Tag: Rick Wagoner

I did an op-ed piece about a week ago on Obama's heavy-handed, central planning, statist-inspired canning of Rick Wagoner, then-CEO of General Motors, among other things.  At that time I used as my illustrative video the "lyric video" of John Rich's "Shuttin' Detroit Down."

Just because I know that there are some country fans (besides me) in RightMichigan-land, I thought that I'd post the official video, which premiered this past weekend.  I know that it doesn't have all the zip and flash of autobots and decepticons, but I happen to think that it's pretty cool.

Feel free to comment on either this thread or the original op-ed.

Given the two most recent GM-related headlines coming out of the Associated Press, perhaps Mister Rich was singing truer than he knew.

First, I see this as another Washington powerplay to beat up on the automakers for the problems caused by the failed policies in Washington.  Once again, a Detroit CEO has to do a "perp" walk for the cameras, while Wall Street bankers get photo ops with the President this past Friday.

Now, I know that there is a disagreement in this forum as to whether any aid or further aid should be given to GM and Chrysler.  However, I believe we can agree that Detroit companies are being treated differently than Wall Street companies.

I don't recall all of these publicly demanded changes to AIG, despite the fact that the government owns 80% of them.  I don's see where AIG is being required to publish their balance sheets and their 5 year forecasts for their business like GM and Chrysler have to do.  

I don't see where CitiGroup has published all of their data, despite that the government is covering over $300 billion of their debt.  I haven't seen the administration calling for their CEO to take a walk to get the aid.

Then, we have Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae (or, Fannie Mac and Freddie Mae, I can never keep them straight).  So far, every person that had to do with their demise not only walk away with millions of dollars in cash, but they also got government jobs and government pensions with the Obama Administration.  Heck, Obama Chief of Staff Emanuel walked away with $300,000 for just serving a short time on their Board.

Unfortunately, GM is losing a good man who does not deserve to go out like this.  I would like to know any other CEO who could have managed this economic environment without government help.  In less than a year, the auto market dropped over 40%.  Even Toyota is losing money and cutting back.  GM has been making major cut backs over the years, thanks to Wagoner.  He managed to sell off Hughes Electronics and DirectTV.  He sold off 51% of GMAC at the best possible time for GM.  He was one of the major players that spun-off Delphi.  He negotiated the major agreement with the UAW in 2007 that would have removed hourly retiree health care from GM's books by 2012.

Wagoner accomplished everything he believe he needed to do, provided we had a normal automotive market.  But, thanks to the greed of Wall Street and the short-sightedness of the types of Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, Timothy Gietner and Henry Paulson, the economy tanked and so did GM.  But, Frank, Dodd, and Geitner still have their jobs.  They are the ones who deserve the "perp" walk, not Wagoner.