The bigwigs on Capitol Hill appear poised to wave their collective magic wand over the economy once again in an attempt to cure what ails us. This time, Detroit's triumvirate of automakers hope to receive the anointing of federal fairy dust in the form of ready cash to rescue their floundering businesses. Having already fleeced taxpayers once to rescue the financial industry, Congress should not so readily attempt the same maneuver.

Why the sudden clamoring for help from the auto industry? As the credit crisis deepened during the fall and access to easy cash dried up, the Detroit car companies found that they didn't have enough cash to make payments on their labor contracts and that getting access to more loans would be difficult.

GM, in the last few days, has released figures showing that it might not have enough cash to meet its obligations through the end of the year, sparking rumors of bankruptcy. Ford and Chrysler are scarcely better off. In justifying the $700 billion price tag of the Wall Street bailout, Congress assured the public that companies like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were simply "too big to fail"-that there was too much capital and too many jobs at stake to allow these companies to eat their fill of humble pie. In making their bid for a piece of that $700 billion package, GM, Chrysler and Ford have employed this same argument, reminding the public of their importance to American manufacturing. But more of that in a minute.

There are several reasons Congress should refuse. First, simply handing money to the automakers provides no incentive for these companies to reform the failed business models they have clung to for far too long. For years, the powerful United Auto Workers Union has successfully bullied the Big Three into providing exceptionally good, but unsustainable, benefits (including a Jobs Bank under which laid-off workers still draw a full salary paid for by GM).

In addition, the Detroit manufacturers relied too heavily on sales of gas-guzzling SUVs to turn a profit, rather than diversifying their fleets to prepare for times of rising oil prices. Writing a blank check to these companies simply reinforces that moral hazard at public expense.

Second, this crisis provides the perfect opportunity for Democrats to demonstrate real change by showing that they are not bought and paid for by special interests. The United Auto Workers Union, which bears a great deal of responsibility for Detroit's heartburn, provided a great deal of aid to the Democratic Party during the 2008 election cycle, and expects some help from Washington. One of the reasons allowing a company like GM to declare Chapter 11 bankruptcy is so unpalatable is that it would force a renegotiation of long-standing labor contracts. Some, at least, of those comfortable benefits would disappear under a Chapter 11 bankruptcy, something UAW looks to sympathetic Democrats to prevent.

At the same time, GM management is reluctant to seek bankruptcy due to the possibility that it would tarnish the company's image and discourage people from buying their cars. People voted for change this fall-now would be the perfect time for Democrats to act on that mandate.

Perhaps the most important reason to refuse the request of these manufacturers though, is the horrible precedent such a concession would continue. Government intervention in the market earlier this fall opened up precisely this possibility-that having bailed out one sector of the economy, other sectors would feel entitled to help as well. It didn't help that the government arbitrarily decided that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were too big to allow to fail, but Lehman Brothers wasn't. Congress's extravagant and haphazard intervention in the market gives them no standard to judge how much aid is enough and no good reason to refuse aid to those who request it. Small wonder, then, that given Congress's willingness to provide aid to Wall Street, the auto industry feels encouraged to ask for a slice of the pie.

Although the Wall Street relief package is a done deal, Congress must now refuse to further involve itself in the economy in order to keep from handing out money to everyone who asks for it. "Too big to fail" is just not a good argument.