Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?

Okay, GM execs took a private plane to go to Washington to beg for money. Stoopid! with a capital S. GM leases its planes and had seven planes. They dropped two in December and are planning on cutting two more, leaving their fleet at three. Compare to Intel, where execs are mandated by policy to take coach. Which company makes money, or at least is not in line for a bail out? Hmmm. Let me see. Just so's ya know--OMG Palin-speech, language must be a virus! Ford exec Alan Mulally had a compensation of $22.8M and $750,000 of that was the use of the company jet by him, his wife and kids and guests. It was hard for him and his family to move to Michigan from Seattle.

My heart effin' bleeds. I got moved for my job and I still own my house in Denver because I could not sell it in the current economic environment. My kids rent it. I lose money on it. Notice the ambition of my son and his dog in the icon. (apologies to Jesse) Can I get a job where I can run the company into almost bankruptcy and make $22.8M? and fly in the company jet to see my kids and wife when I want? Oy!

And, yes, the auto companies need bailed out. Yesterday I mentioned that 2,000,000 American jobs depend on it. Today in the press they are saying 3,000,000 and I am glad that congress is asking for controls, a business plan and so on before they hand over the money. Management has made bad decisions. It needs to be changed. And when you ask for $25B, tough shit if you don't like having strings attached. I hope they can make them a world-wide industry leader again. BTW, link on Forbes.com states Detroit lacks salemanship. Isn't sales their business? D'oh!

One more auto-related item--GMAC, the financial arm of GM (mortgages, car loans, credit cards, etc.) has asked for bank status so it can get bank bailout money. and in the SacBee this morning they were stating that GMAC holds a controlling interest in Cerebrus Capital Management. That is incorrect. GMAC sold 49% of its holdings to Cerebrus earlier this year so it would have liquidity. This is important because Cerebrus owns 51% of Chrysler LLC. So, GM and Chrysler do have a connection through a management firm. That management firm holds Chrysler and GMAC, so with common management...

rojo