An alternative to GM's demise

We read or hear daily that there two options for GM--either we pay billions of dollars to keep them afloat or they will file bankruptcy and most probably die.

There is one other reality that I have not heard mentioned once. Judge the quality of this idea by how you feel when you hear it--are you upbeat, depressed, lukewarm, etc?

What if, whether through bankruptcy or otherwise, the various brands such as Saturn, Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet, and Pontiac were sold or split off? That means we would have a half dozen or so small American car companies. These companies would be entrepreneurial, they would have people with passion designing their product and their customer experience.

It might seem that these small companies would be too small--not true. They would be as large or larger in America than Suzuki, VW, Audi, Mercedes, Subaru, to mention just a few.

Somewhere we have made the assumption that America needs a huge conglomerate that has numerous car brands under its umbrella. We don't. We would be better off if many of those brands were able to live on and thrive on their own.