"How does General Motors CEO Richard Wagoner still have a job?"

[leftchick]

And this is from August of this year!

:grr:


How does General Motors CEO Richard Wagoner still have a job?




Posted Aug 1st 2008 5:42PM by Zac Bissonnette

http://www.bloggingstocks.com/2008/08/01/how-does-general-motors-ceo-richard-wagoner-still-have-a-job/

In June 2000, Richard Wagoner became president and CEO of General Motors Corporation (NYSE: GM) In case you haven't been paying attention for the last eight years, here's an overview of what's gone down:

* GM paid huge dividends even as its pension and health care obligations spiraled out of control leaving the company in a precarious capital position.

* When SUVs started to get hot, GM essentially bet its future on the continuation of that trend and the reasonably low gas prices that made it possible. That's right: GM was essentially an commodities speculation hedge fund masquerading as a car company. Now Bloomberg is reporting that GM lost $2 billion on leased SUVs.

* Now that gas is at $4 per gallon and M&A activity has dried up, GM has decided that this is a good time to try to sell its Hummer brand. Does it come with Pogs, Pokemon cards, and HD DVD?

* The stock was trading in the $60 per share range when Wagoner took the helm and now it's fallen to $11.07 and Merrill Lynch is saying that a GM bankruptcy is "not impossible." And remember: Merrill Lynch has been overly optimistic about its own ability to survive without raising capital. So "not impossible" may very well mean "quite possible."

Given all that, I have a serious question for General Motors' board of directors: How can Richard Wagoner possibly still be your CEO? Hypothetically, what would he have to do to get fired? Join Al Qaeda? In 2007, Wagoner took home $14,415,914, a 41% raise over 2006.

The fact that Carl Icahn isn't filing a 13-D and raising hell is indicative of the fact that this is one company that's probably too late for saving.

[madmom]

1. As a GM "family" we've been asking this for years, but alas lowly blue-collar

workers have no say in this matter.

[tridim]

2. He's also one of the last people on Earth to believe global warming is a "crock".

[BonnieJW]

4. I don't think that's Wagoner.

Lutz is the schmuck who said global warming is a crock. He and his wife EACH have their own jet, EACH have their own helicopter, and own many cars. Can you imagine their carbon footprint?

[HughBeaumont]

3. Because he's the CEO, bitches. HOLLLLAAH!

Mind over matter. He doesn't mind. You don't matter.

GM stock is trading at 3 right now. The major shareholders, who probably sold long ago, are laughing their asses at the peons with their six-champagne lunches.

It's a grand fisting and we're all the ones getting rooted.

Repukes call the French "weak", but they at least stood UP to their wealthy, and continue to do so today.

[leftchick]

5. crude

but very well said. Is it torches and pitchforks time yet?

:mad:

[guitar man]

6. heh

that pretty much shoots the old "people get what they deserve" meme the right loves to throw around in the ass, now doesn't it?