Does Anyone feel like Bailing

[xoxoxoBruce]

[Lamplighter]

This can't be new news to anyone, but I'm wondering if conservatives will have any good words for the events so far ?

As an aside, some retired employees of GM have taken a real beating in all this
because part of their retirement package included the "old GM stock".
My Dad was a lifetime employee of GM and the stock he held was at $90+/share at one time.

NY Times
U.S. Taxpayers Recover Billions in Sale of G.M. Stock

American taxpayers’ ownership of General Motors was halved on Wednesday,
and billions of dollars in bailout money was returned to the federal government,
as a result of the nation’s largest initial stock offering ever.

With the offering, G.M. is shedding its ties to the government faster than expected,
cutting the Treasury Department’s ownership stake to 26 percent, from nearly 61 percent.

For the government, more complicated demands are in play.
Its bailout of the automaker was premised not on making money, but on preserving jobs.

Still, it is under pressure to minimize losses — or even to eke out a profit — by selling its shares at high enough prices.
The government has already recovered more than $7.4 billion from G.M., including interest and dividends.

When the new G.M. begins trading on Thursday — under its old “GM” ticker on the New York Stock Exchange
and “GMM” on the Toronto Stock Exchange — its shares will initially be held by a wide array of investors.

(Shares of the old G.M. — the bad assets that were split off in bankruptcy as the Motors Liquidation Company
— still trade for pennies, essentially worthless.)

[tw]

Apparently so few understood THE most important action during that entire period. There has no been an innovation in a GM product in 30 years except when that innovation was required by government regulation. And so Obama had to do what so many anti-American GM stockholders and GM Board of Directors would not do. Obama fired someone who did more to harm the American standard of living than bin Laden. He had to fire Wagoner because GM was dominated by so many anti-Americans.

GM started designing the Volt. Then went bankrupt. Then came out of bankruptcy. Then went public again. And still is not selling the Volt. Why. Well how long ago did Obama fire Wagoner? Finally obstruction to innovation was removed. The Volt, that was suppose to be introduced (after setting the date back so many times) in 2010 is still not yet for sale. Of course. So many Americans so hated America as to keep buying GM products. Why should GM advance America when the public so encouraged GM to harm America.

GM increasingly has been the enemy of every American for 30 years. A problem that could never end until bankruptcy and then Obama fixed the #1 problem. GM still has crappy products. It will take years. Even the Volt is nothing more than a hybrid. Patriotic companies such as Toyota and Honda have been selling hybrids for how long? A car that Clinton originally paid GM to design 16 years ago. Another example of how anti-American GM has been.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Wagoner was fired because rattner didn't like him.

Wagoner was not a perfect manager, by any means. Unlike Alan Mulally, the C.E.O. at Ford, he failed to build up cash reserves in anticipation of the economic downturn, which might have kept his company out of bankruptcy. He can be faulted for riding the S.U.V. wave too long, and for being too slow to develop a credible small-car alternative. But, especially given the mess that Wagoner inherited when he took over, in 2000—and the inherent difficulty of running a company that had to pay pension and medical benefits to half a million retirees—he accomplished a tremendous amount during his eight-year tenure. He cut the workforce from three hundred and ninety thousand to two hundred and seventeen thousand. He built a hugely profitable business in China almost from scratch: a G.M. joint venture is the leading automaker in what is now the world’s largest automobile market. In 1995, it took forty-six man-hours to build the typical G.M. car, versus twenty-nine hours for the typical Toyota. Under Wagoner’s watch, the productivity gap closed almost entirely.

Most important, Wagoner—along with his counterparts at Ford and Chrysler—was responsible for a historic agreement with the United Auto Workers. Under that contract, which was concluded in 2007, new hires at G.M. receive between fourteen and seventeen dollars an hour—instead of the twenty-eight to thirty-three dollars an hour that preëxisting employees get—and give up all rights to the traditional retiree benefit package. The 2007 deal also transferred all responsibility for paying for the health care of G.M.’s retirees to a special fund, administered by the U.A.W. It is hard to overstate the importance of that second provision. G.M. has five hundred and seventeen thousand retirees. Between 1993 and 2007, the company paid out a hundred and three billion dollars to those former workers—a burden unimaginable to its foreign competitors. In the 2007 deal, G.M. agreed to make a series of lump-sum payments to the U.A.W. over ten years, worth some thirty-two billion dollars—at which point the company would be free of its outsized retiree health-care burden. It is estimated that, within a few years, G.M.’s labor costs—which were once almost fifty per cent higher than the domestic operations of Toyota, Nissan, and Honda—will be lower than its competitors’.

