Jon Stewart's Autoerotic Explanation: "Give Them The Money!" (VIDEO)

The Daily Show's Jon Stewart offered a personal comment on the proposed bailout of American automakers Chrysler, Ford and General Motors.

In about two minutes' time, he says that the government bailed out the financial industry because it didn't want to look stupid, but now that a new bailout is proposed for an industry that people can understand with tangible products they can complain about, people are putting it on hold.

In the end, Jon says to "give them the money!"

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Autoerotic Explanation

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Comments

[Economyones]

A worst case-scenario would be to give needed funding to the "Grammatical Escapades On Ice" Presidential Librairy. Jonh Oliver would be terrific at reporting this un-'sightly' sight, where the ice is thin, and our patience thinner... Yikes!

[thecanadian]

Can someone point out one session, one day or one setting that all the big corporations and banks
went through this same vetting before they got their bailout? This is simply political posturing by all.

[dadw5boys]

" THE NORTH AMERICAN UNION " requires that wages be lowered in the USA and that big unions be broken. So they can treat Americans like they do in South America and just shoot you if you want to organize a Union.

[rf-hawaii]

The Republican response is to damn them because you don't like how they act. And let the economy and middle class suffer.

The Democratic response is to give them a loan to help all involved. Then regulate them enough to keep them from acting badly.

Which makes the most sense? Which sounds more like a spoiled child?

[rf-hawaii]

Republicans are more interested in a chance for union busting and continued pilfering of the middle class than focusing on the economy. They can't help themselves -- it's their religion.

[ezwizzard]

What a shame that you missed out on the full AMC Gremlin experience Jon. My wife and I lost our virginities in a Gremlin back on 12/22/73. Dad updated mom's car to a Pacer for Christmas – more spacious but with all that glass…

I don't usually get this personal on the comments but Jon's story combined with the upcoming 35th anniversary of a special moment with the woman that I am still married to brought a nostalgic smile.

Back to the issue:
I bought a hybrid car last year that meets the 2020 fuel efficiency standards. If we can meet these standards today why wait for another 12 years to comply? US automakers have lobbied for lower standards. Meanwhile they buy up fuel efficiency technology patents and shelve them. The Big 3 should have learned in the 70's when the small imports came in and cleaned their clocks but they didn't.

It may be best for the carmakers to go into bankruptcy. Bankruptcy does not mean that they will stop making cars. It means court managed restructuring. The Feds could help provide the Debtor in Procession Financing (DIP). The parties will renegotiate their contracts. Bondholders will get full recovery and other creditors will recover over 50 cents on the dollar.

What emerges is a leaner and more competitive car company. Not a bailout subsidy with more of the same. If they don’t recover, then we will just have interesting Gremlin stories to tell in 30 years. :D

[twokidsonecat]

Well, thanks for sharing ezwizzard! You and your wife must be very little people.

[SnapShots]

Americans expect yes, no, right, wrong, black, white, broken, fixed, instant gratification. Sorry folks. It took us a long time to get into this situation and it will take a long time to climb out of it.

[KillTheMessenger]

What surprise me is that after asking all the wrong questions they always take

"Next year!"

and

"Please have faith in me!"

for an answer.

[autobailout]

As a lifelong democrat, I am appalled by my elected reps trying to get these bailouts through. The banks didn't deserve it and the auto industry absolutely doesn't deserve it. Everyone is hurting. I am a small business owner on the UWS of Manhattan and I am eating egg salad from a plastic container every day. These auto workers make $56 an hour and their cost of living is low. It's like making $200 on one of the coasts. Our lawmakers need to start thinking of the people who elect them, not special interests.

Protest the bailout at http://www.autoindustrybailout.com/petition/

Enough with the handouts unless you're going to give them to everyone and not just select groups of people.

[Charity Froggenhall]

Right, who's next? The airlines? Retailers? Why doesn't EVERYONE get a bailout? This is getting insane.

[Teritt]

Did you ever wonder how many fewer customers your business will have if our country loses an additional 1 out of 10 jobs? You'll trade for chickens to manufacture your eggs for your egg salad & won't need that plastic container.

[rf-hawaii]

These are supposed to be loans, not handouts! Granted the Paulson mess seems to have turned into a giveaway because Congress didn't do their jobs. No reason the much smaller automaker deal has to done so poorly too.

This has nothing to do with automakers and everything to do with their employees and all the ancillary companies that rely on them. The automakers need to be propped up for a year or two to help this failing economy recover. What's so hard to understand about that?

So people are pissed at the American automakers -- that is NOT the current issue. If they crater after the economy is revived that's okay. The economy is much more important.

