I sincerely do not understand the empathy that some people afford these companies and their executives. For years we have seen commercials where they have wrapped themselves in the U.S. flag and espoused the dedication of their employees to put forth an image of American Know-How and work ethic.

However, America’s BIG 3 simply continued to follow a business model and produce a product line that has been and is still today inferior to foreign competitors in overall quality, resale value, and owner satisfaction. I have in my adult life owned four new vehicles two Honda’s, a Chevy and currently a Volkswagen. The only car that ever left me on the side of the road (3 times to be specific) and actually began to fall apart right at the five year pay-off mark, was the Chevrolet. The other three vehicles worked flawlessly with no major hiccups and always got me from A-to-B with higher gas mileage and a better ride experience. The only compliment I can pay the Chevy is that it had the most comfortable seat of any car I’ve owned. That is a sad commentary and makes me think conspiratorially that Chevrolet may have purposely put extra design effort into the quality of the seat to lure the buyer with an “Ahh!” factor when they first sat in the car.

I truly believe that any aid we grant these companies will only serve to encourage themselves and others to continue their short range profit model that ignores any far reaching goal and stifles innovation. They should be allowed to fail and stand as a warning to other industries to look past the next quarterly report and plan for the future. They will disappear and someone else will come in and buy up production assets at a bargain and create a smaller company that can grow into a profitable replacement for the dead company. Stock holders knew the risk, employees and unions knew the status-quo could not be sustained. If they didn’t then they were either blind or delusional. I can remember a nursery school story about an industrious ant stockpiled for the winter while a lazy grasshopper played in the sun acting as if winter would never come. Winter came and the grass hopper starved while the ant survived until spring. Sometimes death is necessary.

While the rest of the world watches, I hold my head down. Shame on Washington, shame on all of you.