Automakers' bailout hinges on the details

— -- Congress and the White House continued to try to hammer out final details late Monday on a bill that would deliver immediate loans of up to $15 billion to help troubled Detroit automakers survive through the first quarter. General Motors and Chrysler have said they need loans now to avoid bankruptcy filings.

The agreed-upon broad outline would call for the government to oversee a restructuring of the companies getting loans and to gain an ownership stake.

But there were sticking points between congressional Democrats and the Bush administration on some controversial provisions. One would create a powerful overseer, a so-called car czar, to supervise company restructuring plans and oversee spending. The other is a provision banning automakers taking loans from suing individual states that impose higher greenhouse gas emission standards than federal government rules.

In statements late Monday, GM and Chrysler agreed to the overall provisions of the deal. Ford Motor, which says it can soldier through next year without a bailout, said it "fully supports an effort to address the near-term liquidity issues of GM and Chrysler" because "a failure of one of our competitors could affect us all."

The bailout loans "will put the government and its agencies in the automobile business," and that's a bad move, says Gerald Meyers, former head of American Motors, which Chrysler bought in 1987, who now teaches at the University of Michigan.

"It's just a shame this has happened. Here we have an industry gasping for air and allowing themselves to be sucked into this whirlpool of political demands," he says.

The proposed bailout comes amid contentious arguments about whether Detroit car companies should be allowed to survive, and if so, how they should be run and what they should make.

"There's not going to be an endless flow of money," declared House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.

And she threatened to fire automakers' brass, saying that if the federal loans don't produce a thriving U.S. auto industry, "We have to make an evaluation of the leadership."