Well, for all of those that would call me a stubborn, pigheaded partisan who allows the likes of Rush Limbaugh to do my thinking for me I have one thing to say; This time I agree with the democrats.

No, I am not caught up in the Obama Love fest currently available for your viewing pleasure on any news network that is not Fox News. Nor have I been struck on the head by a socialist bat and come to realize the folly of my conservative ways. No, it is really just a simple disagreement over the bailout of the financial industry and what companies are worthy of bailout. Let me clarify.

Weeks ago the country was told that certain companies (AIG, CITIGROUP, J.P. Morgan, etc) were just "too big to be allowed to fail" and that we the taxpayers needed to loan them 700 billion of our hard earned bucks or the apocalypse would begin and we would all be consumed by a lake of fire, or something to that effect. And thus the process would begin by which the companies responsible for the very mess we as a nation now find ourselves in would receive a loan, or multiple loans as is now the case with AIG to get them out of the mess they helped to create. It doesn't make a lot of sense to me, but hey, I don't possess that sense of government logic that those inside the beltway seem to have. And besides, on the surface this is all to help "the little man." You know, the guys who sweep the mail room at AIG or the teachers with retirement funds managed by AIG.

And in the meantime the financial crisis perpetrated by those on the receiving end of the bailout rippled through the economy and brought many business to their knees. Enter the U.S. Auto Industry.

Now the big three have not been the most efficiently managed corporations out there, to be sure and I will spare everyone an in depth breakdown of Detroit's root problems as they are well documented elsewhere. But they have to this point managed to stay out of bankruptcy (more than one can say for AIG and many others involved in the bailout) in the face of very serious challenges on nearly every front. Yes, to say the domestic auto industry has had an uphill climb is an understatement. Much is self imposed, but much is not. Yes, Detroit was cranking out huge, gas guzzling and now incentive laden vehicles. But here is the dirty secret: People wanted those vehicles. GM built all of those Suburbans not out of some fiendish plot to destroy the planet but simply because people wanted them. Enter high gas and an uncertain at best economy and now they can't give them away. A friend of mine just informed me of a twelve thousand dollar rebate on some Dodge trucks. that is a lot of cash. The financial crisis has certainly had an effect on an industry that employs either directly or indirectly one in fourteen Americans. So it stands to reason that the big three would get a piece of the bailout pie. I mean if AIG and other financial giants were too big to fail than certainly the world's largest corporation is too big to fail. But yet again, I lack that "government logic."

At least so far, Henry Paulson has only seen fit to bail out his friends in the investment banking and insurance industry, even if that means companies had to restructure to become eligible for the aid, as is the case with American Express, and the very same folks who were screaming that the sky would in fact fall if AIG wasn't bailed out are now pointing out how poorly the big three have been run. As opposed to the inspiring leadership that companies like AIG and Freddie MAC enjoyed. Again it must be my lack of government logic. Add to this fact that President Bush seems to be playing politics with the jobs of one in fourteen Americans by linking aid to the auto industry to the passage of a trade agreement with Columbia and you can see how I might be inclined to disagree with the Republicans on this one.

But hey, let em' fail. Our struggling economy will probably bounce back and come on, do we really need to build anything ourselves anymore? After all, we can buy some other country's cars as many of us do anyway. And I am sure the Army can find another reliable source for engines for all those up armoured vehicles in Iraq and Afghanistan, especially given how unstable the world is. And all those "little guys" that work for the auto industry building, selling, or fixing those cars will probably be able to find some other work. And if not, at least AIG will be around to insure them.