Things I thought I'd never see on DU, #42,421:

[Occam Bandage]

Pro-labor Democrats absolutely livid with rage over the way management at a historically anti-union megacorp has been treated by the Democratic White House.

[Avalux]

1. Bizarro World.

I can't quite understand it either; best thing Obama could have done for the UAW.

[Eric J in MN]

3. Is the new CEO more sympathetic to unions?

I'd have preferred if Obama said that none of the executives at GM can make more than his presidential salary.

[Avalux]

5. I don't know if he is or not.

But as I heard one union member say today - GM has a lot of different people who can step into the CEO role. I think what's happened is necessary - it will force GM to move forward and restruction and the government will have a good deal of control over it. Subsidizing a move towards electric cars is a big start.

[Eric J in MN]

10. How are they subsidizing a move towards electric cars? NT

NT

[Avalux]

12. Granholm brought it up today -

it's something she wants to see and I agree; I'm hoping the Obama Admin will help GM do this and somehow salvage our auto industry. We all know they can't continue as they are. Can't keep giving them money without a drastic change in their business model.

[lonestarnot]

17. Reportedly not.

[Morning Dew]

71. or that none could make more than their union employees. nm

[Eric J in MN]

2. It was accompanied by the White House telling GM to cut retiree health benefits.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123845522845271355.html

=================
"It will require unions and workers who have already made extraordinarily painful concessions to do more," Mr. Obama said...

The (White House automaker) task force found that GM's own plan to deal with retiree health care and pensions grows "to unsustainable levels, reaching approximately $6 billion per year in 2013 and 2014." To pay those bills, GM would need to sell 900,000 additional cars a year, according to the panel. GM sold 8.35 million vehicles around the world last year.
================

[Avalux]

7. So what is the alternative?

GM goes belly up; pensions and benefits evaporate and workers out in the cold? Unfortunately neither is optimal but something needs to be done.

[rhett o rick]

58. Here's the deal. If the retirees don't get to keep their benefits then the company can go to hell.

Don't give me the bullshit that the union needs to take cuts for the company to succeed. The execs ripped off the money and instituted bad policies. Get the money back from the thieves or put them in jail. DO NOT TELL ME THAT THE MIDDLE CLASS NEEDS TO TAKE CUTS, the rich have raped these companies. They need to make it good. Or let the government take over the companies.

[anigbrowl]

80. You always assume money lost = money stolen

You could take back every cent every GM manager has made in the last decade and it wouldn't make that much difference to the bottom line...because GMs problem was that their cars were too big and expensive for the market. They just didn't make enough money when times were good, or use the money that they did make wisely. Where do you plan on getting this money from, everyone who bought a hummer or an SUV that was underpriced relative to the cost of manufacture?

[rhett o rick]

82. I understand what you are saying, however, the company took money from the employees to keep

for their retirement. That money shouldn't have been used for operations or for exec pay. That money was stolen. This is happening across the nation. I know of a personal case right here in river city. The company used the retirement money to stay afloat for a few years longer while the managers took huge salaries, knowing the company was going down. In effect the retirement money went directly into the pockets of the managers leaving the employees without any retirement.

[anigbrowl]

86. About that sort of thing I have no disagreement.

[dflprincess]

8. Auto workers lose their health insurance

but bank executives get their bonuses.

That's what people are angry about.

[EmilyAnne]

25. This is not Obama's fault. Executives at GM, Chrysler, etc. get their fat bonuses, too.

The autoworkers at these companies have been screwed by their executives.

[Occam Bandage]

9. That is not what I am talking about.

It is people screeching about how unfair it was that Rick Wagoner, who was an-anti labor hardliner and who managed to lose 90% of GM's market value during his tenure, was made to step down with a $20 million golden parachute, and doing so from a "pro-worker" perspective. It is absolutely bizarre.

[ellie]

85. No kidding

He should be put in the stockade outside the RenCen and let the workers take a shot at him with a bushel of Michigan grown apples. He's fucking management!

[Gman]

53. what's worse...

reduced pension or no pension?

