People

CBS Picks Pickens’ Plan to Pieces

By Robert Farago
August 7, 2008 - 1,640 views

The ironically named Kevin Drum takes on once and former oil man T. Boone Pickens' plan for American energy independence. After CBS' Drum has his wicked way with Pickens' not-so-well publicized personal financial interests in the matter, there's hardly a shred of credibility left upon which the Texan can wipe his ass. So to speak. "So T. Boone Pickens has an energy plan he wants to sell us. The basic idea is simple: Build a bunch of windmills in Texas to generate electricity, and then use the electricity to power electric cars. Voila! Energy independence! No, wait. That's not it at all. What Pickens actually wants to do is use the windmills to replace the electricity from existing power plants that run on natural gas. Then we can use the natural gas to run our cars." Hmmm. "Along with being the country's biggest wind power developer, Pickens owns Clean Energy Fuels Corp., a natural gas fueling station company that is the sole backer of the stealthy Proposition 10 on California's November ballot…. But a closer read finds a laundry list of cash grabs — from $200 million for a liquefied natural gas terminal to $2.5 billion for rebates of up to $50,000 for each natural gas vehicle. Much of the measure's billions could benefit Pickens' company to the exclusion of almost all other clean-vehicle fuels and technology." Is that why GM was talking up CNG cars recently? Hang on; one conspiracy at a time, please. 

CBS »

Posted in Alternative Energy | High Finance | News Blog | People | Taxes | 44 comments

GM BOD Defies TTAC: CEO Wagoner Stays

By Robert Farago
August 6, 2008 - 2,570 views

So, what does GM CEO Rick Wagoner have on the 13 other members of the automaker's Bored of Directors? Whatever it is, it must be both criminal AND depraved. How else can you explain the fact that George Fisher (the lead independent BOD member) and his cronies have thrown their support behind The General's top general? Under Wagoner's watch, GM's shed over 10 percent of its U.S. market share, sold everything that wasn't nailed down, flushed its share price down the proverbial toilet, slid into negative market capitalization (if you think about it) and screwed-up its branding beyond repair. That should be enough to get a dictator fired, never mind an executive of a publicly held company. And that doesn't include the fact that Wagoner has banked over $100m personally and NEVER announced hard targets for his "turnaround" plan. His equally nebulous plan from here on out is also grounds for dismissal. Oh well. It looks like GM will file for much-needed and now inevitable Chapter 11 protections over Wagoner's dead body. Perhaps it will go straight to Chapter 7, as and when. Meanwhile, the chances of a GM shareholder revolt grow by the day. And the lawsuit won't be far behind. This is going to get ugly. And if you really want to get your blood boiling, check the caption this photo or click on over to The Detroit News, whose wishy-washy, pom-pom threatening report could well be The Mother of All Apologias.

The Detroit News »

Posted in High Finance | News Blog | People | 52 comments

GM Car Czar Bob Lutz: “We faced reality last week”

By Robert Farago
August 4, 2008 - 2,491 views

Get this: it wasn't last week. It was the week before. GM's Veep of Global Badge Engineering made this comment in an interview with Just-auto [sub] on the 23rd of July at the London Auto Show [sorry we missed it]. Given the $15.5b hole that opened-up in GM's second quarter financial results on the following Friday, I guess you could say Maximum Bob's remarks constitute pre-cataclysmic (post-modern?) irony. Anyway, the winner of TTAC's first annual Bob Lutz Award offered the usual grist for our collective mill. "The US press is full of pontifical analysts on television [Huntley Brinkley?] saying that the real problem with General Motors is that they are just not producing the vehicles that the American public wants. That's a complete fiction. We are producing the vehicles that the American public wants, we just can't produce enough of them because of the sudden swing in demand where all of a sudden everyone wants small passenger cars and a year ago everybody wanted big V8 trucks. We can't turn on a dime like that, but we'll get past that and our future product programmes are all in the pipeline and continue unabated." So, will The Big 2.8 make it? "We have a rough spot to get through in terms of liquidity…" 

Just-auto [sub] »

