Politicians everywhere are forming encounter groups to commemorate the great Detroit rescue of 2008-2009, and given the selection of recent economic policies to feel good about, maybe the auto bailout is the best they can do. Still, amid Michigan's GOP primary and President Obama's re-election victory lap, this $81.8 billion-odd adventure in industrial policy could stand more scrutiny.

The bailouts worked, the story goes, because General Motors and Chrysler still exist and their stocks are trading above $0. Yet existence is...