the basis of how the failure of the big 3 would would affect America's economy in general. Personally I can only speculate on that, but i think the money would be better spent (or saved) elsewhere.

I don't disagree with the first, hyperinflation is horrible and they really need to examine who they're bailing out and when they do the companies need to be under strict regulation. It's only looking like will make money off AIG because the government owns over 80% of the stock the rest not so much...I've even heard Ford doesn't actually need the bail out they just want it.

Anyway after much leaning both ways I think the auto companies actually in trouble need to get into chapter eleven so they can restructure and if they can't, then tough shit they wouldn't have been very successful in the future anyway. Then we should start putting money towards shifting workers to new industries, like alternative energy!

That's a mistake on your part, arrogance and stupidity are to be ignored.

He'll be here all week...

And for the record I agree bankruptcy is just what the MD Rxed.

Where are you hearing that they're just printing brand new money off for the bail out?

I am pretty sure that this is unconstitutional...I think that is the last thing they would do right now because of the weakness of the U.S. dollar already but you have already stated this I believe...We are going to most likely be seeing deflation anyway over the next couple of years which is good for lower middle class ppl like me but is bad for the country as a whole...the bailout has failed at this point and that may change and they may use some of the 700 billion financial bailout money to help the auto industry...All I know is that the stockmarket is in the ****ter already this morning and I am afraid to even look at my retirement account...Things are really bad for the first time in my life as far as the economy goes...I mean really bad...It is scary when no one seems to have an answer.

This is falling apart in the Senate, figures.

The should be bailed out.
They ****ed up big time but if the supply base for GM has no company to supply, then millions of Americans will lose their jobs.
They should pay the CEOs $1 per annum though, I'm all about that.

I'd need more than just this one site to verify this because if this were true than there is a huge hole in your suggestion that you're either ignoring or not looking at. If that much money has been printed then why isn't the dollar already mega inflated?

It's hard for me to have a real opinion on this issue. I work at a bank so all day I hear people talking about the economy. The logical side of me agrees with the "capitalism" argument. This is America and it's not the goverment's place to dictate which company fails and which company is okay to help out. The humanitarian side of me wants everyone to have everything they want or need. I had a customer today who told me that, at his age of 56, this was his first time ever having unemployment. He worked for a tool and die company for 29 years. They went of business this year because GM owes them a couple million dollars that they aren't getting. This hard working man lost his job because of an entire other company.

He chose the job, did he not?

In addition to that, the unemployment rate has been rising (he's definitely not the only one) and the auto industries all had very very very bad business models. It wasn't hard to see this one coming, people don't want diesel trucks anymore they want hybrids.