To answer that, let's turn it around. If someone called you a dyed in the wool, conservative, capitalist, would you be insulted. Not me :)
That's a funny thing I've noticed about the liberals here. That seem to be ashamed of what they are.
In general, I agree. To be fair, the involvement with the auto companies began under Bush. The difference is at least with the Republicans it's a choice of last resort. If you had the Democrats way, their would be a lot more of it. They like to think that they create jobs with direct govt involvement and they know where money should go, like Solyndra and the other solar companies that the govt is now taking a bath on.
Now that you have me going on Solyndra, let's take a closer look at how the Democrats did all those deals. They say they believe in capitalism. Well, they obviously are not capitalists and don't even understand the basics. In the free capital markets, how are deals like Solyndra done? Solyndra would have to go to venture capitalists and in exchange for getting $500mil they would have to give the venture capitalists a huge stake in the company, maybe even more than half of it, in the form of stock, warrants, etc. That way, if the company succeeds, the venture capitalists make a nice profit.
Venture capitalists fund a bunch of deals. On a lot of them, they lose everything. On some they break even or make some money. And on a few, they wind up hitting a home run with the likes of an Intel or Apple. Overall, if you do enough deals and do them right, it averages out to a good return.
Now, how did Obama and the Dems structure the solar deals with Solyndra and the rest? They simply guaranteed LOANS. Meaning they set up the tax payers for a LOSS from day one. There was no upside, only downside. The very best case was the govt/taxpayers just didn't lose any of their money. And in the worst case, they got shafted for the full amount of the loan.
Some real capitalist geniuses. Sound like a good deal to you? In return for those loan guarantees these companies should have had to give the govt equity, warrants, etc so that if they turn into a billion dollar business, the govt gets something. But given the business accumen of the buffoons making the decisions, looks like the chances of that are slim as well.