In the same period, G.M.’s product line was transformed. In 1989, to give one example, Chevrolet’s main midsize sedan had something like twice as many reported defects as its competitors at Honda and Toyota, according to the J. D. Power “initial quality” metrics. Those differences no longer exist. The first major new car built on Wagoner’s watch—the midsize Chevy Malibu—scores equal to or better than the Honda Accord and Toyota Camry. G.M. earned more than a billion dollars in profits in the last quarter because American consumers have started to buy the cars that Wagoner brought to market—the Buick Regal and LaCrosse, the Envoy, the Cadillac CTS, the Chevy Malibu and Cruze, and others. They represent the most competitive lineup that G.M. has fielded since the nineteen-sixties. (Both the CTS and the Malibu have been named to Car and Driver’s annual “10 Best Cars” list.)

link

[tw]

[quote=xoxoxoBruce;695083]Wagoner was fired because rattner didn't like him.

Wagoner was not a perfect manager, by any means. Unlike Alan Mulally, the C.E.O. at Ford, he failed to build up cash reserves in anticipation of the economic downturn, which might have kept his company out of bankruptcy.

Mulally did not build up cash reserves. But an MBA hyping money game myths would order you to believe it. And you did. It is called brainwashing.

Mulally had profits because his products were designed/ modified by engineers. Even the Malibu - the best GM could do under Wagoner - made almost no profits. Other vehicles were selling at a loss. Mulally was selling Fords that were profitable. Wagoner was inventing profits by even shorting the pension funds. Oh. Your citation forgot to mention that to, instead, blame the unions? Honda and Toyota make the same 'just as large' pension contributions - and still have profits.

Wagoner did not inherit anything. He created it. How did GM avert bankruptcy in 1991? GM stopped funding the pension funds. Incurred $billions in obligations to claim only $millions in profits. Wagoner did not inherit this. He create the accounting that made fraud legal. He did this first in 1991 so that GM - only four hours from bankruptcy - suddenly had profits on their spread sheets.

No cash flow (or cash reserve) exists when most GM cars sell at a loss. Why did your article forget to mention reality? Mulally did not create cash reserves. It is called cash flow. There is none when corporate management does not even drive cars.

GM management so screwed all products that every Saturn could never make a profit. Unions did not put crappy 1968 engines in GM cars. 25 man-hours per car did not create those extra $thousands for each Saturn. Did you do the math? 25 man-hours is all labor for one patriotic car. How does a union wage times 20 man-hours increase costs per car by $thousands? Your citation is called brainwashing.

Wagoner went back to Detriot. Got on WDAS TV that weekend. Said that GM is in the best shape it has ever been. That GM's only problem is the economy, unions, unfair Japanese competition, ... the usual suspects. Also called lies that work becasue so many Americans fear to do simple arithmetic. 20 man-hours times how much per hour?

GM submitted their recovery plan. Every Democrat and Republican on the recovery committee was flabbergasted. After 20 years of corporate analysis, one Republican member never saw a corporation so incompetetnt and so in denial. Chrysler managemenet understood their position. But every top GM manager was in complete denial. GM's plan to the government was to do nothing. To wait for the economy to recover. GM was in the best condition in 30 years, as Michelle Maynard reported. That was Wagoner's entire recovery plan to obtain TARP assistance.

Why does your article forget to mention any of this? And provide no numbers. Was it written for brainwashing the most ignorant. Apparently. Reality and numbers say no cash reserve exists when the car cost more to build than it sells for.

Wagoner did not inherit anything as you well knew. And you quite well knew that. GM management was in a 20 year program to reap cash using spread sheet games. Wagoner is personally credited with created the legalized fraud that averted bankruptcy in 1991. Once GM had successfully mortgaged GMAC for cash, then Wagoner had nothing left to rape. And owed the pension funds $20billion. Wagoner had nothing left to rape for cash.

