* So much for more auto bailouts. Steve Rattner has brought some spine to Washington, and the result is 60 days in operational funding for GM (rather than the requested $16b in loans), the ouster of GM CEO Rick Wagoner and just 30 days for Chrysler to complete its alliance with Fiat (or else face liquidation): “The autos panel rejected a claim by Cerberus that Chrysler could be viable on its own, citing its relatively small size, weak product line-up and declining U.S. market share.”
* Michael Osinski: How I helped build Wall Street’s bomb.
* Morning Call: U.S. futures down on automaker woes, European shares pulled lower, London off 2.6% in early trading, Nikkei slides 4.5% and Hong Kong falls 4.7%.
* When a small town loses its only bank.
* Are the lab rat’s days numbered?
* Tim Geithner on This Week: “We have roughly $135 billion left” in uncommitted TARP funds.
* Fred Wilson gives more thought to what a good VC return should be, based on comments by one of his investors. The issue of 10-year returns being influenced by 1999-era dotcoms cannot be overstated. Remember, that was a year in which you could fund a company and take it public just months later. Our data suggests that the 10-year return benchmark will take a massive hit once January 1, 2010 comes around.
* VC-backed HuffingtonPost will bankroll an investigative journalism venture. It will certainly have plenty of available journalists to choose from.
* AFL-CIO Lawyer at a recent WSJ conference: “No One Here Is Going to a Food Bank”
* Stan Marsh takes us through the credit crisis: