It seems as if Congress is about to vote a 15-billion dollar low-interest transitional bailout loan for GM and Chrysler, an additional amount presumably to come from the new administration. I’m not sure how I stand on this, but I do know one thing: I agree with Chris Dodd that as a contingency of this loan GM’s CEO must go. The argument that the management of the company is none of the government’s business does not hold water when it is the government that is (excuse the metaphor) keeping the business afloat. That’s our bucks being used by the auto companies. We get a vote in how they use it. Their leadership has been execrable. Their leadership must go. And, as a public service, and as an inducement, Dodd should resign along with them. He’s part of the problem too, not part of the solution.
In the grand scheme of things, the proposed bailout wouldn’t be that big a deal.
The big deal is the fact that they’ll be back for more in 6 months, tops.
In fact, they’re already upping the amount week-to-week.
Transition to what?
Honestly, let’s be clear: the purpose of a bailout by congress (as opposed to simply filing for bankruptcy protection) is because the senior executives do NOT want to formulate and be held to a genuine restructuring (not to mention the transparency required to go along with it). The UAW agrees, because they know their labor contracts would be first on the chopping block. If the courts decide that the automakers are irretrievable, then we could always turn around and decide if congress should cut a check later. This whole “act immediately or we’ll file chapter 7″ is baloney and should be recognized as such.
I’ll agree that GM’s senior management needs to go. Ford has made genuine progress and Chrysler is under very recent new management, so they can get a pass. The subprime lobbyist firm of Dodd and Frank should resign as well.
Roger, the smoke was starting to curl out my ears as i read your post, until thjat is i came to your last sentences. Yo ho ho –right right right –Barney Franks too — the whole set of subprime players, the insufferably sanctimonious, insufferably guilty, economy-busting, vote-buying, capital-destroying, old folks’ savings evaporating, Kremlin & dictator-enabling, lying, cheating, stealing, sneering at their victims, monsters of congress.
It’s not the management of the big 3 that’s necessarily at fault. It’s the environment that the big 3 operate in, created by the politicians, that is at fault. The auto industry long ago became a politically protected jobs program, and now that the companies have been looted by the workers, there’s nothing left for the government to do but prop them up or let them collapse.
The only reason this bailout is going through is so that the Dems constituency, the UAW is kept happy. I say let the CEO’s stay. No bailout. If they need to go chapter 11 let them and if there’s need for change at the top, the BofD and all the shareholders (what’s left of them) can take care of the big guys.
They now want an auto oversight board in the gov. Why does this sound so wrong in the USofA?
Dodd go? He’s going to top old Klansman Bob Byrd for longevity before he’s through. Nothing short of toe tapping in a toilet stall dynamites these barnacle-encrusted senators out of their seats.
Someone needs to explain to me why Chris Dodd continues to be the loudest voice from congress when it comes to repairing our economy, both with the auto companies and the housing industry.
This is a guy who whould be on trial for the ethical violations with the Countrywide loans he received, and instead he’s lecturing both Wall Street and Detroit how to run their finances.
Am I the only one who finds this grossly absurd?
I’m not defending the management of GM or Chrysler, but just because you give a company a loan doesn’t mean that you now run the company and get to make the management hiring decisions.
And god help them if the Auto makers are relying on the wisdom of Chris Dodd to remake their companies.
“Their leadership has been execrable.”
Not really. These individuals were placed in an untenable situation. One could well deserve an A and still look like a loser. A CEO of an American auto company is similar to someone being hired to captain the Titanic—after it hit the iceberg. Literally, the top auto executives have had to spend more time and energy in keeping the cost of employee benefits under control than focusing on building better vehicles. No, we should instead blame the Wagner Act that essentially allowed the UAW to put a gun to the auto industry’s head and threaten to pull the trigger.