[Canuckistanian]

4. No kidding

I'm always haunted by Roger & Me. I take it out every once in a while and watch it.

It makes me doubt our so-called "capitalist" society, if such cruelty is accepted as "just business".

GM has never been, in the long run, a positive force for workers.

[scarletwoman]

6. Uh, maybe it's because all the union workers are going to get screwed?

You know; pensions cancelled, retiree health care benefits cancelled, hard-fought wage agreements cancelled?

It's irrelevant that the auto companies didn't like the unions, the workers still had their union. Along with all the benefits that they battled for years to put in place.

Obama is enabling union-busting bigtime. Pro-labor Democrats SHOULD be enraged!

sw

[Occam Bandage]

11. That's what happens when business models fail. What Obama is proposing is going

to do more to save workers than simply pumping them cash for another six months would do. I mean, he could cut them another check, and another check after that, until the public gets sick of cutting them checks and they completely fail. That's the alternative. There is no happy solution when major industries fail. The best auto workers can hope for is for an intelligently designed reorganization performed under government protections.

For comparison, look at the airlines. They got their government checks, they got their government checks, they continued to falter, then the government checks stopped coming and they all went bankrupt. And the workers ended up taking 50% pay/benefit cuts or worse, along with mass layoffs. Cutting management another check only prolongs the collapse for workers. Better to reorganize while there's still something left to reorganize.

[BeFree]

14. So

It looks like we are going to pay the pensions for the UAW. Who else will? China?

None of this pension problem is new, it's been told on this board for years. No solution yet and GM is going broke. Who's gonna pay the bills?

[Eric J in MN]

19. If GM goes bankrupt, then the pensions may not be paid at all. NT

NT

[G_j]

15. but I see no reason that any blue collar worker, should sacrifice

while the invisible, blood and sweat money, is flowing out to "save" the economy.

[Occam Bandage]

21. Yes, it would be nice if workers didn't get pay cuts when their employers went bankrupt.

It would be nice if businesses didn't have things like "income" and "expenses" and "profits" and "losses" and could just give out jobs with lots of money for everyone. I know I'd have liked to have the $10/hr I lost when Northwest went under.

[G_j]

30. I understand that, but

it is a double standard, and the last person who needs to pay is the American worker.

[Occam Bandage]

33. When a business can't pay workers any more, then what is a good solution?

Should the government pay the difference indefinitely? I mean, I know it sucks whenever anyone has to take a pay cut, but that doesn't mean that the government must ensure that pay cuts should never be taken by anyone.

[G_j]

51. I think

this industry can be harnessed to build whatever is needed to make the appropriate changes we need to make for a sustainable future.

[dflprincess]

54. I think if tax money can be used to pay the for bonuses

the sacred Wall Street contracts required for the crooks that got us in this mess, it can be used to at least pay the pensions the workers' contracts promised.

[Political Heretic]

76. ABSO FUCKING LUTELY.

[EmilyAnne]

27. If the economy isn't "saved," the blue collar will suffer, too. Not just the autoworkers,

of course.

[G_j]

42. sacrifice is an honorable and important lesson for any human being

but unless they adopt a level playing field, these workers may need to sacrifice only the slightest morsel, if anything.
Level the field and the whole picture changes proportion.

[EmilyAnne]

52. I think the sacrifice they will have to make is not honorable, but horrible. They have done

absolutely nothing to deserve this, nothing to screw over their fellow Americans, nothing but work for companies that were allowed to ignore the realities of a changing market.
I agree with you that, ethically speaking, they "should not" have to suffer as the big wigs on Wall Street eat their free lunch.

Still, I am convinced that our entire economy is a sham created by decades of deregulation. We are going to have to slowly dismantle it, layer by layer, two steps forward and one step back, until we can figure out exactly what of any value we have on our hands. The banking sector will have to be a major focus.
There hasn't been a level playing field for the American worker in a very long time and its not going to happen until we break things down and regulate any growth.

