Too big to fail? I say already failures!

Note this from the article below: GM hasn't made a profit SINCE 2004. And yet now it's a crisis, now we're supposed to save them? Fuck 'em. There's not enough money in the world to save all the companies that need saving. We've got to draw the line somewhere, how about we start with a company that hasn't turned a profit in the last 4 years??? Check out this chart, anything jump out to you? Of course, all the major automakers have been hit hard lately, but which automakers are the only ones below the line? Ford and GM. American automakers have lost almost 100% of their value over the past 5 years. Now, explain to me what throwing $25, $50, $100 billion at them is supposed to solve? Too big to fail? They've ALREADY failed, just nobody has informed management yet.

TARP's $700 Billion Can't Meet `Phenomenal' Spending, Reid Says

By John Glover

Nov. 12 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. Treasury's $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program will have to be increased to meet the `phenomenal' demand for government bailouts, according to Deutsche Bank AG strategist Jim Reid.

The extra $150 billion pledged to support insurer American International Group Inc. this week and the prospect of a financial package to rescue General Motors Corp., the largest U.S. automaker, from bankruptcy may drain the TARP fund, Reid wrote in a note to investors today.

``It does feel that the $700 billion TARP fund is going to have to be increased at some point in the not-too-distant future,'' wrote Reid, head of fundamental credit strategy at Deutsche Bank in London. Either that, ``or another acronym will have to be formulated to deal with the phenomenal amount of government spending that's still likely as this crisis escalates.''

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's TARP fund was created to help shore-up banks' balance sheets by buying toxic mortgage- linked securities. Neel Kashkari, who heads the program, said last week the government is open to all options in expanding the use of the funds.

Political pressure for a bailout of GM is mounting with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi throwing her support behind the premise the automaker is too big to be allowed to fail. Bankruptcy would trigger a ``devastating'' domino effect that would cost millions of jobs, she said.

``Basically it appears to be bailout or bankruptcy,'' Reid wrote in his note. ``The exact outcome is near impossible to predict with any certainty as it's now highly political.''

U.S. sales of GM, Ford Motor Co., and Chrysler, now owned by Cerberus Capital Management, are headed toward a 17-year low, overwhelming cost-cutting efforts including elimination of 46,000 U.S. jobs at GM since 2004, when the company last posted an annual profit.

To contact the reporter on this story: John Glover in London at johnglover@bloomberg.net