Would Romney have deployed a better option for U.S. auto-maker GM than President Obama? Appears as though Mitt Willard Romney would have also disagreed with President Bush as well. (BTW... it was a "loan" not a "bailout".) I think Romney's call to send GM into 'bankruptcy', would have resulted in economic disaster. How much can we trust this guy; the likely Republican nominee for POTUS? (As far as I'm concerned, we can't trust him very much to make these types of decisions.)
Here's the thing ... Conservative Republicans want to hear that the GM Loan was a bad idea ... It doesn't matter what the Facts show ... they don't want to hear it was successful. So if they get a GOP Candidate to support their lie ... then they will swallow as much of it as they can ... even if they choke on it. What on earth does this remind you of?
Who cares if it was successful? Was it Constitutional? Is it moral to bail out certain failing businesses and not others? Who paid the INTEREST on the loan? How much did it cost taxpayers?
I thought that progressives liked breaking up powerful corporations? Did your crystal ball tell you that nothing good would come of the downfall of GM? Say a few spin-offs of better car makers? Did this help the more successful companies who did not need government aid? Well then, it was not a decision that supported maximizing efficiency and rewarding success. Chrysler is garbage and should have failed for sure.
Of course, what you think about a company, any company, declaring bankruptcy legally is totally irelevant. You might also think Barack Obama would make a lovely benevolent dictator. Of course, when you can take assets that rightfully belong to bondholders and shift them to your criminal accomplices, the union, what's the problem? Ehrn you can announce the loan is paid back you can rest assured that when people find out it was paid back with another government load the acolytes of Obama will ignore the reality. I don't know of another liberal Republican would be good or bad but I do know he'd be better than what we have now. Would you trust Barack Obama? I wouldn't. Liberals can say that in 2008 they ddin't know. They, like their King, can deny responsibility. But, not any longer. You can deny but we all know you know.
I don't see where letting GM go through normal bankruptcy would have been a disaster. The profitable parts of it (Corvette, Cadillac, Buick in China, GM Powertrain) would have been bought up. The losers (Opel is notorious) would be sold off at the usual ten cents on the dollar. Creditors and investors would receive their share of the revenue from the bankruptcy sale. Why is this so horrible?
Not in the least. Where in the Constitution does it say that the federal government has the power to extend loans to failing corporations? Then explain why the GM bailout cost taxpayers $14B.
A lot of laws (allowing any number of things) cannot be directly quoted from the U.S. Constitution. I'm no lawyer and don't pretend to be a 'court' of law. Even so, many have taken government loans before, so I'm sure enough helping GM was Constitutional. GM is paying it back, with interest. It was a LOAN... not a "bailout". A bailout is more akin to you paying your kid's VISA bill, after they've run it up far beyond that they'll ever be able to pay back. That, is a "bailout". GM received a LOAN, not a 'bailout'.
It was a bailout, the taxpaying citizenry of the US is still on the hook for a third of that company. And yes it's unconstitutional to provide a bailout to a private industry. http://mises.org/daily/3627
No, it wasn't. When you are afforded money with the expectation that it must be paid back (with interest)... that is commonly referred to as being a "loan".
The US taxpayer still owns a third of the company... GM will never pay the "loan" back... they can't because they build crap that nobody want's to buy.
It is a loan. And it seems for now, it was worth the financial risk affording GM the same. How YOU feel about it, I won't even try to change.
The government bought 61% of GM at the taxpayers expense, and still has 32% of it. The shares it sold were for $33 a share. Taxpayers lost money. The government gave GM $49.5 billion of which $6.7 billion was a loan, the rest was the 61% stake in the company. So when PrezBO declares that GM has paid back the "loan" that only means the $6.7 billion... the rest is a taxpayer funded loss.
I will have to see what others say about the math on that. Even so, I'm certain that with GM's failure possibly affecting one million plus jobs, the investment was worth it. I think the government GAINED, once all things are properly considered.
The auto bail out was misguided. It ended up becoming a feeding frenzy by Obama's labor union crony capitalist friends. Corruption.
Not quite. A bankruptcy reorganiziation would have allowed GM to break their union contract/pension agreements, and emerge from the process a much healthier company. The bailout was to protect the Union.
I like being able to fire people who provide services to me. - Mitt Romney The General Motors bankruptcy came at the height of the economic recession, and there were no banks or other lenders to provide GM with DIP (Debtor in Possession) financing to continue operations in Chapter 11; without which, the company would have been DOA (dead on arrival) the date of the filing of the bankruptcy petition, precipitating liquidation as happened in the Circuit City bankruptcy and that cost over 35000 jobs. The government (and that of Canada as well) were the only entities that could provide the necessary DIP financing to GM; which was critical because the failure of General Motors would have resulted in a tidal wave of subsidiary business failures and bankruptcy liquidations across the country and loss of millions of jobs. President Obama was right to intervene in the GM bankruptcy case. He did it because it was necessary - he did it to save American jobs. And as it turned out, the bankruptcy reorganization worked well as attested by GMs profitability today. Mitt Romney has criticized President Obama for the government intervention in the GM bankruptcy case; but then Mit Romney made his fortune by eliminating jobs. What does that say about him?
