No domestic for me =)

Maybe they should have negotiated this low interest loan for themselves instead of for nonexistent consumers.

I have a GM car, bought new in 2007. Best car I've ever owned. I really hope GM can make it through this.

Imagine Obama's presidential limo with a Toyota badge on it.

@Boberto: I don't think that the brand name on a car is a sign of patriotism. I just don't. Especially in this era of global capitalism and overseas supply chains. I'm going to buy what I consider the best car for the money, period. The nationality doesn't even factor into it for me.

I've got a Pontiac Vibe.
It is a sister car/rebadge of a Toyota Matrix.

So, I could get this deal if I bought the Pontiac but not the Toyota even though the same American workers in California do the work either way? My brain is so confused.

@johnva: Agreed. If you like the American offerings, go for it. I'll stick with my Subarus that get 200k miles or so.

@Boberto: A Toyota is more "made in the USA" than many GM vehicles. That GM limo Obama will be sitting in is probably made in Canada and runs on an engine made in Mexico.

@rdm: I hope you do not have the 2nd gen 2.5L Legacy or you're going to pay a small fortune getting to 200k miles replacing your head gasket every 30K miles.

@mzs:

Next time that happens, find out if the head gasket is a total loss or if it's simply cracked. Mine cracked back in 1998 (on a Chevy), and the repair shop wanted $800 to fix it. (Half of that because I was a young college girl--my dad got his replaced for $400 on a comparable model just a few months before).

Point is, I skipped the repair, and my grandfather simply put stop leak in it and cleaned up the places where the coolant had leaked--then taught me how to do it. I've had to put stop leak in it every once in a while since then, but otherwise, it's run just fine.

Patches like that aren't for everyone--but if you can figure out how to do it, you can save a bucketful of cash.

@johnva: Tell me who will build the military jeeps, the tanks etc if the US manufacturing community is closed? Do you suggest the military outsource these the Arabs, or Chinese or maybe to Iraq?

Give GM all the crap you want, but ford's come a long way in 2 years. Maybe too late for some.

dodge should die though

Honestly, you have to look at this objectively. Many American cars aren't as American as the foreign transplants. That's true, like it or not.

But the business model of some of them doesn't and can't sustain itself. If Honda & Toyota can make a profit with decent quality cars manufactured in the USA, why can"t GM? And why is that my problem?

I didn't see the government intervene during the internet crash of 2000-01. Lots of people lost lots of jobs and money. But if your business can't sustain itself over time, if they're managed poorly, or make products that no one wants, why should taxpayers have to pay for it?

The auto industry is important. But they should play by the same rules as everyone else. Same for banks, investment firms. Government is already plenty f***ed up itself.

Do we really want Nancy Pelosi, Barney Frank or Harry Reid running (or further ruining) the auto industry? And how are they more qualified than people with generations of business experience.

When I woke up this morning, I thought we were a capitalist country. But Iit sure is looking a lot more socialist than capitalist to me.

@johnnya2: Bravo!
What we're doing here is looking down the barrel of practically no industrial capacity. Highly precarious.

And my GM car? A 2007 Saab, built in Sweden with a German engine and a Japanese transmission. Even so, it stickered for $30k and I bought it for less than I would have paid for a stripped down Camry. The car even made Forbes list of best car values

For what it's worth, over the years Global auto production over capacity has been passed around from Nissan to Isuzu to GM to Chrysler. Like a hot potato.

The financial crisis has brought to bear the implications of this over capacity, and equitably spread it across the entire spectrum of manufacturers, virtually overnight.

The real damage comes from the house of cards that leasing's foundations are built upon, and that is projected residual values. Leasing can never make sense when the future value of residuals are so incredibly uncertain. Add the prospect of a possible bankruptcy makes an estimated residual value that much more uncertain.
Thus the drop off of 32% in sales across the board. Roughly the percentage of leased vehicles.

I pray for the success of GM, Ford. Chrysler will likely be gobbled up by Goshen et al. Renault/Nissan/Chrysler group.

