Is “Obama’s ousting of GM CEO Rick Wagoner… a victory for the taxpayer, they ask, or a blow to free market principles? Is GM being rationalized or nationalized? Was Wagoner the wrong man for the job, or the right man at the wrong time?” Tim Heffernan asks for Esquire.
Heffernan writes, “Who cares?”
“The important question is whether the move will ‘save’ GM, and the answer, obviously, is no. No single thing — or even single car — will save GM. Except, perhaps, the appointment of a visionary, vicious bastard-genius to permanently replace Wagoner. Someone with the foresight of a seer, the calculation of a burglar, the self-confidence of a sheikh, and the bloodlust of a Spartan. A century ago, we’d have had been throwing out names left and right: Carnegie, Morgan, Vanderbilt, Rockefeller. Today there’s only one: Jobs,” Heffernan writes.
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Before the GM mess can be cleaned up Jobs-style (killing off unproductive brands (read: most), paring down models (read: most), focusing on delivering a few models of great cars and trucks — one economy model, one mid-range model, and one luxury model for each vehicle category — while working night and day on developing radically new technology), the current union contracts (legacy costs, job banks, etc.) need to be fixed, either via the real threat of, or actual, bankruptcy.
