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I just wonder why Obama's approach is so very different with the automakers than it is with the banking industry:

General Motors filed for bankruptcy on Monday morning, submitting its reorganization papers to a federal clerk in Lower Manhattan.

G.M. said it had $82.3 billion in assets and $172.8 billion in debts. Its largest creditors were the Wilmington Trust Company, representing a group of bondholders holding $22.8 billion in debts, and affiliates of the United Auto Workers union, representing nearly $20.6 billion in employee obligations.

The filing itself seemed anticlimactic. It was a simple procedure done thousands of times each day across the country, by individuals and business alike. But not usually, as in this case, by companies like G.M. that have woven themselves into the fabric of America culture.

The company was forced into the filing by President Obama, who is betting that by temporarily nationalizing the onetime icon of American capitalism, he can save at least a diminished automaker that is competitive.

[...] The bankruptcy of General Motors culminates a remarkable four months of confrontation between Washington and Detroit that is expected to result in a drastic downsizing of the company. It also places the government in uncharted territory as a business owner, as it takes a majority ownership stake in the company during its restructuring.

Why aren't we forcing the "too big to fail" banks to downsize?

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Excellent news in the fight against global warming as Obama moves up the implementation date on U.S. MPG regulations. This is urgent:

WASHINGTON - Joined by an uncommon alliance of auto executives, union leaders and environmental activists, President Barack Obama on Tuesday announced a national program to cut new vehicle carbon emissions and raise mileage by 30 percent, while also reducing oil needs and changing the kinds of cars Americans buy.

"This gathering is all the more extraordinary for what these diverse groups — despite disparate interests and previous disagreements — have worked together to achieve," Obama said at a White House ceremony. "For the first time in history, we have set in motion a national policy aimed at both increasing gas mileage and decreasing greenhouse gas pollution for all new trucks and cars."

"The status quo is no longer acceptable," he added. "We have done little to increase fuel efficiency of America's cars and trucks for decades."

Bloomberg reports:

The plan adopts nationwide a standard proposed by California, setting the first-ever U.S. limit on greenhouse-gas pollution from vehicles.

Auto companies and California have signed off on the proposal, ending their feud over the state’s proposed rules. California’s Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and General Motors Corp. Chief Executive Officer Fritz Henderson are both planning to attend Obama’s announcement.

“It launches a new beginning,” said David McCurdy, president of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, in a statement. “The president has succeeded in bringing three regulatory bodies, 15 states, a dozen automakers and many environmental groups to the table.”

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I can't begin to tell you just how little sympathy I have for the Wall Street bankers who bitch and moan about how impossible it would be to live in NYC on "only" $250K. (My kid manages to live there on considerably less.)

No, my sympathies lie with people like this who worked hard, played by the rules and are now caught in an economic disaster:

As the Obama administration prepares to send Chrysler into bankruptcy court, with General Motors possibly to follow, one of the biggest losers may be the automakers' current and future retirees, a group of nearly 1 million people who could see their pensions and health-care funds slashed by tens of billions of dollars.

The loss could pose political trouble for the Obama administration, which has pressed both automakers since February to ready themselves for bankruptcy as a means of purging their overwhelming debts.

The GM and Chrysler pension plans together cover 928,000 people, and many of them worry that the industry restructuring already underway could slice their benefits.

A group of nonunion retirees is scheduled to meet with the administration's auto task force this morning to try to save their pensions and health benefits. The United Auto Workers is also negotiating over changes to the benefits, but has yet to reach an agreement with the Treasury Department, a source familiar with the matter said.

"We are going to do what we can to help protect their benefits to the degree that we can," said an administration official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the discussions are private. "It's premature to speculate on what will happen. This is certainly a constituency that we are focused on, but we have not and cannot rule anything out."

With Chrysler facing an end-of-month federal deadline to reach agreements with its bankers and the union, stakeholders have been trading a flurry of offers and counteroffers.

In recent weeks, members of the task force have struggled to devise rescue plans and a legal strategy that might protect those workers if the companies file for bankruptcy. But experts say an outcome is difficult to predict.

"I feel betrayed," said Vicki Prout, 57, a former executive assistant at Chrysler whose 23-year career there included typing speeches for Lee Iacocca when he was chief executive. "They offered these incentives for us to take early retirement, and I took one. Now it looks like my fixed income wasn't so fixed."

She estimated that her monthly payment would be cut in half if the pension is terminated in a bankruptcy. She has started looking for jobs around her home in Troy, Mich., but said there are not many to find.

"I feel like I've been caught in a storm," she said.

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The auto bailout plan is on its way to the White House, as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi explained today at her press conference:

Pelosi: We are, as you know, for the past few days, in conversation about how we go forward with a package for the auto industry that produces at the end of the day -- and that means, very soon -- a viable industry for our country. It is an industry that is important to our economy, to our industrial base. There are workforce concerns that again are important to our country. And we want to be able to review the performance of the auto companies as we go forth.

In order to do that, it's important for us to pass legislation that will set criteria for restructuring and reorganization of that industry and the companies within it.

Pelosi then hands off the mike to Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., the architect of the bill. Frank makes clear that the ball is now firmly in George W. Bush's court. Whaddya think the chances are he'll blow it?

MSNBC has more details on the bailout plan.