Congress Spanks Ford, GM, Chrysler

(MoneyWatch)  Congress roundly rejected the CEOs of the Detroit 3 in their appeal for a government bailout earlier this week.

Even the supporters of a bailout piled on, like House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

"It is all about accountability and about viability," Pelosi said in a Nov. 20 press conference. "Until we can see a plan where the auto industry is held accountable and a plan for viability on how they go into the future, until they show us the plan, we cannot show them the money," she said.

About the best thing anybody could say about the prospects for an automotive bailout is that Congress didn't quite say "never." Congressional Democrats seem to be inviting the automakers to return for another try, with the details to be worked out later.

The Detroit bosses must be feeling at a loss, after briefing Congress on plans that they surely feel are radical, viable, and that hold them painfully accountable.

None of them is enjoying a steady diet of cutting jobs and slashing production, which has been the order of the day for a couple of years now. People outside the industry don't realize how much deeper the Detroit 3 have cut back in the last couple of years, versus the long, steady downward trajectory they've been following for a couple of decades. To the country at large, it all sounds like "business as usual."

Nor do people outside the industry appreciate how long it takes the auto industry to take a good idea and turn it into an actual vehicle you can drive ?€" at least three years, probably more like four or five years. And that's if you have plenty of money and influence, healthy suppliers, no disruptions, and your good idea is close to something that the industry already knows how to build.

No power on earth could tear up the existing order in today's U.S. auto industry, fire the bosses and hire new ones, close or merge the existing players, convert production to some new product concept, like 100 percent hybrid cars or even 10 percent hybrid cars, and expect the reality on the ground to resemble the original vision in less than four years.

That's another hurdle the Detroit 3 will have to jump. To satisfy Congress, the next master plans they reveal need to be radical, viable, accountable ?€" and fast.

The Detroit 3 CEOs shot themselves in the foot by playing up the notion that they had the situation under control before the credit crisis came along and upset their turnaround plans -- all with an eye on keeping their jobs.

Nor did they help themselves by showing up in corporate jets. Next time, if I were GM's Rick Wagoner, I would fly coach into Baltimore, and drive a Chevy Volt the rest of the way to Washington.