Roger Simon has perhaps unwittingly touched on the most worrying aspect of Chris Dodd’s comments: the power of the government to determine who runs specific companies. This should literally scare the hell out of you. Also, such an arrangement virtually guarantees failure. Political favoritism invariably is the number one determining factor. And to be blunt, this is unadulterated socialism.
“Literally, the top auto executives have had to spend more time and energy in keeping the cost of employee benefits under control than focusing on building better vehicles.”
Well, David, that’s your view. As a CEO, I have discovered that one of the key parts of the job description is to be able to deal with many issues simultaneously. One of the most important of those issues is to constantly be looking at and planning for the future. The Gang in Detroit has been particularly poor in this regard, although recently they have improved. I don’t like the bailout. But if the government makes a loan, they certainly have a right to make requirements. So, I have noticed, do the banks.
If congress insists on spending money on the auto industry, they should start with the cost of the large number of retired auto workers. An idea floated in a Hugh Hewitt interview was to convert part of the retired auto workers into retired federal government employees with federal benefits. This would reduce labor expenses for the domestic auto workers to roughly the same level as Toyota, reduce the amount of money the UAW handles, and keep congress busy in an area where they have relevant experience. The domestic auto companies would then be free to succeed or fail with expenses similar to their competition without congress trying to tell them how to build cars. It would cost me money, but at least the expense would go down as retired auto workers die off.
Roger, bank loans are business to business. Gov loans are ……..
If banks want to protect their investment by having oversight of their loans that is fine with me. It is strange that I am hearing that government oversight is being peddled as a good thing.
This is definitely a different country the last couple of months. Oh, and I’m not excusing the Republicans in this cabal.
Chris “Countrywide” Dodd shouldn’t be going around telling people that they need to quit until he quits himself.
And Dodd himself is a perfect example of “execrable” leadership. I guess this is “it takes one to know one.”
What are you drinking so early in the day, Roger??
And as an addendum, I just heard that the UAW is willing to make concessions if they can have a seat on the BofD of GM.
It’s all wrong folks.
Roger,
I’m troubled by the idea of telling the recipients of government aid that they must follow government direction. We obviously don’t tell recipients of welfare how to live their lives. More to the point, government investment in business is problematic enough, government management of business, and that’s exactly what dictating personnel decisions is, is tantamount to true nationalization.
I’m no big fan of Rick Wagoner or any of the other bean counters that dominate GM. However, at this point in time, his fiduciary obligations are to the stockholders and directors of General Motors. They come first, before holders of GM debt and certainly before the government.
The idea that Chris Dodd, another Democrat who believes in hereditary privilege, who has never run a business in his life, is giving business advice to the BOD of GM is laughable. GM’s Board may not have done a good job but almost all of them have experience running large enterprises. As the saying goes, the only thing that Dodd has ever run is his mouth.
Besides, if Wagoner resigns, he’ll most likely be replaced by GM’s CFO or some other financial type, certainly not an engineer. I think Ed Cole was the last engineer to be president or CEO of GM.
Alan Mulally isn’t responsible for the problems at Ford. Billy Ford was smart enough to realize he was in over his head so he stepped down to hire Mulally, who turned Boeing around. Mulally may have advanced degrees in business management, but he has a BS and MS in engineering. He’s also made drastic changes to Ford’s corporate culture and wasn’t lying to Congress when he said that the company had turned a corner before the collapse of the housing market (tradesmen buy pickups and vans for work trucks), $4/gal gas this past summer and then the credit freeze.
Many of Detroit’s most notorious problems, e.g. not equipping the original Corvair with a sway bar to control the swing-axle rear suspension, saving a few pennies on how Pinto gas tanks were mounted, were driven by bean counters, not engineers. When engineers are in charge of a project you end up with the Corvette ZR1, which outperforms cars more than twice its price.