I want the banking executives to be displayed in stocks in the town square. But, there is the rational side of me that acknowledges that there is far too much at stake to just allow it to all come crashing down. It makes me sick. Its not just. But its the inevitable fruits of a very corrupt tree that was planted long ago.

[G_j]

59. I have a slight, if no, grip on economics.

so I can only speak from what it looks like from my limited POV.
I do believe that fairness should be at top of priorities.

[brentspeak]

65. If you think that forking over trillions of tax dollars to crooked Wall St. firms

will "save" the economy, I suggest you draw your life savings from the bank and send it along with every future paycheck you'll get to the White House, in care of "Goldman Sachs" or "JP Morgan Chase" or to the hedge fund of your choice.

[Eric J in MN]

16. If the government gave GM the support it gave CitiGroup, then GM would be doing fine.

CitiGroup was able to sell the government $50 billion in Preferred Shares, which they can convert in a way favorable to the corporation, and $300 billion in guarantees.

GM got $9.4 billion in loans through January.

[Occam Bandage]

20. And if they gave my dog a third of that, he'd eat bacon every day. So?

Really, what does that have to do with anything? Is the argument now, the government should give every business that doesn't do well free money as long as it wants? I understand disliking the concept of giving financial businesses bailouts (never mind that they represent more 'value' at risk than the entire world could produce in a year), but what does that have to do with GM?

[EmilyAnne]

29. But what could GM do with that money and support? How could it become a viable, relevant company?

[girl gone mad]

57. Is AIG becoming a "viable, relevant company"?

NO.

Were they asked to show how they would become a "viable, relevant company" before we handed them HUNDREDS of billions of dollars?

NO.

[Occam Bandage]

69. It's not viable, but it's extraordinarily relevant.

That's the problem.

[girl gone mad]

78. I don't think it's any more relevant than GM.

They sold phony financial insurance. Their other businesses are performing poorly. They are only relevant in the sense that their biggest counterparties are extremely well connected politically.

Don't forget, GM has at least $1T in outstanding derivatives contracts.

[Eric J in MN]

74. If they limited what executives got paid...

...to $400,000/year, for example, and prioritized electric cars, that would be a new business model.

Not one I'm predicting, but one I'd prefer.

[brentspeak]

63. In that case, I take it you'll be hitting the phone tomorrow

to blast the White House for giving trillions to Wall St., right?

[Occam Bandage]

68. Why would I? I have no idea if Geithner's plan was a good one or not.

I'm no economist.

[earth mom]

84. Then Obama & Co should let the god damn banks fail too.

Otherwise your argument holds no weight and is total b.s.

[Zhade]

40. Ah. Thanks for the reality check, SW.

NT!

[Odin2005]

13. People are losing their minds it seems.

I feel like I'm in the loony asylum now. :crazy:

[MADem]

18. Yeah. A lot of crazy things up in here of late. nt

[nonconformist]

22. Who is sad about the way Wagoner has been treated?

I've only seen righteous rage about the DOUBLE STANDARD re: GM vs AIG, Citbank, BoA. I've only seen righteous rage about how the unions are expected to make even more concessions. I've only seen righteous rage about how GM and Chrysler have been demonized for needing 17 billion while the banks have been handed hundreds of billions of dollars in several bailouts.

I would say that something I never thought I'd see on DU was people saying it was fine and dandy for US auto makers to file for bankruptcy and potentially fail, but I would be lying. I'm sadly not surprised, really.

[texastoast]

72. I'm pissed about Wagoner

He shouldn't have taken a PENNY. GM made one business mistake after another. No goldhat should be allowed to take a dime after that kind of performance.

[Mithreal]

81. It wouldn't serve the op to be honest about that. nt

[EmilyAnne]

23. And the CEO who stepped down was not on good terms with the UAW. But its such a travesty that he is

going when no one else has stepped down (aside from the heads of Fannie, Freddie and AIG...and the forcing of Bear Stearns to sell at $2 a share...and the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy).

