Toxic Assets; Auto Bailout? Clinton @ State? Prop 8

Sorry, Arianna had a medical appointment -- it's man-on-man only today. And it got mighty heated today in the battle over the economy. No one really has the answer. But a couple of questions include: Where has the money given out so far gone? Where does it come from? Who should really be getting it? All three end up agreeing we cannot afford to let the auto industry sink; but their reasoning in getting there differs. And the men weigh in on the rumor about Hillary Clinton as possible Secretary of State…plus a brief note about the hullabaloo over Prop. 8 anti-gay marriage constitutional amendment that just passed in the State of California.

Links mentioned in today's show:

Depression Economics Returns

The economic news, in case you haven’t noticed, keeps getting worse. Bad as it is, however, I don’t expect another Great Depression. In fact, we probably won’t see the unemployment rate match its post-Depression peak of 10.7 percent, reached in 1982 (although I wish I was sure about that).

General Motors has come to Washington, begging for a $25 billion bailout to keep it and its ailing Detroit counterparts going next year. But nobody seems too thrilled about the prospect. Liberals dwell on the companies' gas-guzzling sport-utility vehicles. Conservatives obsess over all the well-paid union members with gold-plated benefits. And people of all ideological backgrounds remember how they used to buy domestic cars, years ago, but stopped because the cars were so damn lousy. "The downfall of the American auto industry is indeed a tragedy," the Washington Post editorial board sermonized recently, "but the automakers and the United Auto Workers have only themselves to blame for much of it." And, if they have only themselves to blame, the argument goes, why do they deserve taxpayer help? Let them fail and file for bankruptcy. In the long run, the economy will be stronger and the workers better off. It'd be worth?the short-term pain, which might not even be so severe.

The Defining Moment: FDR's Hundred Days and the Triumph of Hope by Jonathan Alter (Paperback - May 8, 2007)