There are those who think that engineers and technical people should never run a big company. I disagree. Engineers are more likely than accountants to have a passion for their products and product, after all, is the key to any business’ success.
what Promoguy is getting at starting at #6 is that the interlocking of corporate & government directorship (a 1920s Italian innovation, the new modernist fascism’s commercial expression) answers the question of beggar-thy-neighbor mercantilism (search Smoot-Hawley) in secret rather than at the ballot box. Not only the freeman right but also the ‘real’ left, the Steinbeck and Dos Passos and Lincoln Brigade kind of left, ought to be horrified, as their straw man –wars and repressions ginned up in secret by international profiteers –is as we speak being hooked up to the machinery in Dr. Frankenstein’s old castle laboratory.
Dodd and Frank are the last ones I want to hear of who is or is not capable to running a company. These were the same guys who defended and praised Raines and Johnson for their ‘leadership’ at Fannie Mae.
Let the big 3 go Chapter 11 and have the Bankruptcy court and the shareholders decide who will replace the execs.
The last thing we need is a Dem-dictated ‘car czar’ who is good at politics, but couldn’t run a profitable lemonade stand in the middle of summer.
Dodd and Frank are the last ones I want to hear of who is or is not capable to running a company. These were the same guys who defended and praised Raines and Johnson for their ‘leadership’ at Fannie Mae.
Let the big 3 go Chapter 11 and have the Bankruptcy court and the shareholders decide who will replace the execs.
The last thing we need is a Dem-dictated ‘car czar’ who is good at politics, but couldn’t run a profitable lemonade stand in the middle of summer.
Why GM’s CEO in particular? Maybe because he’s been there longer than the other guys?
What I’m afraid is likely to happen is that increased government influence over these companies, established as a condition of the bailout, will lead to them effectively being run by *lawyers*.
“Well, David, that’s your view.”
No prospective CEO should accept the responsibility—until after the bankruptcy courts reorganize the companies. And yes, these auto manufacturers need to go bankrupt! At this point in time, everything is a convoluted mess. Only bankruptcy can clear the air. A government bailout only delays the inevitable. The recent leaders of the American auto industry are comparable to a guy who is bound hand and foot and required to swim across the English channel. Their task was virtually impossible from day one.
There is something else that threatens the auto industry of yesterday: cars last a lot longer. Are automobiles possibly even becoming commodity products? Cars some 30 ago were of little value after being driven 100,000 miles. Today’s vehicles should easily last 200,000. Unless one wants to purchase the latest and greatest—most Americans only need to buy a new car maybe once every 15 years.
The Big Three are going to learn what a terrible idea it is to invite government to run their businesses.
So let’s see…politicians, the very people who can’t successfully manage a single dollar of the money they take from the public, are somehow going to turn into financial geniuses and turn around a massive, global, capital-intensive business like designing and building cars? That’ll be the day.
GM would have been much better off declaring bankruptcy. So would all of America.
Scott
So how much power does government have on dictating to private enterprise when private enterprise whores itself at the teet of government?
http://tinyurl.com/6jhh6m
Tman I agree with you. I almost get sick seeing senators and congressmen scolding the auto companies; especially when Dodd is doing it. But who really is to blame, when Americans just reelected people such as “I don’t pay taxes” Rangel (D-NY), “No regulation required” Frank(D – MA) and “Money in the freezer” Jefferson (D-LA).
“Money in the freezer” Jefferson (D-LA)”
Wrong. Democrat William J. Jefferson lost to Republican Anh Cao. Still, your point is well taken. But you also need to realize something else: the MSM has long protected Democrats like Frank, Dodd, and Ragel. Most Americans have no idea, for instance, that Barney Frank is greatly responsible for our current financial mess. By all rights, he should be infamous. And yet, I bet few of your relatives and friends even know he exists.
“Money in the freezer” Jefferson (D-LA)”
Wrong. Democrat William J. Jefferson lost to Republican Anh Cao. Still, your point is well taken. But you also need to realize something else: the MSM has long protected Democrats like Frank, Dodd, and Ragel. Most Americans have no idea, for instance, that Barney Frank is greatly responsible for our current financial mess. By all rights, he should be infamous. And yet, I bet few of your relatives and friends even know he exists.
