A Letter From Michael Moore

The writer, an American author and Academy Award-winning film-maker, frequently comments on U.S. politics.

MICHIGAN, United States -- I drive an American car. It’s a Chrysler. That’s not an endorsement. It’s more like a cry for pity.

Millions of Americans had to look beyond American cars to find a damn way to reach work in something that won’t break down.

My Chrysler is four years old. I bought it for the comfy ride. Daimler-Benz owned the company then and had the good grace to place the Chrysler chassis on a Mercedes axle. That was a sweet ride -- when it started.

More than a dozen times, the car simply died. Batteries were replaced, but that wasn’t the problem. My dad drives the same model, and his car often refuses to start too.

A few weeks ago, I took my car to a Chrysler dealer in northern Michigan. The latest fixes cost US$1,400. The next day, the vehicle wouldn’t start.

So you might think I don’t care about the miserably inept crap-mobile makers down the road in Detroit. But I do. I care about millions of people whose livelihoods depend on the car companies. I care about security and defense because the world’s running out of oil -- and when it does, the calamity will make today’s economic problems look like a Tommy Tune musical. And I care what happens because the Big Three Automakers are more responsible than almost anyone for destroying our fragile atmosphere and melting the polar ice.

Government must save the industrial infrastructure and jobs while protecting the world from internal-combustion engines. The vast production network can redeem itself by building mass-transit and electric/hybrid cars, transport for the 21st century.

Recently, CEOs from the Big Three were scorned by a Congressional committee in a way unlike when financial-industry leaders appeared two months earlier. Then the politicians swooned for the Wall Street schemers who’d concocted Byzantine ways to bet other people’s money on unregulated credit-default swaps.

But the Detroit boys came from the Midwest, the Rust (yuck) Belt where they make real things that consumers need. In November, the auto bosses took ridicule for traveling to Washington on corporate jets (like the bankers did).

Auto magnates once ruled the universe from a pulsating hub that other industries served. Fifty-five years ago, GM’s president sat on the same Capitol Hill and told Congress, “What’s good for General Motors is good for the country.” In his mind, GM was the country.

What a long, sad fall we’ve witnessed. Let’s state the obvious: Every dollar given to the auto companies flushes right down the toilet. In a recession, the management teams can’t convince people to buy their big, gas-guzzling, inferior products. Forget it!

Just as I’m sure the Ford family-owned Detroit Lions won’t reach the Super Bowl, I can guarantee that the car-makers will burn through billions and then return for more.

What to do? Here’s my three-part proposal:

-- As we face a massive economic, energy and environmental crisis, the new president and Congress must do what Franklin Roosevelt did when he faced a crisis (and ordered the auto industry to stop building cars in favor of tanks and planes). Now the Big Three should make only cars not primarily dependent on oil while also building trains, buses, subways and light-rail vehicles (as corresponding public-works projects build new rail lines). This will save jobs and create millions of new ones.

-- Government could buy all the common shares of stock in General Motors for less than $3 billion. Why give GM billions, or anything? Take the money and buy the company.

-- No one wants government officials running a car company, but transport geniuses could be hired to do it. We need a Marshall Plan to switch us off oil-dependent vehicles.

This proposal isn’t radical or rocket science, but it could pull us out of recession.

In contrast, General Motors presented its restructuring proposal by promising to eliminate 20,000 jobs. You read that right. The government gives billions so GM can throw more Americans out of work. That’s been the Big Idea for the past 30 years – lay off thousands to protect profits. But if you throw everyone out of work, who can afford to buy cars?

These idiots don’t deserve a dime. Fire them all and take over the industry for the good of workers, the U.S. and the planet.

What’s good for General Motors is good for the country – once the country calls the shots.

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