24 June 2009

The reason Obama had to nationalize General Motors

Because G.W. Bush didn't want to do so.

This admission comes from former V.P. Dick Cheney, who said in a Fox News interview that the Bush-Cheney administration knew of G.M.'s problems and knew the company should file for bankruptcy, but that President Bush didn't want to be the one to "pull the plug."
“I thought that, eventually, the right outcome was going to be bankruptcy,” Cheney said, referring to GM. “It had to go through such a dramatic restructuring to have any chance of survival that they had to be able to renegotiate labor contracts and so forth, and the president decided that he did not want to be the one who pulled the plug just before he left office.”

Cheney said that rather than acting on GM, the Bush administration “put together a package that tided GM over until the new administration had a chance to look at it.”

4 comments:

  1. So was this a good thing? I understand that there is a courtesy involved during changes of presidential administrations to allow the incoming administration to set the agenda and or national policy. Cheney is right...we should have let GM fold, so I'm somewhat inclined to say to President Bush "shame on you, sir."

    ReplyDelete
  2. I am more than somewhat inclined to say, Shame on you, George W. Bush". He left Obama with so many problems that were created or exacerbated on his watch that if he were an honorable man, he would be so mortified he couldn't show his face in public. Though for the torture at least, He should have to show his face in court.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Shame on both.

    G.W. Bush for not doing his job and leaving this mess for Obama (although I'm sure Obama handled it much better, this is perhaps a good thing) and Cheney for ratting Bush out.

    ReplyDelete
  4. really, Bush couldn't do much between November and January without getting second-guessed. As Brian said, something this major really should be decided by the incoming administration.

    If you read the interview, I don't think Chaney was "ratting Bush out", but rather forthrightly (for him especially) explaining the rational for what was and wasn't done.

    ReplyDelete