Posted in Chapter 11 | Lutzie | News Blog | People | 29 comments

Glenn Swanson RIP

By Robert Farago
August 3, 2008 - 4,093 views

One of the reasons TTAC writers have a take-no-prisoners attitude: they know they're going to die. If you have a strong sense of morality, and accept the fact of your mortality, you realize you might as well make some noise before your time is up. To paraphrase Adlai Stevenson and Dylan Thomas, it's better to light a roman candle and curse the darkness than go gently into that good night. I never met Glenn Swanson face-to-face. I wouldn't have recognized him if I'd passed him on the street. But as writer, he was one of us. Glenn's sense of humor, passion, cynicism and perfectionism qualified him for duty. On Friday night, Glenn died of leukemia. He's the first of our writers to shuffle off this mortal coil. Obviously, he will not be the last. Meanwhile, Glenn will be missed. His spirit and work will be remembered by those who are not afraid to tell the truth about cars, and those who are willing to listen.

Posted in News Blog | People | 30 comments

GM Secret Branding Team Exposed!

By Robert Farago
July 20, 2008 - 3 views

Three years. That's how long an eight-member GM hit squad's been working on defining The General's eight North American brands. Let's start at the end of The Detroit Free Press article on Liz Wetzel's team in GM's Global Brand Studio. Pom-pom-wielding autoscribe Mark Phelan concludes "…the automaker appears to have a solid product plan and design vision for its other brands for the first time in decades." OK, now, here it is: "Buick and Cadillac owners both have money, but they choose to spend it on radically different things. A Buick owner would be inclined for a quiet vacation on an isolated beach, while Cadillac is more about dressing up for a night out on a weekend in the city. A Pontiac will be designed for the nightlife, too, but for a fashion-forward agenda with pounding bass and flashing strobes. Chevrolets aim to look good as well, but with the effortless appeal of blue jeans and a good shirt, not Pontiac's club-hopping flash. Saab sells cars around the world, so it can speak to a smaller audience: people who consider themselves independent thinkers and want a car with Scandinavian style and environmentally responsible performance. Saturn attracts buyers who wouldn't touch a Chevy or Pontiac with a 10-foot-pole and its theme will build on Opel's European strengths: design, handling, fuel efficiency and interior room." Before you ask, in GM's world, that IS a plan.

The Detroit Free Press »

Posted in Chapter 11 | Design | Marketing | News Blog | People | 46 comments

McCain OKs CA’s EPA Trump Card

By Edward Niedermeyer
July 18, 2008 - 1 views

Looking for a campaign bounce before Obama sweeps the media away for his world tour, McCain is confronting the stagnant economy right at its rotten core. But touring the GM Design Center Dome at Warren, McCain may not have uncovered anything energizing for his campaign to latch on to. In fact, early reports seem to indicate that the Senator from Arizona is hardly bending over backwards for the General– or should that be forwards? At an early-morning town hall meeting at GM's technical center, McCain reversed his position on California's emissions regulation, saying "I guess at the end of the day I support the states being able to do that." The gaffery didn't end there. The Detroit News reports that McCain got to visit GM's Volt display, where he was joined by the top brass (CEO Rick Wagoner, Bob Lutz and pals). McCain thought it would be a great place to tout his "Lexington Plan," which includes a $5k tax incentive for buyers of zero-emissions vehicles. But without even entering the "long tailpipe" debate, McCain forgot to remember that the Volt actually has an internal combustion engine. Which means that it ain't exactly zero emissions. Luckily, GM employees have become accustomed to disingenuous pronouncements from their higher-ups. "It'd be nice to have a friend in Washington," said Don Jamison, 49, a GM bumper systems engineer. "Of course, he's politicking for votes, so he's going to be telling us all kinds of things." Roger and me that. 

The Detroit News »

Posted in Hybrid | News Blog | People | Whiskey Tango Foxtrot | 19 comments

GM Car Czar Kisses Astra’s Ass

By Robert Farago
July 18, 2008 - 5 views

GM's flailing Rethink brand is holding a contest that just BEGS to be punked, on every possible level. You can almost hear the titters at GM as the brand managers read the irony-free press release. "Contestants can kiss their own Astra, a friend’s Astra or drop by any Saturn retailer and kiss their Astra, and then upload a photo of the kiss at www.ImSaturn.com [strapline: UR2]. The contestant with the funniest, most creative photo – as selected by the online Saturn community – will win a 2008 Saturn XR 5-door." And if that isn't enough of an open invitation to chaos, yes, that is GM Car Czar Bob Lutz putting flesh to metal on the Belgian-built vehicle that racked-up all of 888 sales in June, 4365 year-to-date. There's plenty more hilarity where that comes from (click here). And MAN what I wouldn't do to see the photos that didn't make the site. But I won't do that. No I won't do that.