GM cars costs more to build than what they were selling for. Withheld $billions from the pension funds to pay for defective cars that earned no profits. So your a business school graduate ignored that in his article. And you call it credible?

Now do some arithmetic. A patriotic car takes twenty some man-hours to make and assemble every part. 20 man-hours in a car times how many dollars per hour? How does that cause some GM models to cost many $thousands more? Oh. An MBA told you it was only a cash flow problem. Numbers say otherwise. So your citation avoided those numbers. Where does that article also claim to be "Fair and Balanced".

Rick Wagoner did when he said GM was in the best condition in 30 years. Your ariticle all but agreed. Meanwhile, we should be prosceuting him for fraud. Unfortunately, the list of bankers about to be prosecuted next year for the same spread sheet games is believe to be in the hundreds.

[xoxoxoBruce]

The article didn't say GM was in good shape, it said Rattner wanted Wagoner out because he personally didn't like him. They went on to describe the good things Wagoner had accomplished for GM, although it was too little, too late. They were pointing out Wagoner was maybe even better than his predecessors, although thats not saying much.

We're all aware of your personal vendetta against GM, so you don't have to keep repeating the same diatribe ad nauseum.

[tw]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

The article didn't say GM was in good shape, it said Rattner wanted Wagoner out because he personally didn't like him.

The article repeats so many MBA lies as to have zero credibility. If you disagree, then post facts that defend its claims and its so many intentionally missing facts.

Wagoner said GM was in the best shape in 30 years. Even the Malibu - the best GM could do - has higher failure rates in only three years. Why does your citation forget that damning fact? GM's recovery plan from both Wagoner and other top GM executives repeated the same lie.

When Democrat and Republican staffers interviewed many GM managers, managers repeated and believed that lie. GM management was that much in denial and was that incompetent. As one Republican notes, he had never seen a company with management that incompetent.

Wagoner was removed because he created many of GMs disasters, and denied those disasters existed. Does anyone remember the EV-1 (and who killed the electric car)? He even shorted pension fund of $billions to claim profits and reap personal bonuses. Then lied again about the legacy costs. Lying to blame the unions says management is most corrupt. Wagoner routinely destroyed capital assets to claims profits - ie the sale of Hughes Electronics. Lying spread sheets were acceptable behavior in GM for 30 years. Wagoner was so corrupt as to think Enron accounting practices were good and acceptable. And xoxoxBruce apparently agrees.

Who said GM products were so crappy even 20 years ago? Who's statements were then proven years later. Constantly because facts and numbers were also provided. Because I keep being accurate, you call that a personal vendetta? If you understood before posting, then you know my every post is very pro-GM. And very negative about those who were destroying both GM and America. But apparently something crawled up your ass and died recently.

If comprehending the always required reasons why, then you knew I was a greatest fan of GM. I even worked there. So, where are your 'always required' reasons why? Instead you take a cheapshot because you defend your emotions? Posted for decades was why so many of America's best workers were making the world's worst cars. If you had read what was posted, then you knew my every post cheered American patriots - engineers, car guys, and union workers. And advocate prison sentences for the enemies of America - both bin Laden and Wagoner.

Apparently you are now so emotional (illogical) as to be blind to realities I have defined for decades - with the 'always required' reasons why.

What would have saved all patriotic American jobs? GM in bankruptcy in 1991 could have eliminated all problems. So the enemies of America, instead, shorted the pension funds. Then blamed the unions. And xoxoxBruce apparently approves.

GM was in such bad shape that the Volt, finally reschedule for a 2010 first model, is now being relabeled as a 2011 Volt.

[fo0hzy]

Originally Posted by tw

GM was in such bad shape that the Volt, finally reschedule for a 2010 first model, is now being relabeled as a 2011 Volt.

Yes. The Volt will be a flopping dud.

Praised by the main stream media, natch, the Volt will be another Studebaker or Yugo.

Gubmint Motors.

I actually suggest buying one. It will be worth it's weight in gold in 70 years.

