Is this a possible reason Republicans are against the auto industry bailout? ?

Just keep in mind that the most vocal Republican Senatorial critics of the auto bailout bill have foreign owned auto manufacturing plants in their states.

Republican Senator Richard Shelby of Alabama is being courted by Hyundai, Honda, and Merecedes (all operate plants in Alabama).

Republican Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina is being courted by BMW, which operates a plant in his state.

Republican Senator Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky is protecting the Honda plant in his state.

And so forth and so on......

I'm sure that is a factor. Not happy crushing unions into submission, they want to go the whole Thatcher-Reagan hog and destroy them by stealth, and if the auto industry has to go to do it, so be it.

To be honest though, I am a socialist and I want the bailouts to stop. I am hoping that people will see capitalism as it really is: a mess that can't right its mistakes without stealing even more money from working people.

edit- amazing how some people here actually think the 'free market' exists. That delusion is so widespread. The US is a state capitalist system when it comes to big corporations, and has been so since the Marshall Plan and the days of George Kennan. All those 1950s 'golden years' were made by a 'big government', small government brought ruined farmers in the '20s and the Wall St crash in the '30s. Reagan scaled back government (apart from military spending, the biggest spending plan in the world). Look at where we are now.

Can't believe anyone would want the auto industry to fail. The Big 3 automakers have been losing market share for years. Consumers don't want their cars as much as they do Toyota, Honda and the competition. However, the Big 3 are stuck on stupid. They cannot seem to change to meet the demands of the market. Why pour money into a failed business plan. Since the money is partially mine, unless new management comes in (Chrysler brought in Lee Iacocca when it was having trouble), and serious union changes are made, the Big 3 can go into Chapter 11 and stay there until they get their respective acts together.

No, the Republican's only asked for specifics in the bill instead of a general open we can do anything we want grant of money without requirements. The problem is that everyone except the Unions agreed to changes. The unions refused to any real changes because they know they'll get anything they want from the Democrat Party so why would they agree to anything. The heart of the problem is the gov't regulating the Auto industry through CAFE standards and forcing oil prices to be high. If they would allow drilling costs would go down and if they let the free market work our auto companies would be as successful in the US as they are overseas. Ford is the number 1 auto company in Europe and has been for decades. The US won't allow this success in the US. The Auto industry needs to be allowed to separate their operations per country and go bancrupt in the US. True restructuring is the only way to get out of the mess the politicians have caused going back to Carter. Leave the free market alone, lower the size of gov't, lower gov't regulations and what made America great will return. France and Italy have finally realized adapted Conservative free market Republican type leaders at a time when the US goes the other way. We're going to pay dearly for our horrible pro-Socialist/Democrat Party/Communist CHANGE.

The individual workers are free to vote as they wish whether they are in a union are not, we have a private voting system here. So if there union leaders tell them to vote a certain way and they don't the union leaders will never know. So those who will vote Republican already have.

Is it possible that the dems are for the auto industry bailout because they receive loads of contributions and support from the UAW?

I don't think you can just say that Republicans were for the bail out of wall street and not for the Big 3 bail out.

Many of the Republicans in the Congress was against the wall street bail out. then for some reason (fear) they went ahead and voted for it.

Now they see, I hope, that it isn't working. Both Democrats and Republicans. And Republicans can see that to bail out the Big 3 is not going to do much good either.

The Democrats are for the Unions so of course they want the bail out.

What I hate about this whole bail out thing is the scare tactics that the media and politicians are using to try and get this through.

And the stupid tax payers are buying into it!

It won't solve anything, like the first person said they will come back later asking for more money later on. As well bailing them out won't solve the problem, the problem with big tree is big, and "smacking them on the hand" won't solve anything. In order to solve their problem not the directors haven to go, but also the Unions, the sub directors and pretty much everyone that was on charge on anything.

I agree with the financial sector bailout as well, it was a mistake. Why should people be rewarded for their mistakes?

i don't think it has to do with the vote but rather the money.

while i am more conservative than liberal and thus more republican than democrat - i say this without malice. the republican's want control of their businesses again. they want them out of the hands of the unions who have destroyed the companies AND The workers who have some of the laziest work ethincs around. when Ford started his company he took care of his employees and they took care of him. when he could pay them more he did and when he couldn't - they didn'y get it. while it's not the market right now for that type of leadership -- there needs to be a leadership that can actually function for the best of the COMPANY which encompasses the people. guess what - the owners want money. the shareholders want money -- they want an ROI. why the workers think they are entitled to the SAME amount of money is foolish. that is where it's become some weird sort of communist reign with the unions.

They are not against the bailout, just where the money should come from. They think it should come from a fund set up to help the industry switch to a more cost and fuel effective way to produce better vehicles.

I wouldn't doubt that it was strategic, the last eight years were just that and nothing has changed yet. I too was once a neutral observer, split with the pros and the cons of the parties and hesitant to participate due to a strong belief that mans laws should not supercede God's laws., but I can't change the world and the Bible says to obey the laws of the land as long as they don't interfere with Gods plan.

Very interesting topic.