[TheRealVille]

For somebody who objected to me voicing my opinion that the Chrysler ad was a thinly veiled Obama campaign ad, you are certainly working hard to keep the issue alive. If you were the company whose Obama-supporting creative staff produced this ad, would you admit that it contained political overtones?

If you were a Italian automotive manufacturer trying to appeal to American auto buyers, would you admit that it was a great big thank you to Obama for sticking taxpayers with a $1.2 billion bill and pressuring Chrysler owners into selling the company to Fiat for a bargain basement price? I don't think so. There is a good reason why two of Obama's top political operatives were tweeting their approval of the ad Sunday night.

If you want to continue to post denials by the producers of the ad that it contained any political content, go right ahead - but you will not change the minds of those of us who immediately recognized it for what it was.

Bush started the auto bailouts, and said he would do it again. Chrysler has paid back their loan, it hasn't cost the taxpayers one dime.

Former U.S. President George W. Bush defended the emergency bailout funds his administration provided to General Motors Co. and Chrysler Group LLC in a speech to car dealers, saying he would "do it again."

"I didn't want there to be 21 percent unemployment," Bush said Monday in the closing speech at National Automobile Dealers Association convention in Las Vegas, according to Bloomberg. "I didn't want to gamble. I didn't want history to look back and say, 'Bush could have done something but chose not to do it.' And so I said, 'No depression.'"

Bush's remarks come at a time when political debate is heating up over the loans provided by the administrations of Bush and President Barack Obama in 2008 and 2009. Obama has touted the bailouts as a success as the U.S. auto industry continues a dramatic recovery. But Republican presidential candidates, most notably front-runner Mitt Romney, have been steadfast in their criticism of the government's decision to wade into the private sector.
Late in 2008, the Bush administration signed off on emergency loans to GM and Chrysler. The bailout eventually totaled $17.4 billion. Upon taking office, the Obama administration enacted what amounted to be an $85 billion bailout.

According to The Detroit Free Press, Bush told about 22,000 dealers at the conference that Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke urged him to take action late in his presidency to avoid the serious repercussions that could have come quickly. Bush wanted to stick to the free-market philosophies he championed.

"But sometimes circumstances get in the way of philosophy," Bush said, according to the paper. "I would make the same decision again."

<----snip----->

Meanwhile, Bush is not wavering on his stance nearly four years ago. He defended the bailouts using the same rationale when he explained it in his 2010 memoir, "Decision Points.""Nobody was more frustrated than I was," he wrote in the memoir. "It was frustrating to have the automakers' rescue be my last major economic decision. But with the market not yet functioning, I had to safeguard American workers and families from a widespread collapse."

http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/294659/2...ercial.htm