“Money in the freezer” Jefferson (D-LA)”
Wrong. Democrat William J. Jefferson lost to Republican Anh Cao. Still, your point is well taken. But you also need to realize something else: the MSM has long protected
Democrats like Frank, Dodd, and Ragel. Most Americans have no idea, for instance, that Barney Frank is greatly responsible for our current financial mess. By all rights, he should be infamous. And yet, I bet few of your relatives and friends even know he exists.
Where does Congress find the chutzpah to criticize the auto companies — demanding the heads of the CEOs because of their incompetence? After all, the Big Three created the exact same mess that Congress has — running huge deficits and committing far more money than they have to pension and health benefits. Both are bleeding red — and will do so for the foreseeable future. Both show no intention to reform themselves. The look of sheer glee on Pelosi’s face when she proposed yet another $150 – 300 billion stimulus package before the ink was dry on the trillion-dollar check for bailouts — it’s all a little mind-blowing. Or is it just me?
I am so sorry for the triple posting. There was apparently a problem with the website.
There is simply no reason why the Big Three should not go through bankruptcy. The bailout money will hold this off for a few months but it is inevitable. What the bailout is doing is bailing out the UAW. It all depends on how much money we want to throw away. So far, it looks like a lot. Maybe they are hoping they can hold out until “card check” allows them to unionize the plants in the south. Then all the cars will be the same crap.
I dreamed Chris, Barney, & Nancy fired the CEO and renamed the company “Genuis Moters”.
Force Rick Wagoner to retire? Not so hasty.
Although the world seems committed to ignoring it, GM has been undergoing a restructuring on its own for several years. In fact, that very restructuring was hailed by the so-called experts for its efforts to address GM’s built-in labor costs… the very costs that everyone decries today.
Could it be done more quickly? Doubtful. Unfortunately, GM is stuck with labor and dealership regulations that would destroy any industry – including the businesses of its Japanese competitors. And those regulations are still on the books blocking many efforts that GM would otherwise take to reverse its fortunes.
Fortunately for the foreign manufacturers, they have been able to select manufacturing States that are not so blatantly pro-union and thus can manufacture automobiles for a fraction of the costs Rick Wagoner has inherited during his stewardship of GM.
Add to that the ridiculous CAFE standards, and I ask for you to name any other industry in which the government so many steps to hasten its demise.
Then, to compound matters, the folks on Wall Street screw up our credit markets so badly that auto loans all but disappear. Believe it or not, its difficult to make money when no one has access to the cash necessary to buy your product. And no, this is not a GM problem. Or even an American manufaturer problem. It’s systemic to the entire auto industry.
But for some reason, Rick Wagoner earns Chris Dodd’s scorn. That is so laughable. Does anyone sense the irony of Dodd’s criticism? He’s the guy (along with his Senatorial brethren) who seeks to strengthen the very labor laws which have forced GM into this predicament. And he’s the guy who insists that the automakers adhere to CAFE mileage requirements that are impossible to attain under today’s technology. And now he has the nerve to lecture Rick Wagoner? Please.
Here’s a thought… scrap CAFE. Allow GM to employ workers without collective bargaining through the UAW. The favorable results will surprise you.
In the meantime, all you car buyers out there… give GM a second look. Under Rick Wagoner’s governance, GM is manufacturing terrific cars. Cars of the year of late: CTS, Malibu, Auroa. Hybrid SUVs: Tahoe and Escolade. They drive great, they look great, they are great.
Its time for you folks on the east and west coasts to realize that the American manufacturers are just as good as their foreign competitors. Stop the GM-hate!
Well! Along with government money it seems we are looking at installing a Czar to oversee automobile production. How long will it be until we have the American version of the Trabant.
