Rescuing Detroit

When they've been flush with cash Detroit auto makers have increased executive compensation and dividends, as opposed to, for example, Japanese auto makers who reinvested in better, more fuel efficient technology. Detroit executives, the poor cousins to Wall Street, in recent years seized every easy way to enrich themselves at the expense of workers and customers. For these executives to cry foul in the current crisis is the height of hypocrisy. And the idea of just forking over a bunch of taxpayer money so that they can keep doing what they're doing would produce no good results. On the other hand the U.S. can't afford to lose its auto makers. The solution is pretty obvious: nationalize the firms that want help, entirely replace management, retool for high-tech, high efficiency cars and trucks, and sell them cheap. Keep union benefits as they are (or increase them) and bring unions into a partnership with the new management, intending Detroit to be a template for helping other unions around the country. Since we have socialism for Wall Street then we should sure have it for working people too.