(labeled the “Troubled Asset Relief Program” or “TARP”), about $350 billion, without noticeable effect in reviving the economy. But Congress has to give permission for the other $350 billion to be used.

In September, when the bailout was being debated in Congress, Paulson repeatedly said that bailing out the financial industry was fundamentally different from bailing out any other part of our economy.

If Bush and Paulson try to use the financial bailout money to aid the autoworkers they will be giving the lie to the rationale for bailing out the financial community.

Obama is promising an economic stimulus to create 2.5 million jobs in two years.

Obama apparently wants to be known as President Pothole. But the American economy is in a government-dug sinkhole. Pouring tax money down the holes won’t lead to economic recovery. It will turn a deep recession into a long-term depression.

Ford seems ready to ride out this storm. If we lose Chrysler in the meantime, so be it. George WIll has a great column showing the steps that Ford has taken in the past two years. Good free market thinking and creative destruction has made Ford, amazingly enough, the most viable of the big 3.

GM is the one over there with their "tin-cup" and their sad
song, looking for more tax-payer dollars.