Its a sad reality, but people need to face that, yes, the banking system has more leverage than GM and Chrysler.
The failure of the banking system will bring further reaching disaster than the failure of GM and Chrysler.
Nevertheless, the president is giving them another 30 days.

[girl gone mad]

60. No offense, but you sound like a shill for the banks.

You always have.

Transferring debt off of the balance sheet of banks and onto the national balance sheet without asking bondholders to take a haircut and forcing management out is not saving our economy. It's merely allowing a bloated, parasitic banking system to keep sucking the middle class dry.

Contrary to the empty rhetoric you post, most analysts believe shrinking the financial sector considerably would be a net benefit to the economy. Finance has grown far too large and useless. It contributes very little of real value. The heart of any viable economy is manufacturing. Every other sector services manufacturing. Without a healthy manufacturing sector, all of those support jobs - laywers, bankers, waiters, Wall Street traders - will disappear.

[EmilyAnne]

79. "You always have." Laughing my ass off. I love the superlative. It reminds me of hearing an

argument between my parents when I was a little kid.
"You ALWAYS leave your wet towels on the bathroom floor!"
"You ALWAYS forget to balance the checkbook!"

The problem here is that you and I have different interpretations of the same information.
I don't think that anyone is advocating "transferring debt off of the balance sheet of banks and onto the national balance without asking bondholders to take a haircut and forcing management out." That's absurd and is not in any Geithner or Obama plan as far as I see.
Yet, you look at the same plans and you come to such a conclusion.

Shrinking the financial sector is inevitable, but how fast, how, how much, at what cost, etc.?
I believe it must be taken apart slowly, piece by piece, layer by layer, so as to ascertain the valuable from the less valuable and the junk from the worthless.
I think there are too many absolutes in the criticisms of Geithner.
All toxic assets are worthless and the government is going to buy them all?
Private investors, motivated by greed and the profit motive, are suddenly going to not mind losing some money just because the government will be losing more?
So, they won't care about looking at the assets' portfolios and determining an appropriate bid?
Krugman and most other economists, even those who are supportive of Geithner, have not laid eyes on the relative information that Obama and Geithner have seen.

As far as manufacturing jobs...we need to be competitive.
GM and Chrysler autoworkers have been screwed by their executives as well as oil lobbyists and Bush/Cheney.
There were no real attempts to be competitive, to deal with changing environmental reality, to deal with changes in consumer tastes.
We can't just bring back the manufacturing jobs that have moved abroad.
A dying automotive manufacturer can not miraculously turn into a brand that inspires consumer confidence and churns out well designed and competitive products.
We need to create new manufacturing industry that we can excel at and accept reality about those that are now obsolete.

We are dealing with decades of freewheeling, unregulated mayhem in both the financial and the manufacturing sectors.
We are going to suffer the consequences.
There is just no way around that.
How do you escape a completely f'ed up situation?
Start over from scratch?
Burn the whole place down?

I say, we start with the possible and the practical.

As far as being a shill for the banks...my mother cleans houses for a living.
My dad is a salesman/ unpaid preacher. He has been getting screwed by the executives since I was born, but he had that old school "company loyalty" thing that translates to him working there for almost 40 years. His 401K is zapped. He is 64 and has no retirement prospects. They offered him a severance package to voluntarily retire that was 20% what he expected.
My husband is probably getting laid off in April. I teach English to refugees and elderly immigrants.
So, that is the profile of the kind of person who thinks the way I do.
For what its worth.

[Spazito]

83. Wow! Well said!

I agree with everything you said. I wish I could recommend your post.

[MannyGoldstein]

24. My Problem Is the Disparity In Which The Companies are Treated By The Administration

The blue-collar companies and their CEOs are treated like crap for asking for a few tens of billions in loans, and are kept hanging for months. The bankers are treated with kid gloves when they ask for hundreds of times more money, and the cash is handed right over along with a "heads they win, tails we lose" guarantee.

Unbelievable.

