Published: November 19, 2008 02:00 pm         

Bailout should bring a new wave

Somebody call Lee Iacocca. The auto industry needs a hero in a hurry.

Anyone who has ever worked in an American manufacturing facility that produces parts for the auto industry has to feel some compassion for what auto industry employees are experiencing.

The American automotive industry is facing perhaps its most difficult stretch in 35 years — or maybe ever.

Even if Congress approves a bailout, there are some questions that have to be asked about the future of the industry. General Motors has the kind of gas gauge instrumentation no company would want to have. It reads: Unless there is a bailout soon, GM will be out of cash by next year.

Ironically, Detroit is much different than Indiana, where Honda is opening its new Greensburg plant and jobs are being added at the Subaru plant in Lafayette.

Sen. Richard Lugar voiced his own reservations about the bailout bill, telling one Indianapolis television station that Detroit’s Big 3 have asked for more money and said it urgently, but there are no new ideas for avoiding the mistakes of the past that put the Big 3 in an unenviable position in the first place.

Even if Detroit doesn’t have a plan for revamping its assembly lines, Washington should have one. It could — and for the future of the country probably should — sound simple. In exchange for the bailout, automakers will agree to preserve jobs within our borders by manufacturing green cars that run on ethanol, electricity, hydrogen or a hybrid of energies. If Washington acts to require bailout money to be spent on the manufacture of green, fuel-efficient cars only, it will allow Detroit to have a niche in the auto market that no other country’s manufacturers have.

This move also would serve America well for two reasons. First, it would retain and possibly expand work forces in places like Logansport where auto companies are a major customer of small manufacturers. Second, it would allow the United States to declare an energy independence day on some Fourth of July in the near future.

Let’s review the impact of that last statement. An energy independence day would allow the United States to never be forced to import foreign oil again. It would mean gas stations would still be in business for a generation, but our foreign consumption would drop proportionately to a level that could be maintained with domestic production.

Take that OPEC. Take that gas gouging oil companies. Take that Detroit fat cats who think they invented an assembly line that cranks out money for millions, even if it has almost ground to a halt because the Big 3 have missed the consumer target.

Keep in mind that if the federal government funds an airport project in your community, it will be done with local and state matching money. Keep in mind that grants to add more police to our city and county police and sheriff’s departments has been done with the carrot that federal money would pick up the tab for most of it.

The same principal should apply to this bailout. We, that is, the American taxpayer, will agree to bail the Big 3 out this time if, and only if, the industry can be preserved in a way that is competitive with the rest of the world and in a way that really can become the envy of the world.

No shipping jobs across the border to Mexico. No parts from China. No plants in Canada.

Our economy has tanked and if this industry goes with it, more than 50,000 jobs will be lost at Citigroup, as was reported Monday. More than 10 percent of J.P. Morgan Chase’s payroll will be slashed, as was reported Monday. A country dependent on manufacturing will be running on empty.

It’s time for Washington to have its carrot cake and for the automakers to eat it, too.

Dave Kitchell is a columnist for the Pharos-Tribune. He can be reached through the newspaper at ptnews@pharostribune.com