NO TO DETROIT AUTO COMPANIES!

To: The Canton Observer
Re: “Save the Big 3”, Nov. 13 Letters.

I have been purchasing and leasing Ford / Mercury products on an exclusive basis starting with my first car in the 1960s. I started with Ford because most of my family worked for Ford in some capacity or another and I stayed with Ford because I liked the product they offered. Unlike Jim Drozdowski in his letter “Save the Big 3”, I would never shame anyone into buying autos only from the Big 3 based on some specious sense of patriotism.

I would also go so far as to suggest that the Big 3, in their present business model, should not be saved because ultimately, they cannot be saved; it just makes bad economic sense to prop up companies that are no longer viable. To do so would be to reward gross mismanagement, incompetence and greed by both management and labor.

What would make sense is to allow the companies to reorganize under bankruptcy protection into viable, sustainable business models. Taxpayer money could be used to speed the process along.

Some critics are even saying that the management currently in place at the auto companies is incapable of performing the restructuring steps that are needed to make the companies viable again and are calling for an independent authority to step in. That may be another option to consider but pouring taxpayer money into firms burning through cash because they are not selling their products, is just plain irresponsible.