Auto bailouts not a winner with many Ohio voters

Washington Times:

The Obama campaign is counting on the auto-industry bailout to carry the president to a victory in Ohio, but it ultimately may hold little sway with voters across the state who are still out of work and struggling to stay solvent.

The bailout package undoubtedly saved thousands of jobs in places such as Lordstown, Toledo and elsewhere, but in Ohio as a whole, a weak economy and poor job prospects trump the car company rescue.

For voters like Rick and Jared Sargent, the bailout is of secondary importance, while prolonged periods of unemployment drove their decisions to support Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

Mr. Obama “has destroyed this country in the last year. His whole campaign slogan is ‘forward,’ but for the last four years my family has just gone backward,” said Jared Sargent, 21, of Dayton, just after he and his father cast early votes for Mr. Romney.

“I’ve been out of work. … I can’t find a job making more than $8 an hour,” he said. “I’m terrified. If this country keeps going the way it’s been going, I wouldn’t want to bring a kid into this world.”

Like many Ohioans, the Sargents felt the repercussions of the U.S. auto industry’s troubles four years ago, but saw none of the benefits of the bailout. Jared Sargent said his mother was laid off in 2009 from a manufacturing job related to the car industry, a job that was eliminated after General Motors Co. closed its massive facility in nearby Moraine.

Since then, she has struggled to find a job, while her husband, Rick, battles health problems and also remains unemployed.

“His record has shown what it’s shown,” Rick Sargent said of Mr. Obama, as he and Jared sat at a picnic table in downtown Dayton.

“These deficits have got me scared to death,” he said, speaking in hushed tones, while his son spoke of the family’s continued struggle to find work with a mixture of anger and sorrow.

Even the president’s supporters think the auto rescue will take his re-election effort only so far, and that the job market in parts of Ohio remains stagnant.
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The bailouts may have been good for the UAW but Obama has their vote locked up anyway.  For the rest of the country the bailouts look like special interest corruption. They have actually hurt the sales of GM and Chrysler much more than a managed bankruptcy suggested by Romney.  Obama, barely mentions them outside of Ohio because they ae so unpopular.