Seize this moment to end oil addiction
freep.com
Rescue should set clear plan in motion
BY RANDY ESSEX
THE DETROIT FREE PRESS
November 18, 2008
Amid all the finger-pointing at executives, labor and Wall Street accompanying the Detroit automakers' request for a government rescue, let's not lose sight of an important question: What's the plan?
As we consider putting billions in taxpayer money on the line to avoid economic calamity, I'd really like to know, from both the car companies and our national leaders, how we avoid being in the same spot in March or June or five years from now.
Can we use this moment of crisis to finally do what our leaders have been talking about since gas went over 40 cents a gallon the day I got my driver's license in 1974, and forge a policy that seriously moves us toward energy independence?
We are told repeatedly that this is a national security issue. Can we act like it?
One of the auto industry's greatest contributions to America was retooling for World War II. Acting in the national interest, the car companies helped win the war, revive the economy and fuel postwar growth.
Today, if General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co. and Chrysler LLC indeed get government money, let's put them in partnership with government to really, once and for all, declare war on our oil dependence and launch the equivalent of a Manhattan Project, a moon shot.
This is a proper role for government involvement, and the automakers won't get there on their own.
Lots of smart and sincere people work at these companies, and the country needs that brainpower. New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman's Detroit-bashing piety aside, these folks want their companies and their country to thrive, and they are making progress. But we need faster progress and a national strategy. If we've learned anything this year, it's that the constant restructuring of recent years has been too incremental in moving away from the truck-heavy model that worked in the '90s.
It is hardly the automakers' fault entirely that we are where we are. Political leaders must do more than call for hydrogen cars during the State of the Union address, as President George W. Bush did. It's easy to say Detroit should build plug-in hybrids, as President-elect Barack Obama has. It's hard to have the political will to approve money for critical battery research and to rebuild the nation's electrical infrastructure to meet the new demand.
I want to see Obama, congressional leaders of both parties and the auto CEOs stand together and declare war on oil dependence -- and actually follow through.
Something like that might really save Detroit.
It may be too late otherwise, even if our companies avoid bankruptcy.
I fear that outside of Michigan, the American consumer is thinking, "These companies are in trouble again. They can't be making good cars. I can't take a chance on them."
And the downward spiral will continue, even with an infusion of cash, unless it is tied to a huge national public-private effort to move America -- and not just the auto industry -- ahead in a real way.
-RANDY ESSEX is assistant managing editor for business and politics. He can be reached at ressex@freepress.com or 313-222-8767. |
