Everywhere I read and everyone I hear - letters to the editor, weblogs, commentaries, etc etc, - they all talk about the intangible positives of the Barack Obama presidency. For example, a letter in Sunday's Chicago Tribune talks about the ability of Barack Obama to inspire people to action. I've heard others suggest that it is a huge positive that Obama shows all Americans and the entire world that anyone can accomplish anything in America. I've said it myself - Obama gives the country a badly needed change of direction.

But all this, especially my own statement, presupposes that the direction we change to is a good one. That's not a given. If we were driving the wrong way down a road, a change of direction might be a good thing - unless it turned the vehicle directly into a concrete embankment. That wouldn't be so good.

So far it seems like all I'm hearing, and to be fair, not just from President-Elect Obama, is "Bail out corporations with taxpayer money". Well damn, shouldn't these guys figure out a way to bail themselves out?

First off, none of the Big Three are likely to go under completely, in my opinion. What I think they're likely to do is lay off thousands of workers, cut out lines of cars they're making, maybe lay off some middle managers, and try to figure out a way to make sure their big shareholders come away with some value for themselves. Bad, to be certain. Very hard on the economy of Michigan.

I come from a town in Illinois that used to have a major presence by Caterpillar Tractor. We had two large plants in town, and they were the major employer for the area. Before that, we had steelworks. Now the steelworks site is a national historic site, and the factories a distant memory. And Cat has one small plant here.

We've adapted, however. Fortunately for us, we're close enough to Chicago (the end of the Metra line and a stop on the commuter Amtrack line) to be a bedroom community of sorts for that urban hub. We also still have some industry around town - a lot of us are employed by Com Ed and Exelon, which run the nuclear power plants, and Midwest Generation, which runs coal plants. We have an Exxon Mobil refinery, we have a Dow Chemical plant, a Citgo plant, and lots of smaller industry. Oh, and we have two riverboat casinos now, serving gamblers from our local area and from the Chicago area.

Michigan towns dependent on the auto industry can't do the same thing? Adapt?

After we hand the Big 3 25 million in taxpayer dollars, we're likely to see ... layoffs, plant closures, and elimination of some lines of vehicles ... and then the need for another bailout in a few years.

The Obama presidency is going to have to make some hard decisions about stuff like this, and the answer isn't fleecing the taxpayers. The money doesn't grow on trees. After all, money is just a symbol - it's the way we keep score of our contributions to the economy. The government can't just keep spending our, and more to the point, our children's and grandchildren's tax dollars to prop up businesses that have clearly failed already.

These are the tangible things that President Obama will have to deal with - inspiration is not a bad thing, neither is a change in direction, necessarily, but it isn't going to solve problems all by itself.