Russia and Germany Shaking Down U.S. Taxpayers on Opel

Boy, are they steamed in Russia and Germany today about General Motors backing out of selling its Opel unit to Canadian auto-parts maker Magna International and Russian lender Sberbank.

Ever-menacing Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin claims GM's board isn't empowered to nix the deal and German unions plan to launch a series of "warning strikes" in protest starting tomorrow.

The wrinkle here is this isn't a showdown between a giant multinational corporation and two of the world's leading nations. Every American has a stake in the outcome since the U.S. government now owns 61% of "the new GM" thanks to $43 billion in taxpayer bailout money. For that reason, the disposition of Opel, and along with it GM's Vauxhall unit, is a pocketbook issue for all Americans.

The Opel sale was just part of GM's bid to unload businesses to shore up its finances and make good on taxpayers' public investment since emerging from a rapidly engineered bankruptcy. Yet in Putin's view, it's the White House that's calling the shots since the U.S. Treasury -- and you personally by extension -- is the majority owner of the embattled GM.

You have to wonder what GM and the White House are thinking in antagonizing the entire car-buying public in Germany, where Opel was founded in 1863 and then taken over by GM in 1929. Maybe it's a negotiating ploy: With Germans rallying to push through a sale, they'll be more inclined to buy Opel vehicles after it closes, which increases the present value of the division GM's seeking to unload.

That may seem mercenary, but the global economy is no more genteel now when it's increasingly intertwined than it was when it was conducted under the banner of nationalistic flags. German workers fear GM will make more cuts than Magna to return Opel to profitability, and don't want to stomach deep concessions like their union brethren and sistren at the United Auto Workers already have in the states.

Consider this the growing pains and gamesmanship of the new world economic order. You've not seen the end of it - in this instance and in the future.