"The Idiot American worker only has himself to blame. Cutting his own throat, and then crying about it."

And don't forget about the American love affair with cheap gas and more horsepower.

I'm hardly sympathetic to the management decisions made by GM and the other domestic car manufacturers which have led to many of their problems. I am perplexed, however, at the insistence by many that these companies have somehow "made cars that nobody wants."

Hummers and SUV's have been extremely popular for so long as gasoline was less than $2/gallon. The recent and sudden price spike to over $4/gallon caused the American consumer to suddenly become concerned about energy conservation and renewable energy. "Why is Detroit still making these dinosaur's," is the question that is now asked "when we want plug-in electric and hybrid vehicles instead?"

The answer is that the auto industry - whether domestic or foreign - is inherently incapable of turning on a dime in developing/changing its product line to respond effectively to the whims of the consumer such as we witness here in America. Whereas Detroit has now been given their marching orders to develop and offer for sale only efficiently "green" cars for the market, I can assure you that the recent collapse in gasoline prices will soon have the American consumer once again scrambling to get the latest gas-guzzler offered and to spit on the Prius and the Volt as being insufficient for their needs.

If we are truly interested in stabilizing the market for our automobile manufacturers (and also "greening" our transport choices in responsible fashion) it is necessary to first stabilize the gasoline market. Fixing gas prices at $4/gallon or above is probably the singularly most important policy change we could make in support of our automobile industry, our environment, and our desire for energy independence.

Perhaps even more importantly, stabilizing the price of gasoline will do much to support the development and marketing of alternative fuels that will at last move us away from our present reliance on fossil fuels. Allowing the fuel market to instead swing as wildly as it has these last number of years is to cause the domestic auto industry, our renewable energy industry, and our economy itself to go completely dead in the water with the weight of the oil companies and the foreign oil producers tied around our neck.