[tw]

Originally Posted by fo0hzy

Yes. The Volt will be a flopping dud.

I don't believe it will be a dud. But it will not be the major sales success that spin was promoting it. Volt is GMs first hybrid - almost ten years after Honda and Toyota were selling same. But then all GM products are typically eight and twenty years obsolete.

Volt has some major flaws directly traceable to Wagoner and his ship of corporate fools. For example, Volt cannot recharge its own battery. A decision made in some corporate board room - not by engineers. Once its battery runs down, then operation is 100% gasoline engine power - not a hybrid.

Once 40 miles has drained the battery, then one must find a 240 volt outlet to recharge it. A recharge will take 8 to 12 hours from a conventional AC 240 VAC receptacle.

The Volt weighs almost 2 tons. That approaches SUV or largest car weight.

Well Clinton paid for GM's original hybrid in 1994. Prototype was ready to take to production in 1999. Then GM quashed all future development when Wagoner took over.

A concept car that became Volt was demonstrated in 2007. Then it took another four years to redesign and existing design into a working model. Meanwhile, Nissan, who had never before built a car of its size and complexity, developed and marketed the Maxima from scratch in only four years. A difference between a product done right the first time and a compromise obstructed by a technically ignorant management.

It may not be a major sales success. But Volt may have been a breakthrough for some of GMs so many stifled innovators. Whereas EV-1 should have had NiMH batteries, the corporate enemies of America replaced it with lead acid (1930 technology) batteries. Those same Rick Wagoner types tried to replace the Lithium batteries in Volt with NiMH. But this time, car guys appear to have finally won one battle (a war that only exists in anti-Americans companies).

Whether the car sells well at $40,000 is not relevant. All future GM products must be hybrids - variations of technologies found in Volt. And no, I am not just discussing electric power. Important gain for GM is that bean counters lost a few battles. And the bean counters must start losing every battle for GM to succeed.

Searching for an island of excellence in a sea of scum, I suspect something good happened in the Chevy Cruze. This is built in a factory that once made some of GM's crappiest cars - Vega, Cimarron, Sunbird, Cavalier , and Cobalt. Bits and pieces suggest that the Cruze may contain some long stifled GM technology that must start appearing in every GM car in the next eight years if GM is to be patriotic.

The good news is Obama let GM be saved. He fired Wagoner. It is not yet clear if Wagoner was replaced by a car guy. But car guys did something that rarely happened in GM. They won some battles.

If true, hopefully that is also happening in a few other American industries so that we can, in ten years, start seeing our debts to the world diminish as Clinton so successfully did. The only thing that will do that is American companies who let the world's best innovators (people who earn less than $250,000 annually) do their jobs.

[ZenGum]

Cookie generator just threw this up:

Students in schools of business in America are taught that there is a profession of management; that they are ready to step into top jobs.
This is a cruel hoax. Most students have had no experience in production or in sales. To work on the factory floor with pay equal to half what he hoped to get upon receipt of the MBA, just to get experience, is a horrible thought to an MBA, not the American way of life. As a consequence, he struggles on, unaware of his limitations, or unable to face the need to fill the gaps. The result is obvious.
- W. Edwards Deming

Cookie generator is wise.

but this:

Volt cannot recharge its own battery. A decision made in some corporate board room - not by engineers. Once its battery runs down, then operation is 100% gasoline engine power - not a hybrid.

Once 40 miles has drained the battery, then one must find a 240 volt outlet to recharge it. A recharge will take 8 to 12 hours from a conventional AC 240 VAC receptacle.

The #$%& WHAT? Are you cereal?

And how easy is it to find a 240 volt outlet in the US? Don't you guys use 110 or something? How is that supposed to work? (first question ... IS that supposed to work?

[tw]

Originally Posted by ZenGum

Don't you guys use 110 or something?

But two cylider ('C') batteries in series. Each batttery is 1.5 volts. Both batteries in series are 3 volts.

Now tap those batteries at each end and in the middle. Now you can power something from one 1.5 volt battery. Other things from the other 1.5 volt battery. And a third groups from 3 volts.

Same is done in AC power. Half the house is powered by one 120 volt wire. Other half by the other 120 volt wire. And heavy appliances (air conditioner, electric dryer) from 240 volts.

