THE CHURCH OF THE SUV . . . AND WILL WAGONER BE THE SCAPEGOAT?

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Pressure for Congress to act in time to save General Motors is apparently reaching heavenly heights. Detroit's Greater Grace Temple -- better known as the site for the funeral of civil rights icon Rosa Parks -- held a prayer meeting for the Detroit 3 on Pearl Harbor Day.

"'We have never seen as midnight an hour as we face this week,' the Rev. Charles Ellis told several thousand congregants at a rousing service at Detroit's Greater Grace Temple. 'This week, lives are hanging above an abyss of uncertainty as both houses of Congress decide whether to extend a helping hand.'"

"Local car dealerships donated three hybrid SUVs to be displayed during the service, one from each of the Big Three. A Ford Escape, Chevy Tahoe from GM and a Chrysler Aspen were parked just in front of the choir and behind the pulpit."

Some undoubtedly saw a bit of symbolism in that the stage which once held Rosa Parks' casket now holds what some may see as three emblems of the death of Detroit.

More than invoking Divine intervention, the Greater Grace Temple photo-op was likely intended to remind the OBAMAcrats to the centrality of auto workers to the left-center voter coalition that boosted Obama into power.

So far, the OBAMAcrats have produced nothing but tedious lectures, CEO humiliations and a homework assignment. Efforts at a broad solution apparently have stalled.

The developing Congressional aid plan merely seems to be an interim measure calculated to push the Detroit 3 credit crisis into Obama's first term. And the cost for the interim financing may just be the job of General Motors' CEO Rick Wagoner.

Wagoner's GM is approaching its sales and financial crisis with unexpected candor.


"'While we're still the U.S. sales leader, we acknowledge we have disappointed you,'" according to a new mea culpa advertisment from GM.

"At times we violated your trust by letting our quality fall below industry standards and our designs became lackluster."

"We have proliferated our brands and dealer network to the point where we lost adequate focus on the core U.S. market."

"We also biased our product mix toward pick-up trucks and SUVs." [Which, given Federal policy and market demand, was a necessity for survival]

All of this self-flagellation is probably not enough to save Wagoner's job. As the only one of the "insiders" left helming a Detroit 3 company, the OBAMAcrats and skeptical Republicans will likely have to make an example of him as "evidence" that Detroit has "repented" from its profligate ways.

Of course the politicians will not require the same level of "sacrifice" from Ron Gettelfinger or anyone in leadership at the U.A.W.

Maybe Wagoner's a praying man . . . .

Perhaps unintentionally, the prayers at Greater Grace Temple were offered on the 67th anniversary of the "Day that will live in infamy" -- Japan's premeditiated and heinous slaughter on American soil at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.

Ironically, the imported cars of the Japanese invaders (despite all of the overinflated claims of their inherent superiority) are not selling now either.

Of course, buying a Japanese import under the current economic climate sends a profoundly insensitive, selfish and -- frankly -- anti-American statement to everyone who sees that new paper license plate flapping in the breeze. And an anti-Christian one, considering that the percentage of Japanese who claim to be Christians hovers in the low single digits.

Certainly, most car and light truck buyers don't think much about nationalism or religion when buying a motor vehicle. But the congregants at Greater Grace Temple and scores of other churches that will be hard-hit if one or more of the Detroit 3 fails certainly do.

Meanwhile, Mike Huckabee continues his not-so-subtle war against any assistance whatsoever for the Detroit 3. On Huckabee's Fox News program, he repeatedly pointed out that "Main Street" was not going to get the same kind of "help" as GM, Ford and Chrysler. Along with Alabama Senator Richard Shelby, Huckabee has become a leading mouthpiece for the "let'em fail" crowd.

Of course, Huckabee -- for all his virtues -- is merely pandering to the "Club For Growth" wing of the G.O.P. on this one. He fails to recognize that decades of Washington's policies "broke" the Detroit 3. He fails to notice that the Detroit 3 are abnormally vulnerable to this credit crisis because the playing field is tilted away from the Detroit 3 by government policy. He cannot see that the Detroit 3 have been intentionally bled to near-death from thousands of cuts produced by government hatchets. He apparently cannot see the impact that a failure of the Detroit 3 would have on the greater U.S. economy and American society as a whole.

Instead, he's as myopic as one of those broke seminary students that he used to be --one of the self-centered ones that will buy the cheapest available car from "godless Japan" instead of supporting the jobs of more of his fellow American brothers and sisters, many of which are tithe-paying, devout Christians.

Another irony is that Governor Huckabee -- unashamedly a praying Christian and former minister -- may be praying at cross purposes to those devote folks at the "Church of the SUV" in Detroit. Of course, such irony is virtually always present in contested political battles (and even shooting wars).

It would seem that the Greater Grace Temple "prayer force" has its work cut out for it. But then, according to the bible, "Nothing is impossible with God."

Just tell that to Rick Wagoner and thousands of other soon-to-be-pink-slipped auto workers.