and the role of government. dan akerson, the ceo of general motors, the largest consider manufacturer in the world back from bankruptcy with a bang. then the new head of the imf, france's former finance minister christine lagarde on the fate of america, greece, the euro and more. also the knight's tell particular. why in the world is an 800-year-old religious organization being cited by murderers on at least two continents? finally, what is this green blob attacking china? first here is my take. i know you heard so much about the debt ceiling that you're probably exhausted. i think it's important to point out a few facts because this matter has been so clouded by rhetoric. did you know there is only one other country in the world that even has a debt ceiling? that's denmark. it's a strange anomaly because its debt ceiling is deliberately kept very high so it will never need to be raised. why does no one else have a debt ceiling? because when a legislature votes to authorize spending at a certain level, but authorizes tax revenues at a lower level, it is assumed the government will have to borrow the difference. the vote to have higher expenditures than tax revenues is in effect a vote to borrow money to cover the difference. in the juntd states congress, including republicans, voted for a budget in which expenditures exceeded tax revenues. so the logical consequence of that budget again passed by the house republicans and by democrats is that the government has to make up the difference by borrowing. to come at it now after the budget has been passed is like getting your visa bill and then calling up the company to say, actually, we don't want to buy all that stuff we bought. that's not how it works. first you pay the bill, then you can change your spending about. so why do we have a debt ceiling anyway? ironically it was put in place during world war i so congress didn't have to authorize every new issue of debt. it was assumed it would be a formality to raise it. since 1960 the debt ceiling has been raised 78 times. my basic point is that this is a crisis we have manufactured out of whole cloth. we have created the circumstances in which the world now doubts our credibility, rating agencies are thinking of downgrading our debt, and the dollar's role as the world's rv currency could be jeopardized. please understand that none of these things are happening because the united states is running deficits. there was no indication by any measure that the united states was having difficulty borrowing money one month ago. in fact, the world has been lending money to the united states more cheaply than ever before. we face down grades and uncertainly and investor panic not because of our deficits, but because we are behaving like debt beats, refusing to pay our bills, pouting while the bill collector waits at the door. we do have a large deficit and a large debt and we do need to get it under control. the fact that the tea party has raised awareness of this issue is admirable. i actually happen to agree with their view that the current set of entitlements, medicare especially, have to be reformed dramatically to get our fiscal house in order. but that is not an excuse to endanger the good standing of the united states. first you pay the bills and then you figure out how to change your spending habits. the tragedy is that the damage may already have been done. from now on, every time the debt ceiling needs to be raised, the world will wonder will the united states stand by its promises, or will it break them? something that was taken for granted, the credibility of the united states is now surrounded by uncertainty. global markets have always had confidence in america. that confidence has been shaken, perhaps forever. and for this erosion, we have only ourselves to blame. let's get started. two years and two months ago one of the most store read american companies filed for bankruptcy protection. in its 100-year history, general motors had once made one out of every two cars sold in the united states. it had once been the most profitable company in the world. but in 2009 general motors lost $4.2 billion in a single quarter, and only one out of five cars in america were made by the company. today, general motors is making billion dollar profits again, and it is this year going to be the world's top automaker again. we the taxpayers own about a third of it. what does the future look like for general motors and america? dan akerson is chairman and ceo of general motors. welcome. >> thank you. when i ask businessmen why they're not hiring more and you're sirting on lots of cash, one of the things they always say is uncertainty. uncertainty probably affects you more than anyone else, this consumer demand, if you could get back up to 15 million cars, it would make a big difference. does this incredible month or two of rangeling in washington and the sense we can't get our house in order and we're so divided, do you think this hurts in a measurable way? >> well, you're right. nature abhors a vacuum and markets abhor uncertainty. uncertainty undermines consumer confidence. consumer spending in our country accounts for about 65% to 70 pushes of the gdp. when consumers lose confidence, they hesitate, not as xwul lish, not spending money. it does have an impact on the economy. but there are all sorts of uncertainties youchlt name one. the oil spikes earlier in this year. we got off to a pretty good start in 2011. then oil spiked above $100 a barrel. that particularly concerned our industry. then there was the tragic earthquake and tsunami in japan. that threw a lot of uncertainty into our industry. so there are all sorts of uncertainty. that's what we get paid to do, is to manage through that. it keeps me awake at night. >> the world you're describing is one where a lot of these uncertainties are beyond anyone's ability to fix. you can ameliorate them a little bit. do you think we're living in a kind of age of uncertainty? >> i do. some of it is stefl-inflicted. if it were a perfect world, i'd like to see the united states not default, technical or otherwise, because i think that throws another level of uncertainty and instability into the system. i've thought long and hard and so has most of our management team and a lot smarter people than we are, about what are the implications? what