[Occam Bandage]

31. Why do you care if a handful of multimillionaire CEOs are "treated like crap?"

A blue-collar company CEO is just as wealthy for just as little work as a white-collar company CEO. Plus, unlike the white-collar company CEO, the blue-collar company CEO spends a great part of his time working on ways to minimize the power of blue-collar workers.

[MannyGoldstein]

43. I Care About The Companies. The CEOs Can All Get Shitcaned.

But the difference in how they are treated by Obama is startling.

And the white-collar company CEOs have done far, far more to economically sodomize the working person than auto company CEOs could ever dream of doing. But they all are rotten, and should be jettisoned.

[Occam Bandage]

46. I don't know, I think the whole wall-street-bonus thing was pretty nasty.

We were trying to strip the performance-based compensation (which, for many people, was their primary income) from thousands of people for no crime but working for a company that had other divisions that made some terrible decisions. AIG even had to issue a memo to its entire workforce warning people to not wear any clothing with the AIG logo when walking outside alone.

Of course, that doesn't matter. Obviously you don't care about the CEOs, and are only using them as a symbol. But really: how strange is it when labor is complaining about how poorly management is treated in Washington, even if only as a symbol?

[Two Americas]

26. you are misrepresenting people's views

People are worried about the union being sold out, That is a serious and legitimate concern. You disingenuously characterize that as concern for management.

Why would you be attacking pro-union people here, and doing it in a misleading and deceptive way?


...

[Occam Bandage]

28. Oh, well then, it's a good thing I haven't seen any references to Wagoner then!

Oh, wait.

[Two Americas]

32. don't be silly

I am certain that you know better than this. You saw a way to make trouble over this and divide people here, and get in a blow against your perceived enemies, and you exploited it.

You know that pro-labor people are not defending management. You must know that.


...

[Occam Bandage]

35. Sure I do, and I understand why people like to bring up Wagoner:

because he makes a natural comparison to the way financial execs were treated, and therefore he serves as a handy shorthand for "look we blue-collar GM folk are treated differently from white-collar Wall Streat folk." Politics often makes strange bedfellows; sometimes, those bedfellows are hilarious. I really never thought I'd see the day when UAW allies were angrily denouncing the humiliating firing of an incompetent, anti-labor CEO of GM.

[Two Americas]

87. still way off

People see the danger of bankruptcy being used to crush the Union. That is not siding with management, as your simple minded formula suggests. They also see that an industry that actually produces something, and that represents thousands of Union jobs, is being held to a different standard than the financial industry is. That is not siding with management, either.


...

[EFerrari]

34. Not how MANAGEMENT has been treated but how the INDUSTRY has been treated

when compared with the generous Obama donors on Wall Street.

Your OP is disingenuous at best.

[TahitiNut]

36. at best.

:thumbsup:

[EFerrari]

48. No justice, no peeps.

[Occam Bandage]

38. To open up a new conversation, which is the primary problem:

that Wall Street was given bailout money, or that GM is being asked to do unreasonable things? "There are different responses" by itself is not a complaint; it is an observation.

(Your post in particular would be probably answered by the subthread immediately above it)

[nonconformist]

45. Maybe because it paints an ugly picture, for one.

This all seems to say that Wall Street is more deserving, more valuable, more competent, more trustworthy, and more important than Detroit. It seems to say, "Fuck off, Michigan".

Now, you can argue all you want about how that's not true, but that's how it appears. And people are understandably pissed about that, especially those of us who have a stake in the future of GM and Michigan as a whole.

[Occam Bandage]

47. So the problem is, rather, the unfortunate juxtaposition?

That seems a reasonable explanation for unreasonable demands.

[cliffordu]

37. Now we're cookin!!!!

I hate the management at all the bailout companies, Union busting car companies and the yuppie fucks that gnerally inhabit the upper floors of business.

Fire and jail them all and I'm happy as a fly on shit.

[Zhade]

39. Here's one - DUers excusing Obama not going after war criminals.

NT!

[Occam Bandage]

41. It's good to know we've got our versions of Rudy 9iu11ni too!

[Stinky The Clown]

44. Actually, I think the real issue is the **comparative** treatment realtive to financial companies

And the sensitivity to the workers - union vs non-union.

