Rounding Up Votes for Auto Bailout Could be Daunting

[babylonsister]

Oversight for Auto Bailout a Key Issue as Drive for Votes Looms
By Joseph J. Schatz, CQ Staff


Congressional Democrats and the White House were negotiating late Sunday over how to structure government oversight of a proposed U.S. auto industry bailout.

Democratic leaders were working to preserve maneuvering room for President-elect Barack Obama , who will bear longer-term responsibility for any auto loan program and is weighing in on the talks.

Christopher J. Dodd , D-Conn., chairman of the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, said that General Motors Corp. chief executive Richard Wagoner would likely have to be replaced as a condition for government aid. “I think he has to move on,” Dodd said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”

Dodd said he thinks there will be enough support to pass a short-term loan package, which he portrayed as the precursor to a broader, government-supervised restructuring of the domestic auto industry that would occur next year.

With the Senate set to return in lame-duck session on Monday and the House planning to reconvene on Tuesday, congressional leaders were facing a difficult week as they attempt to round up votes for yet another corporate bailout from skeptical members of both parties.

more...

http://www.cqpolitics.com/wmspage.cfm?docid=news-000002994119

[anonymous171]

1. The Corporate media has done a lot to turn the people against it.

[BeatleBoot]

2. It's a LOAN

Not a bailout.

Detroit doesn't want a hand out like AIG and the banking industry.

They want a loan. Which they will most likely pay back early. With interest.

[hendo]

4. pay back early? with interest?

are you serious?

[BeatleBoot]

5. Were you around in 1979?

I am dead serious.

[hendo]

6. nope sorry

but I doubt that the economy this time around will compare to the economy the last time around. It will be really bad this time.

[BeatleBoot]

8. When the Prime Rate is pushing 19%

We'll talk.

Until then.

[Vincardog]

3. Get rid of their rearward fixated Board of Directors too.

[babylonsister]

7. Tension grows

Obama Preserves Political Capital for Stimulus Plan

By JONATHAN WEISMAN and DEBORAH SOLOMON


WASHINGTON -- Barack Obama's transition team is resisting Bush administration overtures to coordinate more on the financial-sector rescue, convinced that neither the lame-duck President George W. Bush nor the president-elect has the clout to win a smooth congressional release of more bailout funds.

With the first $350 billion of the bailout money nearly allocated, transition aides are pressing Treasury officials to convene a bipartisan meeting on Capitol Hill this week. Obama aides say the Treasury needs to sound out congressional leaders and rank-and-file lawmakers on what information they need to release the second, $350 billion tranche from the government's Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP.

Senior transition officials said they would attend the meeting, but they made clear they would neither lead it nor lobby for approval of the funds. Their focus is on passing a separate, half-trillion dollar stimulus program that Mr. Obama said Sunday would be the largest infrastructure program since the Eisenhower administration's construction of the interstate highway system.


more...

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122866009874385877.html