are the downstream impacts of a default? well, i'm responsible for general motors, and i would hate to have the job of one of the policymakers in washington these days. but i can focus and impact on what we're doing at general motors. we have about $35 billion to $40 billion of cash in our balance sheet. that's a lot. but i don't know what's going to happen. >> what would you do if there were a default? now, six months from now, a year from now? >> well, as you know, u.s. treasuries are the, quote, unquote, gold standard. if we default, the cost of treasury will go up and all other, whether they be mortgage rates or car loan rates would go up. that would create an issue or concern for us. at some level we just may have to kind of baton down the hatches and get through a tough storm. that wouldn't be good for general motors and i don't think it would be good for our customers or for our country. >> the question everyone wants to know is -- and the tea party, as you know, is animated in part by this concern. should the united states government have bailed general motors out? >> yes. simply put, yes. let me explain why. when you look at the helping hand, if you will, the bailout wasn't just for general motors specifically, but basically an industry. general motors was so dominant, especially in the united states, had chrysler and gm gone down, the supply chain would have cratered and it would have unimaginable impacts throughout the economy. it's estimated there were a million jobs saved in the extended automotive industry, bios fear, if you will. if are we doing on that promise today? we're profitable, very profitable. we have saved not only that million jobs in the intervening period since the restructuring awful general motors and chrysler, we've hired 115,000 auto workers across the nation. so it saved an industry that is profitable today, healthy today. it's creating jobs and it saved jobs. we've paid back roughly $30 billion plus of the $50 billion that was put in the company. as you say, the taxpayers still own a third. >> a lot of people say the government shouldn't be doing this kind of thing. i was at a speech one day and some guy comes up to me -- i said something about how i supported the rescue effort. he said it's government motors. this is not what the government should be doing. how do you respond to that? i say this because i know you, dan, and you were in the naif vays, oversee a tech company, you're kind of a republican-leaning guy i would say. >> that's probably fair. well, there are certainly different points of view around the table. but to the credit of the government, they invested and stood back and said run it like a corporation. they've never been in the board room. they've never involved themselves in any operational decisions. so the progress and the success of the company has been in the context of a competitive company that's owned now -- we had the largest ipo in the history of the world which we're very proud of, is the government is an owner. they're a minority owner. we're making great progress. and i think a company like general motors is important in way that is are unimaginable to the industry infrastructure of this country which is something that's not to be dismissed easily. >> do you think this is something that is an inevitable emergency role the government has to play. >> there have been cyclical instances over the last 20 or 30 years. we had the brady bonds, basically bail out sovereign debt around the world when commodity prices got ahead and then collapsed, and secretary brady came to the fore. had the resolution trust crisis during the s&n crisis. both passed, basically saved industries, if you will. i think this is the same analogous situation. at some point in time the government -- in fact, they're out of chrysler now, and over time i believe they'll come out of general motors as well. >> what do you think of the obama administration in terms of the way it structured the bailout, the conversations, discusses around it. you were on the board then, not ceo. >> i came on the board following the bankruptcy at the request of the invitation of the administration. i think the restructuring was done by, quite frankly, a bunch of private equity folks who are, i would say, expert in turn-arounds and restructurings. it was done pretty well and the prooch has been in the subsequent two years. like i said, a very successful ipo, payback of the majority of the money fronted by both the canadian and the player khan governments, and the fact that we're creating profits today, good cash flow. we're hiring people. we're designing cars that are some of the best in the world. we're building them and selling them not only in the united states -- and that's important to mention for general motors. we're a very successful competitor in the united states, we also have the leading market share in the bric countries, brazil, russia, klein nah and germany. that money comes back to the united states. we're moving on all fronts, a lot of strength in the company, a lot of energy. very proud of the progress we've made. >> we'll come right back with dan akerson, the ceo of general motors. i'm going to ask why he, the ceo of general motors is actually in favor of a gas tax when we come back. and 24/7 help from award-winning customer support to take control of my finances and my life. i tap into the power of revolutionary mobile apps. to trade wherever. whenever. life isn't fully experienced sitting idly by. neither is investing. 