The auto workers union and their corporate masters are engaged in a conflict that could sink the American economy and both sides have their heels dug in, unwilling to concede anything at all.

Everyone at the table is being unreasonable and it’s fascinating to see this dick measuring contest play out.

The manufacturers are doing what they always do and started shooting hostages, but the union has decided two can play at that game.

If I’m a betting man, I’d say the union will be offered a modest increase in salary and benefits and eventually succumb to the growing pressure to accept. Corporate America has infinitely deeper pockets and they own the politicians too, so they can afford to hold out longer.

Labor doesn’t get bailouts the same way that corporations do, or with nearly as many zeroes. When the manufacturers tighten the screws, the people with blue collars will bleed most. Red, white, and blue are battling a civil war, the modern kind fought on balance sheets.

They’re all wrong, though.

Labor is looking to secure their future by tying themselves to a sinking ship. The manufacturers are trying to keep their ship upright by using the bodies of their labor to plug the leaks. No one has the intelligence to look up and see they are already drowning.

They’re all slaves to the fossil fuel industry that will do everything in its power to snuff out alternatives until they have drained the planet of every resource that can be commodified.

All of the out loud struggle, us against them posturing will mean nothing when the planet sloughs us off like the dead weight we are. And neither side is interested in having a rational conversation about how we might stop all of this nonsense for a minute and talk about our future as a species.

There are too many top level concerns like money to be bothered considering we might be hastening an apocalypse.