If the automakers can be weened off their linkage to oil in the process, so much the better ...

[Bruupo]

They do not make $56 an hour.

You probably know how misleading that number is, just like you know that the NYT came up with bogus numbers last week.

Since when does anyone divide total benefit payment by hours worked? Since when is that not lying.

YOU KNOW that when you quote a number like that, and call it "an hour", you are trying to imply that that number represents some kind of average hourly wage- yet it doesn't, and that number is a lie.

On top of that, you add on generalized garbage about cost of living - Ever notice what happens to the home prices in an auto factory town once the lay-offs start? When half the plant is closed? And YOU want sympathy from your perch on the Upper West Side?

As long as you're going to quote numbers that you either do or should know are lies, you and your petition can go s c r e w.

[mamacat]

A few thoughts:

When the Japanese government negotiates Free Trade Agreements (FTAs), they pursue a policy of removing other countries' tariffs to their industrial goods. When the U.S. government pursues FTAs, it does so with an eye to removing American tariffs to cheaply made foreign goods. The obvious results are good for Japanese industries and workers, and bad for American industries and workers.

The Japanese and Chinese governments pursue monetary policies to help their industries. "The impact of the Japanese government actively maintaining an artificially low yen is a fundamental competitive factor for the entire U.S. auto and auto parts industry. The misaligned yen is giving the average imported Japanese car a $4,000 windfall cost advantage over U.S. automakers and other competitors in the U.S. market."

Jon Press, a Chrysler vice chairman who worked for Toyota for 37 years, has said: "100% of the research and development costs" of the Toyota Prius' hybrid system was paid for by the Japanese government.

As unfair and unlevel as the playing field for automobiles has been and continues to be, the official Japanese policy is that they support a U.S. government "bailout" of the American automobile industry, because the results of allowing it to collapse would be disastrous for the entire world economy.

[pro america]

There's always two sides to a story.

Japan and Korea are the two biggest consumers of American beef and agricultural products in the world. Without these exports, American farmers would go bankrupt.

The concessions our government makes against our car industry are made up for the demands they gain for the farm industry.

[msgotrox]

You make an interesting point. How do the USDA's billions of dollars worth of annual farm subsidies figure into this theory?

[BenNC]

GM is sending New Economy jobs to India.

We really need more of that?

http://www.google.com/search?q=gm+outsourcing&sourceid=navclient-ff&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1B3GGGL_enUS240US240&aq=t

[Carolab]

They're investing $1B in Brazil, too.

[pro america]

It's time for the unions to make less demands, so our car industry can be more competitive.

GM is on the brink of bankruptcy, how can they NOT reduce costs? Do you think that the government can bail them out forever?

[msgotrox]

So because we've already made a $700bn mistake, we should go ahead with another $35bn mistake? Huh? A big wrong makes a smaller wrong right?

[mamacat]

The $700 billion bailout (that part of it which has been used so far) was supposed to enable the banks to return to lending money, both to people and to businesses. Banks are not making new loans to the Big Three, and the lame duck Republicans in Congress and the White House refuse to allow any of that $700 billion to be used directly as gauranteed loans to the Big Three.

The effects of a "smaller wrong" are likely to be that the country is prevented from descending into a prolonged depression, and that millions of Americans who actually work for a living get to keep their jobs. While one can argue that many of those who were directly helped by the bail-out of the banking system were the very same individuals who helped to cause the financial meltdown, one cannot make that argument for the workers who would see immediate benefits from loans made to the Big Three.

In the short run, $150/barrel oil and the collapse of the banking system are responsible for the lack of cash at the Big Three. The temporary return of oil to $40/barrel, and loans issued by the government instead of the banks, gives the American industrial heart, the auto industry, more time to modernise and restructure, and gives the new Democratic Congress a chance to force the Big Three to improve their CAFE standards.

[crackerjill]

I think what a lot of Americans are concerned about is that we'd be ennabling a failed strategy, and forestalling the inevitable. You can't force a corporate culture change, and if anything, the Big 3 have behaved antagonistally towards pressure through legislation to provide fuel efficient alternatives and technology, which if embraced, could well have circumvented this disaster. In 2010, nine years after the launch of the Prius, Ford are introducing the hybrid Fusion. For nine years, all they gave us was a hybrid SUV. Speaks volumes. I'm no Faith Popcorn, but I could have predicted the price of gas would go up over time. It's not the price per barrel, it's the reluctance to innovate.

