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UPDATE: TPM flagged this, as did Oyster and Atrios, but if you believe that Vitter's gonna comment on the fact that the Bush Administration is allowing the CEO's and top management to still receive their over the top bonuses, I've got some prime beachfront property in Leeville, LA I wanna sell ya.
Last week, our junior Senator, David Vitter, or as Danger Blond referred to him, clASS act, got up on the floor of the United States Senate, and called the plan for the auto bailout "ass-backwards."
While I find it disconcerting myself to have to bail out the management of the American car manufacturers, who have buried their head in the sand for the last 30 years (and taken home MILLIONS in compensation), I find it incredible that Senator Vitter is so blase about the fact that thousands of Americans will be out of work if we allow the auto companies to fail. And it's not just the workers for GM or Chrysler that will lose jobs, it's the sales people of the car dealers across the nation, the folks who take care of the lawns at those dealers, the auto parts industry, and on and on. It will cascade into another Great Depression.
Yet, Senator Vitter and his Republican allies in the Senate are adamant that before they bail out the auto industry that the UAW, the union that represents the auto workers, take pay cuts, cuts in benefits and cuts in pension benefits before they would agree to a bailout the auto companies. Need proof? Here ya go:
"This is the Democrats' first opportunity to pay off organized labor after the election," read an e-mail circulated Wednesday among Senate Republicans. "This is a precursor to card check and other items. Republicans should stand firm and take their first shot against organized labor, instead of taking their first blow from it."
These class-warfare lovin' Republican Senators frequently cite the fact that American automakers pay their workers the $75 an hour compared to the $40 an hour Honda and Toyota pay their workers in the "right to work" South. The $75 an hour is a flat-out lie. The UAW tells us, that after the wage and benefit concessions in the 2005 and 2007 contracts, their workers' pay ranges from $14 an hour for new hires to $33 an hour for the skilled labor.
One of the many reasons why the American auto companies are struggling is that people aren't buying their gas guzzlers anymore, but also because we have an antiquated health care and pension system that puts the onus on the employer to ensure that their workers have health care and a pension. That needs to change, and it is what the Republicans are gearing up to fight in the coming year.
Perhaps the UAW's Shreveport Local 2166 President Morgan Johnson is on to something with respect to Vitter:
"I don't know what Sen. Vitter has against GM or the United Auto Workers or the entire domestic auto industry; whatever it is, whatever he thinks we've done, it's time for him to forgive us, just like Sen. Vitter has asked the citizens of Louisiana to forgive him. Otherwise, it would appear, he'd rather pay a prostitute than pay auto workers."
And if y'all think that auto bailout doesn't matter here in Louisiana ... well, GM has closed its' Shreveport Hummer plant until February 15th as a response to the failure of Senator Vitter and his allies to bargain reasonably on the auto bailout.
Is it a coincidence that I don't recall Senator Vitter asking the bankers to agree to pay cuts in return for the $700 billion bailout a couple of months ago?
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