Bill G. you are so right in your analysis regarding American made cars and when I finish my lease, back to American. In the farm areas across this nation both Chevy and Ford trucks have been driven for years & even with rust can be seen doing a good job. I had a friend here in Los Angeles, a Japanese
Manufacturer that would only drive American automobiles and drove his Olds Station wagon over 214,000 thousand miles as a family car going skiing in
the mountains etc.. He said no one will ever build a more comfortable car & if taken care of properly will last as his did. Unfortunatly it caught cold on it’s last trip to Big Bear and finally died.
If anyone can give an explanation why China for years favored the big Buick 3 & 4 Holer, if not for comfort and performance, why? Chris Dodd uses his
power like so many to transfer blame away from where it truly belongs, in his own back yard with his cohorts right along side. Does anyone know what cars they drive in their families, would be interesting……
It’s not clear that Dodd can point to any specific reason Wagoner should go, other than the fact GM is in trouble. A broken clock is right twice a day. Dodd can pontificate about what should happen, but I strongly doubt he understands very much about the business. He knows how to talk into a microphone. Also saying Wagoner should go is not giving an indication of what is expected from GM in return for the money. What exactly does he want GM to do other than fire Wagoner?
So would Dodd expect the CEO of Countrywide to go? No, he’d probably give him a raise.
None of them would dare since they came with outstretched palms, but how fantastic it would have been if just one of these CEO’s gave it right back to the supercilious, corrupt ignoramus Dodd and his senatorial brethren. If done elegantly enough, they would have garnered enormous support from the American people, and done their brands proud because many Americans would actually make a point of buying their cars if the CEO’s “spoke truth to power” (to use a particularly irritating, but in this case, applicable phrase).
That was a great post, Bill G. One of the stumbling blocks for Big Three in the last few years is the publicity around the so-called “legacy cost” in each unit. You’ve heard it & read it over & over –it really strikes a chord –that for the same money you can get a couple grand more car if you avoid UAW-built. It is a crappy deal but there it is.
As far as Dodd & Frank, who couldn’t see the wheels turning in the aftermath of the revelations of the genesis of this 50 trillion dollar global crash, as the dynamic duo leapt forth into every spotlite anywhere, pontificating like a brace of Cotton Mathers on speed, logorrheally dedicated to Public Service, High Principle, and the American Way. Who couldn’t write the script for the meeting where the House leadership decided on the “brazen it out” strategy for those two guys hiding under Pelosi’s desk sweating like a couple of disqualified sumo wrestlers?
“…….for those two guys hiding under Pelosi’s desk sweating like a couple of disqualified sumo wrestlers?”
or lovers
/sorry couldn’t resist
Promoguy, that’s one of things that makes Barney so brave –after getting attacked for his lifestyle some years ago, he’s now comfortably ensconsed inside the Democratic Fortress of Certified Victims and is thus & henceforth immune to criticism. This parlayed a triple play on Frannie & Feddie’s Subprime Follies –any critics had to be 1, 2, 3, racist, elitist, homophobic. And it’s certainly to no one’s credit (listening, GOP?) that it worked so well.
If the Congress/Federal Govt are so effing smart, let’s go all out: today’s market cap for GM& Ford total 11.08 Billion. (Chrysler’s private, so m.c. is unknown.) Time to buy all three & turn them into “Government Sponsored Enterprises” cf: Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac. Could all be done for under $30 Billion. Would also cover the next money-mooch we all know is coming. Think of the advantages: Unions happy; smart-a$$ pols can fire all the execs. Everybody wins (US Constitution is shredded already.)
The sooner they demonstrate (again) that Socialism won’t work, the better.
In for a penny, in for a pound.
or just have Uncle Sugar buy the unsold fleet –it won’t be depreciating on the car lots anymore, the money would fall into the channels that were expecting it anyway, the vehicles could go to China in lieu of interest payments, and the taxpayers would get that repatriation benefit at least. a win all the way around, hey?
We talk generally about the difference in UAW and non-union labor costs, but when you see the numbers a stark reality sets in. Per the WSJ last week “hourly labor costs are $44.20 on average for the non-Detroit (but still U.S.-based) producers, in line with most manufacturing jobs, but are $73.21 for Detroit.”
