Subsidizing GM gas-guzzlers: where all the bailout went

By handing money to GM and guaranteeing the debt of their former credit arm, GMAC, the Bush administration is bankrolling and subsidizing past production of gas-guzzling vehicles of declining value.

For years, auto company lobbyists, their elected officials and regulators claimed that fuel-efficient and oil-free cars were "too expensive" to build, and would bankrupt them.

Well, they didn't build them, and went bankrupt anyway.

And now, the bailout funds are funding past "rebates" that induced poor credit risks to splurge on a big SUV instead of buying a reasonable car.

Those subsidies need never have been spent if regulators, such as the suborned California Air Resources Board, had insisted on forcing the members of the Auto Manufacturers' Alliance (AAM) to continue production of an all-electric car and/or fuel-efficient cars.

By keeping the technology alive, the AAM would have been able to expand the lineup of all-electric cars when oil prices started to rise, and would not have been caught flat-footed.

GM and Chrysler, essentially bankrupt, are paragigms of what NOT to do when running a big company!

Now today, instead of being wisely handed out to force recipients to build better cars, the federal subsidies are, instead, validating and funding their production of SUVs that make no sense.

And, of course, big salaries to the executives that, instead, deserve to be brought up on charges of cupidity...or stupidity.