The hoped for liquidity from the 700b bailout has not materialized, and that doesn't stand in this bailout's favor. True, this bailout could have a direct positive impact on hundreds of thousands of families, but is it too much to ask for a Gant chart from these guys? Some objectives, and a parcelling of money that's dependent on meeting those objectives? Would any initiative / bill with a 25 billion price tag dare approach the table without at least 100 pages of budgeting and analysis?

[Teritt]

Wonder how much has been spent on lobbying by the Oil companies to keep CAFE standards lowered.....

[rf-hawaii]

Right. Those against the car maker loans seem more interested in ventilating their displeasure with the companies than repairing the economy and helping out the middle class.

Perhaps that's their real problem -- actually helping out the middle class for a change. It's so anti-business.

[texasaggie]

The primary problem with the auto industry - along with many of our other industries - is that they all have to be in the health care business. $1,200 per car paid for health coverage for workers and retired people. Foreign auto companies who build here also have to pay health coverage costs, but they get tax breaks and subsidies from all levels of government to entice them to build here. Without abolishing the medical insurance industry (which has become a huge part of the finance industry - deregulation for you) and replacing it with national health coverage, all of our manufacturing businesses will continue to fail or outsource. Obama's medical coverage plan and all of the bailout plans he appears to embrace do NOTHING to remedy this crisis. It only puts more money into the insurance industry and big banks, and will make our true, job creating, product economy worse in the long run - by decree.

Owned!

[KillTheMessenger]

So what stops them from raising the price for their cars by $1200?

Would you buy a Japanese car you don't like just because the American car is slightly more expensive?

I wouldn't.

[majorteddy]

Trouble is, the American cars are often cheaper in price. Toyotas and Hondas don't give anything off sticker.

[tryharder2think]

No the primary problem with the American auto industry is that they make shoddy cars that are riddled with problems.

The last american car my family owned was crap.

America should really attempt to make cars like Nissan, Honda, Lexus, BMW, Audi, Volkswagon

Even the Korean manufacturers are improving their autos the level of japanese autos.

Make a product people want to buy and they will buy it regardless of the price.

[artimus711]

I have never owned anything but american vehicles....mostly work trucks.....and i have been pleased with all my vehicles..­.....ameri­can autos have come a long way........i think their reputation has long outlasted it's veracity..­.....btw..­...did you notice that the foreign car sales here fell as much as the americans?­......ford­'s drop was actually less than the foreign carmakers.­.....maybe there is more to the story than the tired old 'american vehicles suck' rhetoric......

[StellaDuBois]

GM is the top selling manufacturer in the US, easily outpacing Toyota, and Ford's quality is best in class in most classes.

GM also had the fewest recalls of any major manufacturer last year, even though they are the top seller.

[gbrooks]

Ford is drastically improved in quality (they edged out Toyota), reliability and, in my opinion, style. In my opinion, GM and Chevy vehicles usually look and feel cheap.

A little innovation on all three's parts would be great. If I had the $$, I'd be driving Teslas. I might even consider trading in my VW GTI for a Ford Focus if they make them handle as well.

[rf-hawaii]

So what!? Yes, they need some work. That is NOT the issue. The failed economy is the current problem. This is NOT the time to whine about shoddy cars.

It's the economy!

Fix or fail the car makers later. That is a much lesser problem.

The boat is sinking and you're complaining because the paint it flaking.

[killpack]

Congress should NOT have bailed out the financial industry (against the people's will) nor should they bail out autos (also against the people's will). Shame on Congress! I have written several emails to my Congressment DEMANDING the original bailout be repealed!

[gbrooks]

Same here. The gov'ts getting too big and forgetting who they are supposed to be working for.

We need to be much more involved in watching what the gov't does and making sure that those politicians who ignore the will of the people are voted out.

[killpack]

I tried in this last election, but suspiciously there was no one on the ballot who voted FOR the bailout. Except for John McCain and Barack Obama, of course.

[Blurp]

This is about union-busting. The war on labor.

[KillTheMessenger]

If nothing else, for many it will be a welcome side-effect.

[BenNC]

Uh, labor lost already.

GM is shipping the new economy jobs to India...

http://www.google.com/search?q=gm+outsourcing&sourceid=navclient-ff&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1B3GGGL_enUS240US240&aq=t

ps. Ford and Chrysler too.

[rabiddog6708]

How long do you think it would take the Big Three to burn through the 34 billion? Who, in this economy, is going to buy their cars so they can survive and even thrive in today's market? Honda or Toyota make way better cars than GM or Chrysler......Ford trucks (even though I would never buy one) are thr only thing Ford seems to selling beyond the SUVs. Giving them a loan they won't be around to repay is not helping....force them into bankrupcy....force them to restructur­e....don't encourage past bad behavior by just giving them money.