(Bryan Snyder/Reuters)
You absolutely wont believe
the ridiculous op-ed Mitt Romney wrote in today's
Detroit News, where he not only calls himself a "Detroiter" but simultaneously says Detroit should have gone bankrupt and that President Obama followed his recommendations at the same time.
See for yourself:
Managed bankruptcy may sound like a death knell. But in fact, it is a way for a troubled company to restructure itself rapidly, entering and leaving the courtroom sometimes in weeks or months instead of years, and then returning to profitable operation.
In the case of Chrysler and GM, that was precisely what the companies needed. Both were saddled with an accumulation of labor, pension, and real estate costs that made them unsustainable. Health and retirement benefits alone amounted to an extra $2,000 baked into the price of every car they produced.
Shorn of those excess costs, and shorn of the bungling management that had driven them into a deep rut, they could re-emerge as vibrant and competitive companies. Ultimately, that is what happened. The course I recommended was eventually followed.
Can you believe this guy? First he says GM and Chrysler should have never received bailout funds and that bankruptcy was the right way to go. The problem with this argument is that no private investors were interested in investing in Detroit. Make no mistake, Mitt Romney said in his famous op-ed "Let Detroit Go Bankrupt" that President Obama's course of action would
destroy the auto industry:
IF General Motors, Ford and Chrysler get the bailout that their chief executives asked for yesterday, you can kiss the American automotive industry goodbye. It won’t go overnight, but its demise will be virtually guaranteed.
Guaranteed! Now he's out there saying that his recommended course of action was followed. How is it possible that a bailout would destroy the auto industry AND that the bailout worked? Why does he think the people of Michigan are going to buy this drivel?
This is probably why the people of Michigan are telling Mitt Romney to go away.
He then goes on to call on the administration to dump GM stock on the market with no respect to what a sudden flood of shares will do to the stock price. Instead of selling them off piece by piece to net the government more money via capital appreciation, he's calling on the administration to dump the shares right away and hand out rebate checks. All that's going to do is kill the stock price and net the taxpayers less money than if the government exited GM responsibly. Could Mitt Romney really be this stupid?
No. He's not that stupid. He's just being the same old lying, coreless automaton he's always been in attempting to pander to the insane GOP base.
The ending is the real kicker:
Their dream is alive in all of us who have ever called Detroit home. And with a Detroiter in the White House, that dream can be realized once again.
Ummm Mitt, your whole point is that government shouldn't get involved. So why would electing you president be a boon for Detroit?