U.S. automakers' groveling falls mostly on Congress' deaf ears

WASHINGTON — The CEOs of the nation's Big Three automakers didn't get much respect when they pulled up at the nation's money pump asking for a $25 billion fill-up.

Senators weren't in much of a mood to talk about it Tuesday, at least not without a heavy dose of sarcasm.

"No one can say that they didn't see this coming," Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd, D-Conn, told the executives sitting in a row before him. The industry was "seeking treatments for wounds that I believe to a large extent were self-inflicted."

And Dodd's actually a supporter of the new lifeline, like most Democrats and President-elect Barack Obama.

Bailout foe Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., asked: "Will it be used to improve their business model — which has been a failure — and product lines or is this just life support?"

The three auto chieftains testified that the rescue loans weren't just to keep their companies afloat.

This could be a national catastrophe, they said, warning that millions of layoffs would follow their demise as damaging effects rippled across an already-faltering national economy.

Still, the new rescue plan appeared stalled on Capitol Hill, opposed by the Bush administration and Republicans in Congress who don't want to dip into the Treasury Department's $700 billion financial bailout program to come up with the $25 billion in loans.

It's not the first time the U.S. auto industry has found itself behind the curve. In the late 1970s, when practically all they were building were fuel-inefficient heavy cars, tensions in the Middle East sent gasoline prices soaring — and suddenly demand for the big, expensive vehicles dried up.

In the 1979, Chrysler persuaded Congress to bail it out with $1.2 billion in loan guarantees, money it paid back.

Back then, former Chrysler CEO Lee Iacocca reduced his salary to $1, something two of the three auto executives said they'd be willing to consider as they groveled for federal help.

On Tuesday, the automaker chiefs blamed their current economic woes not on any management mistakes or lack of vision but on the larger financial crisis triggered by plunging home prices, rising mortgage foreclosures and frozen borrowing.

"There was this unbelievable bubble," said Chrysler LLC CEO Robert Nardelli. He first saw it in housing as chief of Home Depot Inc., and then with the bursting of the credit bubble as head of Chrysler.