GM Goes BK.

From the Detroit Free Press:

President Barack Obama will announce on Monday the bankruptcy of General Motors Corp., launching a complicated, $59-billion effort to prevent the century-old juggernaut of American manufacturing from collapse.

Backed by its unions, large bondholders, and the governments of the United States, Canada and Ontario, GM will file in New York a painful plan to cleave itself into a lean, government-owned automaker pared down to compete in a sputtering U.S. market.As part of the bankruptcy, GM will spell out 14 plant closings expected to affect 21,000 jobs, and additional cuts among salaried workers.

President Barack Obama will address the nation from the White House at 11:55 a.m. on his rescue of the nation’s largest automaker, planning to infuse $30.1 billion to pay for the bankruptcy and emergence of a new GM, on top of the $19.4 billion in loans that officials say did little but delay the reckoning by a few months.

Hard times in the Motor City.

More here.