ImSatrun.com »

Posted in Marketing | News Blog | People | 31 comments

$3,200,000,000,000 for an Oil-Free Future

By Robert Farago
July 18, 2008 - 4 views

Well, you can't accuse either side of the political spectrum of hanging around while gas prices have opened-up the debate on America's energy policy, or lack thereof. While President Bush has removed the executive order against off-shore drilling (over to you congress), former Vice President Al Gore has asked Americans to help foot the bill for a ten-year, three trillion dollar "moon shot" effort to switch to "clean" electricity from solar, wind and geothermal power. While this is an extremely inconvenient solution for coal mining states that leaves pro-nuclear partisans in the cold, I mention Al's plan here because it's implicit that the transition would enable a nation of plug-in hybrids or pure EVs. Hey, what about hydrogen? Big Al made no mention of water vaporware. But The Boston Herald reports that a group of scientists have priced-out a U.S. switch to hydrogen-powered vehicles at $200b. No mention was made of the energy source for the fuel, but apparently the the Committee on Assessment of Resource Needs for Fuel Cell and Hydrogen Technologies have bigger fish to fry (deep freeze?). "The cost of platinum is approximately 57 percent of the fuel-cell stack costs and represents the greatest challenge to further cost reductions," the study said. "Future platinum supply is a critical issue in forward projections of fuel-cell costs." If it's not one thing, it's another.

Posted in Alternative Energy | Green | Hybrid | Hydrogen | Media | News Blog | People | Politics | 45 comments

Terry Box Nails GM’s Coffin

By Robert Farago
July 12, 2008 - 7 views

Even though I disagree with him more often than not, I like Terry Box's writing. If such a thing is rhetorically possible, The Dallas News car correspondent thinks outside-the-box. He's also a true champion of blue collar consumers. So when I caught a link to his coverage of GM CEO Rick Wagoner's appearance at a Dallas luncheon– where Rabid Rick's dropped his infamous and ineffective "inaccurate" bankruptcy rumor remarks– I knew we'd get some additional insight into Wagoner's thinking, or lack thereof. Box flags the fact that Wagoner reckons GM's Arlington will be GM's sole SUV supplier. "We think the segment will be big enough to support a plant," Mr. Wagoner assured his Lone Star State admirers. Think? But here's the real money shot: ""We used to do cars and everything else – with everything else being trucks. Now, we are moving toward three channels: cars, trucks and crossovers." Parsing that, it seems Wagoner still doesn't get it: America's future is predominantly car-shaped. Or does he? "Our job now is to get our cars more profitable," Wagoner announced. And how, pray tell, is he going to do that? Oh sorry. The answer would require a coherent turnaround plan with publicly stated goals. Why start now?

The Dallas News »

Posted in Chapter 11 | New Cars | News Blog | People | 35 comments

Hertz: High Gas Prices Haven’t Hurt Holiday Travel

By Robert Farago
July 12, 2008 - 7 views

You want to talk about high gas prices? Hertz used to charge its customes $7.99 a gallon to refuel a car. In an interview with The New York Times, the rental car company's chairman and chief executive says Hertz has modified the charge to stop gouging their customers [paraphrasing]. "We are now reducing that to the pump price, which is $4 or so, plus a one-time fee of $6.99," Mark P. Frissora reveals. "We also have a fuel-purchase option. In the past, if you elected to buy the tank of gas in advance, we charged a 10- to 20-cent premium on that tank. But now we give a 15-cent discount to whatever the price is at the pump." Hertz is hoping new customers will cover the lost revenues. But what about the old biz, the vacationeers facing pump shock? "In general, gas prices going up is not a positive thing. However, it is not nearly as negative as you might imagine in rental car land. Typically, the rental car itself and gas are no more than 10 percent of the overall cost of a vacation. We are finding that people aren’t cutting vacations right now. You would think that with gas prices being high, there would be a deterioration, but we haven’t seen that." Yet. In other news, Hertz has just 3k Priora in its Green Fleet; Toyota's hyrbid's residuals are safe. For now. 

The New York Times »

Posted in Green | Industry | News Blog | People | Used Cars | 8 comments