I was feeling unreasonably serene this New Year's morning. To balance my humors, I decided to take a trip to the Wall Street Journal editorial page. As expected, I was richly rewarded.

Holman Jenkins' free-market screed on the U.S. auto industry was just what I needed to turn my mellow into venomous bile. Predictably, Jenkins lays blame for the Big Three's profit swoon on CAFE standards, the UAW, and the Wagner Act. While his proposed way out is buried under a gimmicky blanket of irony, it apparently (and predictably) involves the dismantling of unions and a commitment to let Detroit do what it does best: make three ton gas pigs.

This is stupid on so many levels. To maintain what's left of my holiday spirit, I'll focus on just a couple.

First off, placing yet another bet on an endless tide of cheap oil is disingenuous at best, ignorant at worst. Just a few months ago, gas was at $4 a gallon. While Jenkins points out that half of U.S. vehicle sales at that time were light trucks, anyone who tried to trade in an Expedition, Suburban or Escalade for a Civic Hybrid could tell you that people weren't exactly storming car lots in search of Detroit iron. If it takes five years to get a new model to market, would you retool for Navigators or Priuses?

Jenkins argues that CAFE is a global laughingstock, and the foreigns simply pay their fines and keep the X-6s, Cayennes and Mercedes staff cars coming 'cause that's what Americans want. Of course they also build what those over-regulated Europeans want, which is fuel-efficient vehicles using clean diesel technology. CAFE is a laughingstock because the standards were never given real teeth. As a result, big Three "leadership" has never been able to view oil as a finite and dirty resource and plan accordingly. A $80 price floor on oil might stimulate discussion around the boardroom table. 

Then there's the union thing. Blah, blah, blah.

No question, UAW members retire too early and will have to share the pain of other Big Three stakeholders if Detroit is to survive. Yet as I pointed out in my previous post, non-legacy compensation accounts for about $800 of the price of a Detroit-made vehicle. And American brands are already cheaper than Hondas, Toyotas, Benzes and Bimmers.

Come on, Holman, at least spread the blame around. Detroit's ridiculously overcompensated leadership is guilty of gutting American brands and profits, and they should be held to account.

Back in the (really) bad old days, when shoddy quality and hideous styling had Americans fleeing Big Four Three showrooms and the Japanese were tooling up on U.S. soil, Detroit executives decided to counter their corroding brand equity by cooking up a potent and addictive blend of financial incentives. Rebates, zero percent financing and leases became crack cocaine to American consumers. Cash back became table stakes in showroom negotiations. Sweet lease deals put folks of modest means into immodest vehicles. Profitability vanished.

Since then, quality is vastly improved, but reputation trails reality and it will take time before Americans fully embrace U.S. brands. And it will take serious rehab to walk into a dealership and sign papers without a $5,000 rebate and employee pricing sweetening the deal. The response by our fearless leaders, naturally, is to incorporate GMAC as a bank so it can hit the TARP trough and offer no-interest loans to folks who really can't afford to borrow money.

The last car I bought was a used Honda. Why Honda? It was to be our family car, and would you buy a seven-year-old Chevy for your family car?