In all the sad stories about the poor little rich boy who wants his life back, Tony Hayward, CEO of BP, has been excoriated and vilified ad nauseum by people who need to shake a stick at something. But those who expect him to get fired, to lose his livelihood as have so many others because of BP's clumsiness at great depths, are making it too easy. If the whole idea is to fire Hayward, then we first have to believe that if only he had not been at the helm of the rig, if only someone better, smarter, more aware, nicer, had been there instead, then none of this would have happened.

I don't buy that.

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Posted by Martha Rogers | Permalink | Comments ()

Barney Frank is up to his old self-dealing tricks again. He's the politician who, more than any other (and there were many many others), pushed Freddie Mac to subsidize more sub-prime mortgages. He did this for one or both of these reasons: (1) he was genuinely concerned about providing better, more affordable housing for people who otherwise couldn't afford it, or (2) he wanted the votes of these people. You be the judge of motive, but the results were economically ruinous.

Well, he's at it again now. JUST after General Motors declared bankruptcy and gave a majority of its equity to the US Government, Barney Frank called GM's CEO personally to dissuade him from closing a distribution center they had been planning to close, in Mr. Frank's home state of Massachusetts. Apparently, his effort was successful, and CEO Fritz Henderson changed the plan after talking with Mr. Frank.

Continue reading "And Now, From the People Who Brought Us the Mortgage Crisis..." »

Posted by Don Peppers | Permalink | Comments ()