General Motors, which only a few short months ago President Obama considered too big to fail, has failed anyway. It took $20 billion in taxpayer money down with it before finally being forced into the second largest industrial bankruptcy on record. And there will be at least another $30 billion in government aid to come. If this is the way the company will be managed from now on, politically correct Edsels will soon be rolling off Obama Motor’s newly reorganized assembly lines.

The White House’s initial insistence that GM not be allowed to go bankrupt, followed by its unprecedented takeover of the Detroit automaker, sends confusing and contradictory signals. GM’s bailout was supposed to protect jobs, but 120,000 factory and dealership positions will be eliminated under the bankruptcy. Obama insisted he had “no interest” in running the struggling automaker, but under the terms his auto industry task force imposed on GM, the federal government now has a 60 percent stake. Repeated White House declarations to the contrary notwithstanding, it’s been clear who was in charge since the day Obama fired former GM CEO Rick Wagoner.