Congressional Democratic leaders and the White House have finalized a deal to spend $15 billion on emergency loans for struggling U.S. automakers, officials said Wednesday.
The measure could see a House vote later Wednesday and be enacted by week’s end.
It would create a government “car czar” to dole out the loans, with the power to force the carmakers into bankruptcy if they didn’t cut quick deals with labor unions, creditors and others to restructure their businesses and become viable.
Congressional Republicans, left out of negotiations on the package, are expressing grave reservations and may seek to block it.
House leaders have scheduled a test vote on the bill.
The Democratic leadership is sufficiently confident of the prospects that such a bill could successfully be brought to the floor that they scheduled a procedural vote for later Wednesday.
The White House and the Democratic-run Congress have come to an accommodation on the broad outlines of such a rescue package, although some differences remain over the fine print.
An agreement on the $15 billion bridge loan was reached late Tuesday night following a two-hour conference call between congressional and White House staffers, who went over the 35-page proposal line by line, reports CBS News correspondent Thalia Assuras
Many are concerned that the $15 billion represents just a down payment on what may become a much larger package.
(Source: CBS News)
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6 Responses
A pound of Chicken $2.89 a pound, Tuition for a small child $10,000 a year, supporting your kollel son-in-law and daughter $35,000 a year, making a wedding $75,000. The automakers bailout plan $15,000,000,000. Venting on YWN, PRICELESS. There are some things in life, money can’t buy, for everything else, there is VISA!!!
Why are they doing this? If Americans have to budget and cut-back, so should our government. What will they do with the money? Will they continue to make a ton of shabby cars with the worst warranties in the auto industry? They have neglected to make cars that can compete with overseas automakers for a long time and they have known for a long time why people buy foreign cars. I dont want them bailed out. Let them do it the capitalist way; build a better mousetrap for a better price. We are spoiling what should be top of the line businesses run by top of the line executives.
do you people realize that 1 in 7 jobs is from the auto industry – how much unemployment can you stomach? Now its %.6.5 persent and then ad another %12 per cent on top of that!!
good money after bad. The US car makers have had their big heads under lots of sand for quite a while, making gas guzzlers when the economy, the environment and consumers want economical cars. instead of selling the same cars in the US as they sell in the rest of the world, they lobby politicians for bailouts. boo. I live in London, so care less, but I do drive a GM car.
If anyone deserves a bailout it is the U.S. Auto companies. They are the icon-example of individuals HERE IN THE USA who STILL DO NOT SHY AWAY FROM A HARD DAYS’ WORK to bring home $$$ to put food on the table. There isn’t anybody who was so taken advantage of as the US autoworkers, by our pandering to all the Asian carmakers & letting them DROWN us with their Hondas & Toyotas, Nissans & Mitsubishis, Accuras, Lexuses & Infinitis, Mazdzas & Subarus, Hyundais & Dihatsus – the list goes on. While we got the BAD end of the deal, the short end of the stick, ALL THE TIME! If I were the one calling the shots, I would impose A 50 % TARRIFF ON EVERY SINGLE PRODUCT & SERVICE PRODUCED OR PERFORMED OFF THE SHORES OF THE UNITED STATES. Boy! Would you see the economy bounce back in no time! The idea of a “global” economy is a terrible mistake & disaster for America. You cannot pretend that people who need over $100,000 a year just to pay minimum bills can “share an economy” with people who live on $300 a year. It just doesn’t work! And the drunk liberals who concocted this as part of their sick idea of a “world order” (the way THEY would like to see it) could find no better time than now to wake up from their misrable dream and face the abysmal reality that this thinking has created.
If anyone does NOT deserve bailout money it is the sheisters on Wall Street, who never produced any product, only were adept at taking your money, making a big fortune for themselves & leaving you with a “small fortune”, sometimes with $0.00. Please note that a large number of these white-collar crooks (I shy away from saying “the majority”, but it’s close to it) are also foriegners – Asians & Europeans who came over here to invade our shores financially. We need to learn SELFISHNESS & SELF-MOTIVATED DRIVE from these foriegners who come here to further their agenda, particularly the Asians (try to get a Chinese to give you HIS shirt for a cleenee, or any other business for that matter). Anyway $700 BILLION to these loan-shark masters, and a measly $25b (or do Ihear on $15 billion!) to the good-old automakers?!!! If anything it should be the opposite way around!
The gov’t should kick out the non-working crooks from Downtown NYC, and turn Wall Street into a huge factory for GM, Ford and Chrysler (so long as they don’t band with the Germans). BTW – It would be a good idea if, for a while, these “big three” original USA automakers should band together and the Gov’t do EVERYTHING IN ITS POWER to get them back on their feet for good.
We need to know that another scourge that has brought these legendary giants to their knees is the curse of the unions. The unions were meant to accomplish something good – to ensure that workers do not get abused by their employers. But, like everything else, they turned into someting evil & destructive. They became the decrepit oracle of the chronically corrupt socialist bosses who come up with daily schemes just to scuttle any effort by the companies to advance & grow. And guess what – in Asia there are no unions. It’s slave labor in many cases.
Just because they made lousy cars, overpaid their workers, and ridiculously overpaid managers (a huge multiple of what non-American car execs get)
If you don’t bail our rich and corrupt fools, then the fools will stop paying campaign contributions to our politicians, and how will our politicians get by. Silly.