Obama's New GM

I'd like to know where to file my application to become one of the president's appointees to join the remade Board of Directors of General Motors. I don't know a lick about making or selling cars, but I think I have a pretty persuasive case to make for membership nonetheless.

First off, in the new era biography is everything, and I grew up in a car town --Warren, Ohio. It was home to the old Packard Electric and still is the next door neighbor to Lordstown, still turning out excellent GM cars and slated to produce the Cruise in the next couple of years.

I am a member of a union. Now, the American Federation of Radio and Television Artists isn't exactly the UAW, but hey, it is a union.

I can talk a good game, pretty much about anything. The marketing advantages of having a nationally-syndicated talk show host on the Board and extolling the new "green" brands every day should be obvious.

My ace in the hole, though, is I used to be the Deputy Director and General Counsel of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, the successor agency to the old Civil Service Commission. I served at OPM from 1986 through the beginning of the first President Bush's term, and was even confirmed in the #2 job by a unanimous vote for the Senate. Teddy Kennedy and Robert Byrd voted for me. How bipartisan does a man's support have to be?

OPM is in charge of the hiring, firing, and retiring of the nation's 2 million or so federal civilian employees. Health care, security background checks, charity drives --you name it and I have helped regulate it. As GM appears to be going the way of becoming just another governmental agency, this is the invaluable background experience I offer. When it becomes impossible to discipline or reassign recalcitrant employees, I won't be frustrated in the least. Been there and done that, a lot.

Now the whole manufacturing side of the business is a bit of a question mark. Ditto design. I haven't changed oil or a tire in 30 years. I am not sure if carburetors even exist anymore.

But I did serve for a time on the board of the South Coast Air Quality Management District, which regulated emissions throughout southern California, so I am prepared for the mandated-though-impossible-to-achieve mileage and emission standards of the near future.

In short, the perfect resume for the new, government-managed GM. What worries me most is that the nominees the president comes up with might actually know a lot less about the car business, or the government business, which is what the former is rapidly going to become. I expect a lot of hedge-fund Democrats to appear on the board, very knowledgeable in the ways of the board of Fannie and Freddie, but lacking even a drive-by a real car plant.

2 posted on 04/04/2009 5:21:36 AM PDT by ReleaseTheHounds ("The demagogue is one who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots.")

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3 posted on 04/04/2009 5:24:29 AM PDT by Zakeet (Thou Shalt Not Steal -- Unless thou art the government)

$50,000 hybrids will be all that they offer. GM will shut down shortly after that.

ROTF.

God help us. And I mean that both literally and reverently.

5 posted on 04/04/2009 5:27:04 AM PDT by mewzilla (In politics the middle way is none at all. John Adams)

I raised my family in Warren ,Ohio. It was a really nice town. We lived on Logan NE off East Market Street. Not very far from Trumbull Hospital. Loved it there. Lots of good people. Ours was a cultural neighborhood-Greek ,Polish ,German. My children had the best of all places to grow up..I miss it still.

What has happened to the Mid West is a disgrace. I live in Cortland Ohio near Warren, it is very sad to see what the stupid trade policies and excessive government regulation has caused...I’m telling you there will be blood if this continues...you can’t take away a person’s ability to earn a living permanently and not cause social unrest...I’m surprised given the seriousness of the situation, it has not already begun.

7 posted on 04/04/2009 6:20:53 AM PDT by nyconse (When you buy something, make an investment in your country. Buy American or bye bye America)

He will create a new car one that is small and 20 Obozo’s ride in, with holes in floor, as it is foot powered.

What has happened to the Mid West is a disgrace.

Indeed.

Amazing << Hear this. Feel this, and tell me that this isn't music.

Oh, dear...

9 posted on 04/04/2009 10:21:04 PM PDT by rdb3 (The mouth is the exhaust pipe of the heart.)

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