@johnva: Exactly. This whole concept of supporting an industry for the sake of "american jobs" is ridiculous. Toyota and Hyundai employ many people outside of the michigan region. And personally, I feel no obligation to a region that has a reputation for ugly unions and gas guzzlers (the worst parts of both political parties).

Regarding who will build hum-v and jeeps for the military, hey, why don't they buy up those parts of the auto industry and run those factories themselves? The only difference is that some backwards thinking CEO wouldn't get a cut of the profit.

@rdm: I like my 95 Cadillac SLS that got 207000 miles before the tranny went out. Or my current 97 Ford Ranger that has 150000 and still going strong. I also had an 87 Nissan Sentra that died with only about 140000 on it and a Mitsubishi Precis that only got up to 170000 before it crapped out. Of course, I've had a 66 ford that died at 120000 and an Isuzu pickup that was going strong at 186000 when the rust problem got too bad. I don't see much of a quality difference from my experiences.

i think it's pretty awesome that they teamed up with credit unions to offer this program instead of banks. i hope it works out for them.

@sinfonian94: Damn, you drive a lot.

@johnnya2: First off, I suggest we cut back a lot on our military adventures and interventionist foreign policy so that we need a lot less investment in weapons. A lot of other countries do just fine, defense-wise, without manufacturing their own cars and trucks.

Second, it's not my problem how the military supplies itself. I refuse to buy an inferior product just because the military needs that industry. That's their problem, not mine. Maybe they should look at buying from a better source than GM, too...I bet some of the other manufacturers would like to have that business.

Third, I'm not saying I want the U.S. manufacturing economy "closed". On the contrary, I think it's important that we retain that. But they need to compete effectively or we're just subsidizing mediocrity. I would support some more things like a national industry policy along the lines of some more socialist countries, in order to retain that, and I support taxpayer dollars spent on trucks and planes being spent here in the U.S. (reference the whole air tanker mess). But the goal of the industrial policy should be to make our manufacturing the best and most efficient in the world, not to just prop up an inferior product. And when I'm buying for myself, I refuse to buy a poorer quality car just because GM or Ford can't seemingly make as good and reliable a car as Toyota or Honda (and yes, I realize they've improved somewhat, but I have to say that even on our current cars my wife's domestic car has a helluva lot more reliability problems than my Camry. On the plus side, it's cheap to have fixed).

@Boberto: It probably wont break down like what happened to Bush in Rome in 2007 [jalopnik.com] or [www.autoblog.com]

:-p

@drdom: The difference is the internet job crash you mention happened for different reasons from the Big 3 failing. A very common, failed logic to the big 3 having problems is they have "crappy cars". GM sold more vehicles last year (9.3million) then ANYONE ELSE including your beloved foreign auto makers. The big 3 have problems because of all of the banks that failed. The banks and companys that were buying and selling useless and worthless loans imploded and they pushed the failing economy over the edge, bringing down the big 3 with them.

What ticks me off is all the people that seem to be blind in seeing this. I would agree with you had the auto industry gone sour during an economic upswing. Also, I wouldn't want them to have a bailout had we not already bailed out the richy rich banks that didn't deserve it. Not to mention the banks have gotten trillions of dollars and the auto industry wants a tiny 15 billion?

@drdom:

No one seems to care that a major part, if not all, of the U.S. Manufacturing capabilities will be gone if these three die. I don't know about you but if/when there is ever another large war similar to past World Wars we are screwed. The Steel Industry has already been screwed over and if the manufacturing is screwed over this country will be done for. GM has started to rebrand itself with new vehicles such as the amazing Malibu and Saturn Aura and Pontiac has been undergoing a big overhaul with their vehicles as well but I don't believe they though this would happen so suddenly with gas prices, which was extremely stupid. They started to rethink themselves too late in the game. It needed to happen 5 years ago. Also, I'd rather see the Bailout be dropped from Wallstreet and help these companies instead since more everyday human beings, rather than wealthy business men work there.