This morning General Motors has filed for bankruptcy in lower Manhattan.  GM then announced that it would close plants in Michigan, Indiana, Ohio and Delaware, while plants in Tennessee and elsewhere in Michigan were put on standby.

In its bankruptcy petition, G.M. said it had $82.3 billion in assets and $172.8 billion in debts. Its largest creditors were the Wilmington Trust Company, representing a group of bondholders holding $22.8 billion in debts, and affiliates of the United Auto Workers union, representing nearly $20.6 billion in employee obligations.Source: www.nytimes.com

General Motors is hoping that it will soon be able to reorganize and become profitable once more.  After its sale of Opel, it is likely to sell off additional brands while closing others.  Saturn is expected to be phased out by 2012, while Saab is already under bankruptcy protection in Sweden.

Barack Obama is expected to give a speech on GM's bankruptcy at 1200 EST.  In this speech, Barack Obama is going to discuss giving GM further monetary support to keep them solvent.

... American taxpayers will invest an additional $30 billion in the company, atop $20 billion already spent just to keep it solvent as the company bled cash as quickly as Washington could inject it. Whether that investment will ever be recovered is still an open question.Source: www.nytimes.com

While this seems extremely illogical to some, employees of GM, and more importantly the high paid administration of GM, are likely extremely happy with this new cash injection. 

This latest bankruptcy will not help the USA out of the Financial Crisis.  GM will be closing about 40% of their 6000 dealers, further driving up the unemployment rate.  It seems that the latest injection of $30 billion would be much better spent helping the newly unemployed, but what do I know?