Some of the outrage is, indeed, irrational. But a good bit of it is based on real perceptions.

Maybe it is the all-too-dispassionate presentation of the plans.

Maybe it is as you say.

I really don't know.

I **do** know that much of my own reaction is emotion-tinged since I don't actually know jack shit about high finance.

[Occam Bandage]

49. There's more truth in your post here than most anything else I've read here.

Or written here. Our reactions are all emotionally based. None of us really know shit, but we all know we've been wronged. We don't know for sure whether Obama's helping us or hurting us; we just know who fucked us over and who gives us jobs.

As for my post here? I didn't intend to take much of a stand; I just noticed, hey, that's kinda funny, and went with that. Glad I did; there's good discussion in here.

[Stinky The Clown]

50. Amen

:thumbsup:

[Jennicut]

55. Look at all the good Wagoner has done for GM:

"The raw numbers suggest Wagoner should have been replaced as CEO long ago.

GM has lost $82 billion in the past four years and hasn't earned a profit since 2004. Not many chief executives could keep their jobs while racking up such massive losses.

When Wagoner took over as CEO in 2000, GM controlled 29 percent of the U.S. Now it's down to about 21 percent." http://www.mlive.com/business/index.ssf/2009/03/former_gm_ceo_rick_wagoner_mad.html

I agree the economy hurt GM as did high gas prices. However, even some in the UAW wanted someone new. Remember when the Big 3 CEO's flew in on corporate jets to the Capital Hill meetings? They are idiots.

I agree all the CEOs in the financial sector are aholes and need to go. But didn't AIG's new CEO get hired for $1? He still stucks. Guess management can change but the companies don't always. We shall see what happens.

[tavalon]

56. It's topsy turvy world!

[brentspeak]

61. And you still didn't see it

The "pro-labor Democrats" (actually, you're not a real Democrat if you're not pro-labor) are angry by how the auto workers are being treated, not with management being asked to step aside (but we are angry that Wagoner is getting his customary $20 million payoff).

Nice try with the misrepresentation, though.

[Occam Bandage]

64. You may find posts #28 and #35 relevant to your interests!

[brentspeak]

66. They're relevant for proving my point

All you managed to do was just repeat your original bogus assertion - this time with different words: "I really never thought I'd see the day when UAW allies were angrily denouncing the humiliating firing of an incompetent, anti-labor CEO of GM."

[Occam Bandage]

67. Nope!

I explained that I understood full well why people were using Rick Wagoner's firing as an example, but that it doesn't take away from the fact that they're still angrily using him as an example of their mistreatment, and that like many things in politics, it's funny in a whoda-thunk way when removed from context.

[brentspeak]

70. Do you now or did you ever work for Fox News?

Apparently, you think that if a lie is repeated often enough, it becomes "truth".

Which people are angry that Wagoner was fired, Chuckles?

[izzybeans]

62. I think a lot of people do not realize that a large proportion of autoworkers

have already been screwed completely. It's time to pick up the pieces. This is what is happening. It ain't pretty and we all aren't going to be happy about it (me included). But it is what it is.

[obiwan]

73. I am glad to see Rick Wagoner go.

He is a spudboy. Under his "leadership" from 2000 to present the stock price went from $70.00 to less than $4.00.

Even the brilliant Bob Lutz can't save GM.

GM management are a mutant species and they must be allowed to die.

It's not the worker's fault. The cars were never engineered to be assembled by the workforce they had.

Now, Chrysler and FIAT? That's a hilarious idea. Kind of like a poodle f**king a Doberman. Can't wait to see the kids.

Everybody who drove a U.S. FIAT, especially in the 80's, knows what I mean.

[Political Heretic]

75. I tend to get angry at hypocritical contradictions.

What I'd like it some consistency between the way Detroit and Wall Street get treated (frankly with Wall Street getting treated a little bit more like Detroit)

[leftofthedial]

77. fuck management

I'm livid about how the workers are being treated.