The New Motown Song & Dance

[with apologies to the Gaye/Terrell original]

Ain’t no wage too high.

Ain’t no sales too low.

Ain’t no shame in sight enough, baby.
We’ll just call out your name. We’ll be there in a hurry. We won’t have to worry.
 
Ahhh. A huge bloc of UAW votes and PAC donations balanced in ballet with gobs of bailout cash. Is there any sweeter ballroom couple than the US Automakers with hands out and our US Congress with hands in [our pockets]?

The dance began with Nancy Pelosi inviting the hat-in-handers to testify [sic] before Congress and detail how GM, Ford, and Chrysler (now LLC, not Corporation) are just not going to be able to make ends meet if they do not receive a sizeable chunk o’taxpayer cash. Unfortunately, the dodos headed for DC without using their heads and traveled in private jets, and not together, clumsily stepping on Nancy’s foot right at the start.  Small oversight, but one with great, non-positive public relations implications. This dance floor booboo meant that Pelosi, as dance leader, would have to improvise to cover her partners’ misstep. What an improviser she proved to be!! The boys in the grey flannel suits were yanked around the floor, then made to sit still, while US Congressman admonished, at length, the Detroit Troika regarding past performance, and in what manner would they change to ensure that the bailout would not be in vain. Hear! Hear!

The Shrinking Three had to go back to Michigan, finish their assignments, and only return once they had separate business plans that would show how the bailout was really, really only a temporary crutch. Mind you, these are the same people whose latest implemented business strategy must have been to go bankrupt because it’s tracking right along. But, going back they are, and, this time car pooling in hybrid vehicles for the DC return trip. Man. What a coincidence! The corporate aircraft must be in for much needed repairs just when they were needed to return to DC. It would seem, also, that all commercial flights from Detroit to DC must have been booked full or cancelled for that same time frame. You guessed it, just when they were needed. Curse the bad luck, eh? Oh well, guess the auto execs will have to get their first, first-hand look at the hybrids being touted so heavily by Congress as the immediate answer to our global warming prayers. This solo dancing is part of the mandatories to get to the freestyle begging.

The bile these execs must have had to swallow to earn the return trip, wherein they will receive their hand-, er, bail-out, likely churned a bit on the 2 hour trip, but they did have to take one, even a little one like this, for the home team, and for their dance partners in Congress. Does anyone seriously believe that what will be offered in the ‘recovery’ plans will somehow be based in a reality this side of ‘Alice in Wonderland’? Even if the Shrinking Three turned loose all their MBAs with Notebooks asmokin’ with just the darndest cute, but formal Power Points - with annotated handouts, no pun intended – and every spreadsheet interlaced, interlinked, embedded and hog-tied together, will any of that answer the question of: ‘Will somebody please buy American cars?’ Worse than that, does anyone seriously believe that anyone in Congress, with rare exception, would be able to understand what was presented and, without voters brandishing pitchforks and howling in the background, pose any biting questions as to veracity of the numbers?

We will soon be witness to the intricacy of the Power Point Tango, with backup Greek Chorus played by the UAW business agents, and guess when the climax will occur? Just prior Christmas hiatus time for Congress, when they are to depart DC to rest, recover from the grind of having to dance for a month before handing out $20 billion or so. You see, in their judiciousness, they will determine that Detroit doesn’t need $25 billion, at least not right away. The vote will happen. Everyone leaves. Nobody to contact with protest. Time softens the memory. Money will already have been spent. Detroit’s got their cash. Congress pats itself for the hard work. Taxpayers. Well, they get it in the end, too.