General Motors, reeling from millions of recalls and an ensuing scandal, fired 15 employees today. That's just two more than the number of people killed by a defect in the company's cars. In announcing the firings, CEO Mary Barra refused to name those who were axed. That is where you come in.
General Motors recalled another 2.7 million vehicles due to faulty ignition switches last week, bringing its total for the year to 11 million. Worse, the company apparently knew about the defects as far back as 2001, and a leaked memo revealed a list of words—including "Kevorkianesque" and "sarcophagus-like"—that GM…
Mary Barra, the CEO of GM, spent yesterday being grilled by Congress for her company's years-long failure to fix a known safety defect in its cars. Barra's lack of answers is being blamed on the size of the organization she leads. Which is a great argument against the salaries that CEOs earn.
Cadillac unveiled its first electric car last month. Apparently afraid that power-lunchers might think they'd gone soft, they rolled out the World's Douchiest Ad to tout the vehicle. Now, Ford has released a video response to Cadillac. That response, basically, is: "Don't be a douche."
Wrigley's gum just pulled its ads from MTV's teen drama Skins because the show is too sexxy. Taco Bell and GM have done the same. From now on, all teens must have sex in Fords while chewing Trident.
Attack of the Show last night profiled two new "green" concept cars; the GM En-V, which looks like a bubbly deathtrap with unimpressive specs (only 24 miles on a charge?), and a group of students' Bridgestone F1-style 300 MPG roadster.
Hey, America: Time to get excited! Why? Because a year and a half from now you could be eating the very first genetically-modified animal approved for public consumption: The AquAdvantage® salmon! Assuming it passes the approval process, which began Wednesday.
The Way We Live Now: Rearranging the fundamental tenets of reality until everything is just fine. GM's losing billions, which is a huge success. Our wallets have totally disappeared, which is a mark of progress. We're cannibalizing each other. Delicious!
The GM Building may not be the GM Building for much longer. Naming rights are up for grabs now that the automaker has gone bankrupt. And it's quite an opportunity: "This is the first time since 1968, when General Motors completed construction of the 50-story tower at 767 Fifth Avenue, that the rights to dub perhaps…
The Treasury Department's soon-to-be-announced executive pay guidelines will drastically slash cash payouts to executives at GM, Citibank, AIG, Bank of America, and Chrysler. Not on the list: AIG pass-through beneficiary Goldman Sachs.
The Way We Live Now: Broke as a joke from coast to coast. They're selling heroin in Maine. They've sent everyone on furlough in California. And in the Midwest, you can't even leave salt outside without enterprising Americans swiping it.
Darcy Stacom, the commercial real estate broker who convinced Mort Zuckerman's Boston Properties to pay $3.5 billion to buy the GM building in 2008, has suggested that Apple cough up a few bucks and pay Zuckerman for the right to rename the tower, so it doesn't sport the name of a bankrupt automaker. Let's hope Steve…
On Friday, noted blogger Mickey Kaus decried the Obama administration's attempts to prolong the inevitable death of shitty car company GM. No one even wants their depressing cars, he noted! On Sunday, it's the fault of "unskilled workers making $28 an hour who have bankrupted their employers."
• JPMorgan Chase, American Express and Morgan Stanley all announced plans to raise fresh capital today, so they're prepared to repay the taxpayer money they've received as soon as Washington gives them the go-ahead. [WSJ, BN]
• Related: The Federal Reserve says next week it will announce an initial set of banks that…
"Twenty years ago when I made Roger & Me, I tried to warn people about what was ahead for General Motors. Had the power structure and the punditocracy listened, maybe much of this could have been avoided." Hah, really?
General Motors is bankrupt. Whoops. It was probably going to happen no matter what, but lots of people hoped that bankruptcy would remain a threat that would encourage everyone to band together to save the company. Who is to blame for the death of the American auto industry?
• It looks like General Motors will file for bankruptcy on Monday. [WSJ]
• Bill Ackman, the activist investor who's been taking aim at Target for months now, lost his battle to remake the company's board yesterday. [Fortune]
• A group of banks and money managers are now trying to "fend off" some of the new trading…
The Way We Live Now: With the shame of the defeated. We're too dumb to even figure out how to make our biggest companies go bankrupt properly. But we will obstinately stand on the power of our "luxury" brands until they sink in the financial muck and drown us, triumphantly!
The Way We Live Now: At the bottom of a bucket metaphor. GM is burning up the money we all gave it as fast as humanly possible. Bread lines are lengthening. But something's still selling:
The Way We Live Now: Rollin on Dubs. You can't keep the US auto industry down! Unless "you" are a superior foreign competitor. But if "you" are bankruptcy, forget it. USA car companies are back!
