Mr Detroit goes to Washington (again)

The Detroit carmakers, in true Three Stooges fashion, are back in Washington with yet another bailout plea...sorry, I meant "viable plan for survival". It looks like Chrysler will be the sacrificial lamb, with its remnants carved up between GM and Ford - although I wonder if the US might allow (heaven forbid!) a foreigner to buy some of these beleaguered assets?

One of the bizarre proposals is to siphon off funding for fuel efficiency programmes to rescue the carmakers. I might be missing something, but Honda and Toyota got their promising hybrid/electric businesses up and running under their own steam.

It took them a decade of R&D investment, but they innovated and created a great product that is in demand. Doesn't this sound familiar? Yes, it's free enterprise, and the Japanese carmakers should be admired for being so forward-thinking. Of course, if helps that they can build cars that work, unlike the cobbled junk coming out from the US carmarkers.

In comparison, the gruesome threesome of Detroit are a pretty rotten lot. Like a manufacturing Dorian Gray, the reality is actually a long history of laziness and efficiency. They all deserve to hit the wall, and the sooner the better, so that they can be restructured into a half-decent business.