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[ male announcer ] we are insurance. ♪ we are farmers ♪ bum, ba-da-bum, bum, bum, bum ♪ any questions? no. you know... ♪ we're not magicians ♪ we can't read your mind ♪ ♪ read your mind ♪ we need your questions ♪ each and every kind ♪ every kind ♪ will this react with my other medicine? ♪ ♪ hey, what are all these tests even for? ♪ ♪ questions are the answer ♪ yeah ♪ oh unlike fish oil, megared softgels are small and easy to swallow with no fishy smell or aftertaste. try megared today. we are back with dan akerson, the ceo of general motors. you caused some alarm or alarm bells to go off when you said something to the effect that the most efficient thing for the government to do if it wants to encourage us to kind of move to a new generation of cars, wean ourselves off imported oil would be to have a gas tax. tell us why you think that's a good idea. >> well, i think what we need more aptly is a pragmatic national energy policy that is market-based, and then we'll start to allocate resources more efficiently. we want to be part of the solution that helps us become less dependent on foreign oil, foreign imports. and so we've looked at a variety of technologies we're starting to deploy today. we have the volt which was not a step forward, it was a leap forward in the electrification of the car. soon we'll be introducing bio fuel engines that can burn both compressed natural gas and liquid gasoline. we're looking at hydrogen fuel cells which have no carbon emissions, zero. they're very expensive now. but we've just in the last two years reduced the price of that technology by $100,000. the car is still too expensive and probably won't be practical till the 2020-plus period. i don't know. then there's the issue of infrastructure. there are a number of different ways to attack a goal, to address an ambition, aspiration. that aspiration should be a pragmatic national energy policy. and there are many variables, many options and alternatives. this was one of many, and it's not the only one. >> what i notice right now though is given the japanese -- the tsunami and what it's done to the people's views of nuclear power, germany shutting down, switzerland shutting down, the reality is the world is more dependent on oil and natural gas perhaps than it has been for a while. >> uh-huh. >> can we really wean ourselves off petroleum? >> well, long term i do think we can. i think we ought to -- in this country, and i think it is region and country-specific. you have to look at what natural resources you have. i believe we -- we've been called the saudi arabia of natural gas. i've heard t. boone pickens speak about that specifically. so i do think we should utilize our own natural resources more so than foreign resources if you will for a lot of reasons that have benefit in the broader economic context, balance of trade, dependence on maybe unreliable suppliers. >> when you look at the american economy, what we see is we're back to the gdp levels we were at before the crisis, but with ten million fewer people working. that's at some level a sign of great productivity, but for those ten million people it's a tragedy. how do you get jobs back? how do you get america to be employing people and in large numbers again? >> well, i think you have to look at innovation. great nations, and i believe we're the greatest nation on the face of the earth, we need to continue to invest in r&d and we are. you have to look at automation. we recently opened -- trying to build the first compact car in the united states. no one is trying to do that today. and in this new era of productive industrial relations between management and union, i think all parties have learned great lessons over the last couple years. one of the things i've been add vo kating and i think is starting to get some traction is that we don't want to see our structural costs go up, that the union should be on a profit sharing regime wherein if management gets a bonus, union members get a bonus. if we do well, we all ought to share in it. auto! and innovation is critical. 20 years ago the cost of manufacturing a car, the cost of labor was roughly 20, 25%. today it's 10%. yes, there's fewer jobs, but they're more interesting, more challenging and we can afford to pay costs, but we can't see escalating costs as far as the eye can see. we need to see costs reasonably predictable, our fixed costs, and the variable component is contingent upon our success in the marketplace. >> dan akerson, pleasure to have you on. >> thank you. >> and we will be right back. i love that my daughter's part fish. but when she got asthma, all i could do was worry ! specialists, lots of doctors, lots of advice... and my hands were full. i couldn't sort through it all. with unitedhealthcare, it's different. we have access to great specialists, and our pediatrician gets all the information. everyone works as a team. and i only need to talk to one person about her care. we're more than 78,000 people looking out for 70 million americans. that's health in numbers. unitedhealthcare. now for our "what in the world" segment. what exactly is the knight's tell particular? the group has come to everyone's attention because of anders breivek's killing spree in norway about a week ago. he claimed in his rambling manifesto to represent a modern day knight's tell particular, but who are they? the name might ring a bell, especially if you've seen ""the davinci code"." >> and their military arm, the knight's templar. >> or "national treasure." >> they brought the treasure back to europe and took the name, the knight's templar. >> these are, of course, all fictional. what are the facts? the knight's tell particular was a christian military ordered founded. they quoer distinctive white mantles with a red cross. they made their reputation by winning a series of battles. their first headquarters were in a mosque in jerusalem because they believed to be built on the top of the ruins of solomon's temple. the knight's main job was said to be protecting christian pilgrims from muslims amongst others. to this day the site of the mosque and temple mount remain one of the most heavily disputed places on orth. the order of the knight's temlar was dissolved but the legacy lives on. rumors swirl that they still exist, but in seek' and guard the holy grail. what sounds like fiction back to fact, we saw breivek saw himself as a knight's templar. get this, a new drug gang has recently arisen in mexico. they call themselves the knight's templar and claim to live which a religious code, a copy of which the associated press recently obtained. it says the drug dealing knights will defend against materialism, injustice and tyranny and hits members will be honorable, noble, courteous and honest. they are selling cocaine or whatever in the name of god. anders breivek's fascination with the knight is less bizarre, part of a larger movement. people like breivek are trying to resurrect the idea of a modern day crew said, a real clash of civilizations against what they see as an islamic invasion of europe. in fact, muslims make up only 3% of europe's pop lakes and that's likely to