Today in Washington House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will meet with the CEOs of the Detroit Big Three and the head of the United Auto Workers who will be personally appealing for billions in additional federal aid to help the struggling American automotive industry.

Much in Washington is uncertain as the nation's lawmakers enter the transitional period between the election of Sen. Barak Obama and his January inauguration. For her part, Pelosi has indicated a desire for a lame-duck Congressional session opening November 17 to enact some version of a second economic stimulus package.

The amount of money involved in such an effort will depend on the degree of cooperation Democrats can achieve with Republicans in the closing days of the Bush administration. Some Democrats have indicated they will pass what they can now and come back in January with a larger effort.

The Bush administration, for its part, has made efforts to speed the implementation of a $25 billion low-interest loan program approved in September and targeted at automakers and their suppliers. Only yesterday the Department of Energy finalized a set of guidelines for companies to apply for those funds.

Automakers have been denied a share of the $700 billion bailout to financial institutions and may have to wait for the changing of the guard in Washington to be complete to have a chance to garner any serious funding. Deals like the proposed General Motors / Chrysler merger may hang in the balance until the issue of government assistance is resolved and in the meantime, the automotive industry continues to return sales and earnings figures that are at their lowest in a quarter of a century.