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Detroit, 4:38 AM
Tue Nov 10
27 posts in the last 24 hours
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03/30/09
03/30/09
If I was president, I would have fired Wagoner a long time ago. Why? Here's my list of reasons:
-After all these years, GM's quality is still inconsistent
-Past statements that higher fuel prices "won't matter" to truck sales... which shows a shocking lack of foresight.
-Canceling the EV1 rather than continuing to develop it and taking a lot of the cost out by moving it to a common chassis
-Not listening to hard core EV1 enthusiasts and instead of letting them have their cars, taking them back and crushing them
-Canceling/destroying diesel-electric and gasoline-electric prototypes (yes there were functional hybrid versions of the EV1... even a 4 door model)
-Handing off GM Ovonic (owner of key NiMH battery patents) to Chevron when they could have used that intellectual property to make money off of every CURRENT maker of hybrids using NiMH batteries and could have given themselves a competitive advantage and would have continued to give GM a bit of an advantage all the way to around 2015 when the patent runs out.
-Selling off GM Electromotive in 2003... and all the diesel-electric powertrain knowledge that went with it.
-NOT forging partnerships with battery makers such as Panasonic to facilitate REAL headway in battery research and profit.
-Focusing on spreading disinformation such as "hybrids don't make sense" when in fact Electromotive has been making diesel-electric powertrains for decades and when you run the numbers, it already made sense in large vehicle applications such as transit buses, rail road switcher engines and many other applications where there's a lot of stopping and starting. And that also extends to LiIon batteries... saying that they "Weren't mass produced" when in fact they were... Laptop computers anyone? All that needed to be modified was the packaging and figure out a way to get the cost down (which is where a battery maker like Panasonic comes into play)
-Doing NOTHING with research paid for by the US Government... specifically... those 80mpg cars developed during the Clinton Administration. What happened to that research and why couldn't they make use of it instead of having to start from scratch with the Volt?
This is all stuff that happened on Wagoner's watch.
When you're in charge and pulling in a 7 figure salary, you're getting paid for your foresight. Wagoner didn't have very good foresight... nor was he very good at leveraging GM's intellectual property.
Nobody should be surprised that his head is rolling now.
03/30/09
Oh, and LOL to the "80mpg cars" developed under the Clinton administration. Gimme a break.
03/30/09
03/30/09
Not sure that's a better thing. I've watched his progress from GM Europe president (where he did do well) to CFO to now, actually sat next to him during a dinner (wasn't impressed on personal level).
He doesn't impress me as someone who can turn GM around.
03/29/09
03/29/09
When you go to the bank with hat in hand looking for a loan to keep your business afloat, does the bank not look at your organization and make certain "recommendations" (IE conditions) that you have to agree to before they will hand out the money? Of course they do, it would be seriously fucking irresponsible to do otherwise. Just because Congress (not Obama) blindly gave nearly a trillion dollars to the fucking idiots on wall street who for the most part got us into this mess, doesn't mean we should do the same for the auto industry. The US government is making loans here. For them not to attach conditions would be highly irresponsible. To blindly give money to the automakers just because they did to the financial industry would be compounding their original error (which error, I must point out, was made BEFORE Obama took office).
03/29/09
03/30/09
So, yes I agree with attaching conditions, but I don't think that we should have given them loans in the first place. If I could echo the German and Swedish Finance Ministers when they stated that they "Weren't interested in getting into the business of making cars."
03/30/09
03/29/09
03/29/09
This is my interpretation as well, but we shall see tomorrow.
03/29/09
03/29/09
03/29/09
Wait, am I allowed to say that without sounding un-American?
03/29/09
03/29/09
Ya, you are. Just start drinking heavily. Works for me.
03/29/09
I'd give you hand, but my punishment for saying that Bush was an idiot is the ongoing torment of slowly transforming my car into a rolling art-deco vehicle covered with flags, fireworks, and little pictures of Cheney holding a shotgun.
America, f*ck yeah.
03/29/09
I have Black Label, Gold Label, and a little bit of Jameson left. I am willing to share.
03/29/09
03/29/09
03/29/09
/couldn't resist
03/29/09
Rick, Rick, you make me sick
You may have built some fly cars
but your still a dick.
You fly around in your big corporate jets
But you always loose, a bit like the Mets
Rick, rick, we've had such a good time
I just can't wait to make another crude rhyme
You, Fritz and Max Lutz,
your companies union still had you guys by the nutz.
It's been a long time waitin'
We all knew Barack was procrastinatin
Watch out for the golden parachute on the way down.
03/29/09
I think the genius is tying Lutz to nutz.
It works in so many ways.
03/29/09
03/29/09
03/29/09
But then again, I don't know what went on and I can't say any different.
03/29/09
03/29/09
03/29/09
03/29/09
If by asking you mean like "asking" the last tresspasser on my property to leave by hooking a log chain to his Subaru and dragging it off the property. Yup, just asked.
I would have loved to sit in on that conversation between Obama and Rick.
03/29/09
03/29/09
03/29/09
03/29/09
03/29/09
They are doing just fine on the product side these days. The problem now lies with the business side, and that, unfortunately, is a vastly more difficult problem to sort out, regardless of what option is chosen.
03/29/09
03/29/09
Just look out for them plagues we got coming.
It is NOT gonna be pretty.
03/29/09
03/29/09
03/29/09
To play the devil's advocate, however, he is absolutely correct from a sheer business standpoint. As much as it pains me to say it, as I was looking forward to the introduction of a real El Camino replacement, it just made zero sense from a business perspective in this turmoil.
03/29/09