If the Shrinking 3 could produce the smaller end of their product lines in lower cost countries and still meet the CAFE standards, this would all be a lot easier, but no………..
“This parlayed a triple play on Frannie & Feddie’s Subprime Follies –any critics had to be 1, 2, 3, racist, elitist, homophobic. And it’s certainly to no one’s credit (listening, GOP?) that it worked so well.”
I strongly disagree. Barney Frank would have been toast if GOP elected officials had some guts. Unfortunately, too many of them are like John McCain who freak out every time when confronted with an issue tinged with political correctness. Most Americans are ignorant concerning the damage caused by Congressman Frank. There would be hell to pay if they knew the truth.
#41,I don’t understand your last line, how would producing the “smaller end ” of their product in lower cost countries help the workers in this country?
Maybe I am missing your point?
Maybe if our country limited the import of foreign made cars to this country by those having our country made cars sit at there ports and just in general
the ” good old boy’s & girl’s” in Wash. started protecting our manufacturing in this country so we all would see more “AMERICAN MADE ” labels in our stores, all of us would be in a much better financial position. I realize this is a compounded sentence, but the action of certain corrupt Senators have been compounding the problems we all are facing today, not the workers and in most cases not the newer CEO’S trying to make a sick compay well again. Why is it necessary for our farm’s across America being idle or decaying while foreign food is being shipped in? Why are our young people not being taught about the manufacturing and farming industry in this country, giving them the spirit to want these job’s. It use to be American Workers picking in the fields of yesterdays crops, grown in America and proud of a day’s work. We trusted the food we picked and ate across the USA, now we read labels and are scared that we might be feeding & eating contaminated product’s, who is watching our back’s, not Dodd & his co-buddies. We need to become a self sufficent country again & regain our standard’s that made us strong in the first place, ” a day’s honest & hard work ” never hurt us before and today we are in a better position with the newer technologies to make us even stronger. We must insist that GM, scale down and produce
with our tax dollar’s car’s that are made with advanced tech’s in today’s world, Ford is already at the gate of entry, but Chrysler needs to use some of the fund’s they pulled out of their ‘Mervyn’s” operation, causing it to fail, and bail out their company.
One thing I want people to consider:
GM’s primary problem isn’t one particular thing. I’ve seen lots of people talking about the UAW or the fact that they promote fuel-inefficient SUV’s instead of “green” cars.
The reality is that these auto companies are f&$%ed up from end to end. At the top of their supply chain, they have terrible relationships with their distribution network. Toyota and Honda have cooperative relationships, where each works to help the other be more efficient. That is as true here in America as it is in Japan. The Big Three have adversarial relationships– they dictate a design out for bid and take the low bid. This once helped them in the short run, but they were out-innovated. It turns out that there were more savings to be had by reducing inefficiency in tuning processes than there are in shaving the suppliers’ profit margins.
In the Big Three themselves, their organizations are stodgy and inefficient. Layer after layer of middle management (which should have been computerized in the 90′s) live on, taking paychecks in exchange for slowing down operations. Labor has become a massive problem, of course. They take huge salaries and benefits, work less efficiently, and dictate through their contracts business practices that can’t be changed easily, leaving them slow and unresponsive. Toyota, Honda and others instead work very hard to be agile, each year relentlessly changing things to incrementally improve quality, improve designs, and reduce inefficiency.
Their product management; that is, what cars they build, what they look like and what features they have, is a symptom of this problem. Yes, some of their problem is bureaucracy and thick-headedness. But some is that the cost to build a small, cheap, efficient car is surprisingly similar to the cost to build a big expensive car (land boats, SUV, luxury cars, etc). The difference is that because of the above, the Big Three have to make expensive cars because they can’t survive without the bigger margins. Cut their huge variable costs, and you’d see smaller cars become viable.
