Since we're throwing around $Trillions, ....

[bvar22]

How about a $500 Billion Contract with the US Automakers to retool and build a State of the Art Rapid Rail Mass Transit System using only American Products?

America needs it in the face of rising energy prices and extortion from Terrorist Funding Nations (Saudi Arabia).
It would put thousands of Americans back to work with good paying jobs... talk about a STIMULUS.

AND, unlike the Wall Street Banker Bailout,...
Americans would have something to show for their money!

Note: The $500 Billion Dollar figure is completely arbitrary.
I figured that an Auto Worker should be worth at least 1/2 as much as a Wall Street Banker.

[leftstreet]

1. K&R

:thumbsup:

[ixion]

2. I'm all for rebuilding mass transit, but I don't believe it should go the Big Auto

they don't deserve it.

[tbyg52]

3. Well, at least they make something useful to regular people.

Unlike the banksters.

[pscot]

5. If everybody got what they deserved

we'd all be lining up at the gates of hell. There are no innocents in this society.

[bvar22]

7. American Automakers and American Manufacturing...

...can build ANYTHING.
It has been MANAGEMENT and maximizing PROFITS that has been the problem, not the people who actually build the product.
Get rid of the deadweight (the CEO class), write up the specifications, and let er rip.

[ixion]

8. break them up and sell off the assets to younger companies

and give them a chance. They will hire many of the workers back, and it will bring innovation into the mix.

Giving dinosaurs more money when they've shown they don't give a crap about anything but their bottom line will accomplish nothing but the enrichment of the executives.

[scarletwoman]

4. k&r -- Works for me! Actually ANYTHING that funnels money into projects that put people to work

MAKING something tangible and durable works for me.

We will never get beyond economic crises until people have jobs making stuff HERE, with the wages and the profits staying HERE. You know, like it used to be when we had the biggest most prosperous middle class in the world and the term "homeless" had never been coined.

sw

[MannyGoldstein]

6. Sorry - There's No Cash In It For Bankers

Summers and Geithner would shut that idea down right quick.

[KharmaTrain]

9. GM Does Make Locomotives...

Your suggestion sounds very reasonable...and inevitable. Anyone who lives in a metropolitan area knows how gridlocked our roads have become and when gas soared to $4 a gallon many of those who used to brave the long drives round out it wasn't just cheaper but also less hassle to take a train. It's about time and a trend that we need to encourage.

Before you build new locomotives and trains, we need to rebuild our railroad system. Much of it has been neglected for decades, many tracks need to be either replaced or expanded and existing track made more commuter friendly. Add to that light rail projects (many that have been sitting on drawing boards for years) that would be a low cost alternative to building more roads.

The corporates will only do this if mandated to do so and a new mindset and management is needed...one that looks at public transportation as an asset not as competition.

[TWiley]

10. add ....... 4% mortgage rates for ALL homeowners, and you got a deal

Talk about a boost in spending power..... take the republican $20 / week tax cut off the books

[HughBeaumont]

11. All Cleveland would need is one or two more lines.

From Vermilion to Ashtabula . . . one line going from one part of NEO to the other. Let's also have it drop off at multiple hot spots in town, not just one place like the current one does.

Maybe get a line connecting Cleveland to Akron also.

RTA improvement is a long time coming, and if Cleveland is going to get serious about recovery, this would be a long-term need and plus for them.

[90-percent]

12. History

Did not American Automakers actively dismantle the US rail system so that all form of US transport would be in the family car driving all across our Interstates that were designed originally to transport War Goods all over the country?

That would be ironic giving that to the people who destroyed public mass transit fifty to sixty years ago?

I would suggest a new law that forbids the current management class from being employed by an company that has more than ten people. And that anybody that has an Ivy League MBA or undergrad degree could not serve in any position other than one level below middle management.

America's entire management class has betrayed the interests of all American workers and the American economy itself.

I have to work out all the Unconstitutional aspects of my plan, however. Give me a brake. I only thought of it in the middle of writing this post!

Money Handlers do not create wealth. Manufacturing is what creates wealth the most. If the American people were allowed to design and build modern rail mass transit without corporate pinheads ruining it, it would be the envy of the World.

Let's get back to making stuff instead of creating toxic economic bubbles that only benefit sociopathic corporate greed heads, at the expense of the retirement funds of the remaining 98% of us.


-90% jimmy