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GM IPO: The Result of Grand Theft Auto?

The the big news story for the last couple of weeks has been the IPO of General Motors .  They managed to raise something on the order of $20 billion last week selling literally millions of shares owned by the Federal government and reducing the Federal government’s share of General Motors to 33% down from a high of 61%.

This situation has been much ballyhooed by the press who has always and forever been in the pocket of the left. So when you see that much in the way of trumpeting a supposed success   it seems logical to question whether not it is a real success.

First of all, I think I should point out that General Motors still owes taxpayers something on the order of $30 billion and if you add in what GMAC owes, it comes out closer to $45 billion.  That aside from the taxes which were completely written off by the Federal government at the leading edge of the Obama bailout.

[1]Secondly, let’s consider that if finances are a zero sum game as the liberals like pointing out to us, then saving General Motors came at the cost of something else.  Like, for example, small businesses everywhere, upon whom this tax burden no false.  Does anyone doubt for a minute that tax rates are going to be going up on everyone else as a result of this governmental largess? In the process of this largess toward General Motors, the question must be asked, how many tax imposed failures have been created by the Obama White House?

Thirdly, there are large questions looming on the horizon for GM, because of the general financial condition of the company, and the large number of unfunded liabilities, which are governmentally imposed.

Fourth, we should consider the real purpose of bailing out General Motors.  Helping a business, any business, is generally not the bailiwicks of the Liberal.  So why would they go so far out of their way to help General Motors?  The answer lies with the United Auto Workers union… This is a group that has historically leaned left at every opportunity.  It seems clear that what we have is a massive bailout of a particular political constituency.  Consider the hypocrisy involved.  The left is forever and always complaining about “fairness”, and who gets what.  Yet, there is an alarming inconsistency in all of this, because it would appear that the UAW gets theirs, and everybody else gets to pay for it.

I do feel a obligated to point out that for every piece of supposedly happy news coming out of Washington, and Detroit, over this matter, (GM paying the money back, etc) how many tax dollars have been lost with other businesses failing because of the large nod to the UAW?

A fifth, and rather potent point that the funding news media seems to miss , is that the bailout of General Motors may have solved the UAW’s concerns, but not the unemployment rate which still hovers at around 10%. Oh, sure, the White House, and the usual lefty pundits like to tell us about how money “million jobs” have been saved but ultimately when you look at the situation from an objective viewpoint it seems clear that the figures being tossed around use the same rather suspect methodology of “jobs saved or created” that were used to justify the original stimulus, which demonstrably did nothing. I hasten to add that had General Motors gone belly up, most of their businesses would have been snapped up by other car companies , most workers would have been reemployment, allbeit absent the influence of the UAW. In short, the bailout of General Motors has probably cost more jobs than it saved, and other negative consequences still loom on the horizon.

Now, let’s consider the reasons involved for the seeming popularity of the IPO.

If, as we are told by the left, finances are a zero sum game, then we must consider that the snapping up of shares of the newly reformed General Motors, is at the expense of people buying stock in other companies, or other investments.  And the investors that were kicked to the curb by the government takeover are largely being ignored by those investing now.  Investors at the moment are looking at this as a guaranteed income.  The reason that is a simple; a precedent has been set, which indicates that the government is never going to allow General Motors to fail. Consider the worldwide precedent for such things.  That way lies the Ziguli, and the Trabant,  for two examples.

This government in particular is not about to let General Motors fail, because with a handpicked CEO, whose style is apparently amenable to the leftist politics emanating from the White House,   the White House gets to pursue its pet projects, such as the electric car.  (Well, OK, maybe not all electric.  I guess some lies are to be expected. [2] after all, these are leftists we’re talking about.

The bottom line, here, is that none of this is good news for the American public.  Not one iota of it.    Yet, Obama touts this disaster as a success.