At the G-20 Meeting Bush is being cornered by the EU (in particular France) and Russia who insist a fundamental change in the world wide financial system is a must. It is pretty well understood that Bush is reluctant to agree to any far reaching changes and the EU and Russia already eye a February meeting with Obama.

Caution is the key word for Obama. He must not give away the entire store.

G-20 finished their DC meeting. www.timesonline.co.uk has a 9 page report. There is a lot of "should" in there. What should be done here and there, etc. I cannot see any actual resolutions.

Nevertheless, it is interesting to read.

Acording to newspaper reports here one of the major car companies will go bankrupt before January if they are not offer help. Obama and the Senate wants to help but Bush still vetos the Senate Bills. This is one case where caution is not the wiser policy. Obama will not give away the whole store but will provide help where it is needed to prevent a total collapse.

I don't know what Obama will do, but the word 'should' needs to be changed to 'shall' for any of this--including the exotic welcoming dinner--to have any real 'teeth.'

Aus, Obama isn't President yet, so there isn't much he can do.

Even more pointedly, should we bail out the automakers? I think not.

If their current emploers go bely up, they will find other work. It may be inconvienent for them or require a relocation but that is the nature of things. They certainly are not entitled to retain their high paying union extorted jobs at the expensive of the tax payers bailing out inefficient and uncompetitive companies they have driven to bankruptcy. These employees are for the most part skilled laborers who can find jobs elsewhere.

Hopefully something will come of the G-20 meetings, and it won't be just a display of massive egos strutting around and meaningless resolutions.

I think a plan to help these workers find new work, including education if necessary, would be a more worthwhile investment in the future than keeping the heads of fat-cats above water. I also disagree with funding inefficient companies, at least in terms of bailout, loans are a different issue but only if the loan comes with a strict set of conditions for company restructuring.

I believe I agree. The U.S. auto industry has painted itself into a corner due to various bad decisions in a great many areas and throwing money at the isn't going to cure the disease, merely ease the symptoms for a while.

Allowing the auto makers to declare bankruptcy would not necessarily result in the demise of GM, Ford and/or Chrysler, but it might give them the chance to do some top-to-bottom restructuring under banrupcy court supervision and approval that could, could let them emerge in a much more competitive position.

You mean like the auto jobs moving to Canada? An average auto worker earns about $78 a hour. A very large portion of this is hourly wage is for his health and welfare insurance. It benefits the manufacturer to move operations to a country like Canada to take advantage of their country's health care plan..hence saving the company mega dollars

I suppose you are right, the auto worker, could find some job... working for half the wage, and no benefits.

Folks, it all starts with fixing our health care system!

I would have loved to have tasted that $400.00 bottle of wine!

Myr, there has been a movement for some time to change the buying currency for oil from dollars to euros. If that happens, our goose will be cooked. As is, the world has to come to us to buy our dollars before they can buy oil. We don't need oil wells; all we need are machines to grind out our dollars.

We have pole position... For how much longer is the question, since we are in the middle of a big financial mess.