Double standard in D.C.

Double standard in D.C.

It’s become clear why the Bush administration was so opposed to tapping the Wall Street bailout money to help save the struggling U.S. auto industry. The Washington Post reported Saturday that only $15 billion is left from the first $350 billion in rescue money allocated by Congress.

Detroit’s Big Three automakers couldn’t get loans of $34 billion from Washington, but the Treasury Department rushed to commit $50 billion to one bank, Citigroup.

Congressional leaders and President George W. Bush reached an agreement Friday to provide about $15 billion in loans to the auto industry by taking the money from a $25 billion auto loan program that was meant to finance the production of more fuel-efficient vehicles. That would seem to assure solvency for the automakers until March, and by then, the new Congress and the Barack Obama administration will have had time to put together a more comprehensive package.

Haves and have nots

Clearly, the automakers faced a double standard when they went calling on Washington for help.

For instance, while Congress spent hours grilling automakers on their mode of travel and on compensation levels for everyone from the CEO to the entry-level assembly line worker, bankers and financiers came under no such scrutiny.

We commented two weeks ago on the plan for PNC, headquartered in Pittsburgh, to buy National City, which is based in Cleveland. Some questions have been raised — and rightfully so — about that deal by Northeast Ohio congressmen Steven C. LaTourette, R-14th, and Dennis Kucinich, D-10th.

Few others seem interested, even though the deal would involve PNC providing golden parachutes worth between $50 million and $80 million to 14 National City executives. That’s more than the CEOs of the Big Three make in a year — combined — for the work they do. It will be parcelled out to a handful of bank managers in one city in exchange for them walking away from their jobs.

And from Congress and the Bush administration, there’s barely a peep.