Compromise Near: Pelosi Agreeable To Wasting Money Already Earmarked For Waste On Bailout

So the taxpayers win, see? They were already going to waste this money, so why not shift it from one wasteful project to another?

WASHINGTON (CNN) – Help may soon be on the way to the struggling U.S. auto industry after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi backed off her opposition to using funds from a fuel-efficiency research program for a bailout, two congressional officials said Friday.
The significant move from Pelosi signals that the deadlock over rescuing Detroit may be over.
Congressional Republicans and President Bush support the idea of tapping the $25 billion advanced technology fund. Two officials familiar with compromise talks told CNN that the working target is $15 billion to $17 billion in bridge loans, intended to fund the struggling Big Three automakers through March.

Why did the federal government have tens of billions of dollars earmarked for this sort of research? Who knows, but this demonstrates the basic stupidity of our government.
Rather than keeping taxes and regulations low so that this sort of research and innovation could take place in the private sector, the government keeps taxes and regulation high so that government bureaucrats can decide what sort of research is necessary.
Which is a big reason why the auto companies are failing. The government does this research, then tells the automakers what kind of cars to make, not giving a fig along the way for what kind of cars Americans might actually want to drive.