Finally, their distribution chain is a mess. Their current model is to practice what is, in my opinion, nothing less than channel-stuffing (another term is trade loading, but it’s the same thing). That’s where you force your distributor network to take on way more inventory than they can handle, forcing them to discount to dump it into the market. The Big Three use huge networks of dealers, each of whom have gigantic lots of cars that they try to force out the door with smarmy, ethically challenged personal selling forces. The lots have to pay for the inventory they’re carrying, the land it’s carried on, and the margins and customer relations they sacrifice to try to force it all out the door.
OK so imagine you go in the door at GM, Ford or Chrysler. Where do you start? This isn’t a technology problem, this is a failure at every level of the organization, from the line worker to the union boss to the middle manager to the upper executive. In a sane world these companies go into chapter 11 and come out rebuilt and reformed, or scrapped and replaced.
Anita, finally, one word of warning. The problem isn’t that we’re not protecting our industries from trade. Protectionism simply lets you get deeper into the hole at the expense of consumers before you’re again forced to improve. The golden age you’re talking about was back when the whole world except us was devastated by war and/or enslaved under communism. We had the world markets to ourselves. The current automakers are actually far more efficient than they were back then, the problem is that new competition has emerged, and they’re getting better much faster.
david @ #42 –that’s what i was trying to say–a GOP mortified at the thought of inching toward that place where someone in the press could sniff out a “thought crime” –is damn near as responsible as the active pushers.
David T, Sorry but “Barney Frank would have been toast…” no way no how. The LLL majority in Barney’s district would re-elect him no matter what. (short of him becoming a conservative).
Remember we’re speaking of that great Peoples Republic of Massaholia here. I’m one of the few conservative types around MA and there’s no way any of these clowns would ever lose an election they want to run in.
Massachusetts would elect Osama bin Laden to office if he changed his name and ran as Osama bin Kennedy.
(AlanC re MA)
“USA has a national politician who helped an enemy win a war against USA.”
>>”Oh? I bet THAT ruined his career!”
“He’s from Massachusetts.”
>>”Oh. Then what, is he the incoming Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee or something?”
“Yep.”
>>”Jeez. Say, let’s go get drunk.”
“Ok, why not.”
Wellspring, What are you warning me about, I don’t quite understand what you mean? Our country and the whole world is still devestated by war’s, but
it still the US that ends up being regarded as the ones at fault over mass failures. Why are so many of our elected officials looking the other way from their responsibilities regarding the jobs they were elected to do? ” PASSING THE BUCK REFERS TO MORE THAN GREEN BACK’S”. You appear very knowledgeable in your explanation of failure in the American auto industry, it is ashame you are not one of our good Senator’s working on improving
industry in are period of insanity in this country. We are still the best, but need to reeducate our citizens to today’s world as an industrialized modern nation, not just on a PC or MAC, but in the world of business. Your analysis should be a coarse in all high schools throughout America regarding all corporation and large business communities.
Have a good productive week.
well, to veer the off-thread back onto topic: With the Big Three becoming GSEs like Frannie & Feddie, move over Apple, RePo is the new growth industry. Wonder what Emilio Estevez is doing these days –
I believe that Rick Wagoner must go. This has nothing to do with his qualifications, or accomplishments. In fact he has been the best CEO GM had in the last 20 or 30 years. But I do not think that he has the sense of urgency that GM needs now to survive.In fact watching him during the congressional I could not help thinking that he considers the whole process a Kabuki theater and being supremely confident that he and GM will eventually be bailed out.This is not the attitude that GM needs now. GM needs somebody willing and able to shake up GM’s culture, products and relationships. Wagoner with his pleasant play along,go along style is the wrong man for the job.
Tom, it IS Kabuki theatre and GM WILL be bailed out. No one can shake up GM’s culture unless and until there is a major shake up in Washington DC. Wagoner has a very small area in which he has freedom to move due to the various and sundry regulations he has to live under.