We called for a Chapter 11 solution months ago.
We did not call for Obama Motors.
Even The NY Times is a bit concerned about Obama Motors:
"President Obama owes American taxpayers and voters a candid and detailed explanation of the government’s goals and the levers it intends to use to achieve them.
He should make clear that the overarching objectives are to create a profitable company that makes cars that people want to buy, and that are more fuel-efficient." (NYT)
We need to know this: When is the government going to sell its stake to private investors?
Frankly, the sooner the better!
Let's face it: No one is going to invest in GM as long as union contracts make up such an unreasonable share of the sticker price.
How well will this work out?
I don't know. We don't usually agree with Ralph Nader but he has a point:
"Today's bankruptcy declaration in federal court by General Motors is an avoidable, crude weapon of mass devastation for workers, dealers, auto suppliers, small businesses and their depleted communities.
For GM's voiceless owners -- the common shareholders -- it is a wipeout."
Like Pres BO's deficits, we have never been here before! We have never had the federal government take over a company. Welcome to the new world of Obama!
"Mr. Obama likes to say he's a pragmatist who only prefers a government solution when it will work. But in resurrecting an industrial auto policy that even the French long ago abandoned, the President has made himself GM's de facto CEO.
Our guess is that he'll come to regret it as much as taxpayers will."
Let's hope that GM is back in private hands very soon!
Or CEO BO will be as unpopular at the last GM CEO!
What successful example of a government-run car company can you think of?
What happens when government gets into the private sector?
We will know soon.
What are the unintended consequences of running a car company? Corruption? favoritism? what's going to happen to Ford Motor Co?
Who has ever run a car company in this White House?
I hope that everyone at the White House reads Chrysler, GM, and the Law of Unintended Consequences By Lee Cary!
