The Real Problems behind Detroit

The chairmen of the “Big Three” automakers were on Capitol Hill yesterday, begging for money. The focus has been on jobs, not the cars and why so few people are buying them.

Detroit is in trouble because of impossible union demands, impossible requirements by Congress which wants to please its green lobby and mismanagement by the CEOs. That’s all the explanation you need.

Japanese car plants – the latest of which opened Mon day in Indiana – make cars without huge health care and pension benefits because they don’t answer to the United Autoworkers Union.

If Detroit gets the money, there is no guarantee that they will make cars people will actually want to buy at reasonable prices. GM is pushing the Chevy Volt, which  is designed to move more than 75 percent of America’s daily commuters without a single drop of gas. Sounds good, but will people buy them? This lame duck Congress may not approve the bailout, but the next one will because Democrats owe it to the union. But what do they owe the taxpayers?

Cal Thomas is a nationally syndicated columnist based in Washington, D.C.