So that proper voltage and currents are provided (to foolproof things), then each receptacle is shaped accordingly.

Volt will need an extension cord maybe designed for NEMA 6 or NEMA 15 receptacles. Or, more likely, a type that locks (NEMA L6 or NEMA L15) to the receptacle.

How many will forget to unplug before driving out the garage? That will also have to be part of the design. Does the car come with an electrician visit?

[Clodfobble]

You know that thing tw's always referencing, how Warren Buffet says he pays a lower tax rate than his secretary?

Turns out, not only does he say it, he has recently challenged every other billionaire on the Forbes 400 list: he will pay a million dollars to any one of them who can show they pay a higher tax rate than their own receptionist. So far he says only three of his close friends have admitted to making the calculations, and they all found they didn't qualify for the money.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by tw

And xoxoxBruce apparently agrees.

But apparently something crawled up your ass and died recently.

Apparently you are now so emotional (illogical) as to be blind to realities I have defined for decades - with the 'always required' reasons why.

And xoxoxBruce apparently approves.

Look you lying motherfucker, stop putting words in my mouth, and claiming I support anything. You got that Tom?

I clearly posted what was written, and who wrote it, neither of which was me.
I posted it because it's an interesting footnote, that in spite of Wagoner's performance before Congress, and the real condition of GM, he would have been retained if Rattner hadn't taken a personal dislike to him.

[classicman]

I hate to interrupt you calling out tw, but I thought this was a very interesting statistic. bold mine.

In a New York Times profile of J.P. Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon, author Roger Lowenstein wrote:

"America's five biggest banks, including Dimon's, now control 46 percent of all deposits, up from a mere 12 percent in the early '90s. Since the financial crisis, a sort of Jacksonian animosity toward big financial institutions has overtaken the public -- witness that, in the recent election, no fewer than 200 candidates spent money on ads attacking Wall Street. 'Big banks don't have a lot of friends right now,' says Nancy Bush, an analyst with NAB Research. 'Europe loves its big banks. America hates them.' "

link

[Lamplighter]

Resurrection ... just FYI

NY Times
Financial Crisis Was Avoidable, Inquiry Finds
By SEWELL CHAN
Published: January 25, 2011

WASHINGTON — The 2008 financial crisis was an “avoidable” disaster
caused by widespread failures in government regulation, corporate mismanagement and
heedless risk-taking by Wall Street, according to the conclusions of a federal inquiry.

“The greatest tragedy would be to accept the refrain that no one could have seen this coming
and thus nothing could have been done,” the panel wrote in the report’s conclusions,
which were read by The New York Times.
“If we accept this notion, it will happen again.”

The majority report finds fault with two Fed chairmen:
Alan Greenspan, who led the central bank as the housing bubble expanded,
and his successor, Ben S. Bernanke, who did not foresee the crisis
but played a crucial role in the response.
It criticizes Mr. Greenspan for advocating deregulation and cites a
“pivotal failure to stem the flow of toxic mortgages” under his
leadership as a “prime example” of negligence.

It also criticizes the [b]Bush administration’s “inconsistent response” to the crisis [/B
— allowing Lehman Brothers to collapse in September 2008
after earlier bailing out another bank, Bear Stearns,
with Fed help — as having “added to the uncertainty and panic in the financial markets.

Democrats also come under fire. The decision in 2000 to shield
the exotic financial instruments known as over-the-counter derivatives from regulation
made during the last year of President Bill Clinton’s term, is called
“a key turning point in the march toward the financial crisis.”

The report does knock down — at least partly — several early theories for the financial crisis.
It says the low interest rates brought about by the Fed after the 2001 recession;
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the mortgage finance giants; and
the “aggressive homeownership goals” set by the government as part
of a “philosophy of opportunity” were not major culprits.

It says the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, which regulates some banks,
and the Office of Thrift Supervision, which oversees savings and loans,
blocked states from curbing abuses because they were “caught up in turf wars.”

Of the banks that bought, created, packaged and sold trillions of dollars
in mortgage-related securities, it says:
“Like Icarus, they never feared flying ever closer to the sun.”