From Park To Reverse

A new CNN poll out ahead of tomorrow's Big 3 automaker Congressional hearings is more bad news for Detroit.

A new national poll suggests that six in 10 Americans oppose using taxpayer money to help the ailing major U.S. auto companies.

Sixty-one percent of those questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corp. survey released Wednesday are dead set against the federal government providing billions of dollars in assistance to the automakers, while 36 percent favor such a bailout.

The poll, conducted Monday and Tuesday, also indicates that a majority of Americans, 53 percent, don't think government assistance for the automakers would help the U.S. economy.

"Only 15 percent say that they would be immediately affected if the auto companies went bankrupt," said CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. "Seven in 10 say that a bailout would be unfair to American taxpayers."

Evidence strongly suggests that the Big 3 CEOs slit their own throats last month.

In early November, polls indicated that nearly half the public supported federal assistance to the big automakers when the issue first came before Congress. But evidence in surveys from other organizations suggested that the poor performance by executives from GM, Ford and Chrysler at congressional hearings, and the admission that they had flown in private jets to get there, resulted in a steep drop in support for the aid.

Even if the Big 3 do come up with a plan, the fact of the matter is they got into this mess by making cars Americans didn't want to buy, or couldn't afford to buy, and Americans who do buy cars aren't going to buy them from a company that most likely won't be around in 2009, much less five or ten years down the road.

Chrysler and GM say without billions in loans before the end of the month, they're goners. Ford may survive but not without the manufacturing subcontracting infrastructure that they share with GM and Chrysler. Short of a protectionist government backlash against foreign car companies, I don't see how the Big 3 can retool fast enough to survive without taking tens of billions in government cash.

And even so, if you're going to buy a new car on a 4 or 5 year loan and need that car to make it ten years or more, you're not going to be looking at a GM or Chrysler vehicle right now. No way. Should these companies go bankrupt and reorganize, loan companies will stop making loans on their products. They're all but done.

Which is depressing, because the practical upshot is if the Big 3 go under, the job losses will number up to 5 million more Americans out of work in this dismal economy. Some tough choices are going to have to be made well ahead of Obama's inauguration.