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GM CEO Mary 'Under-The-Bus' Barra's "Why Did It Take So Long?" Congressional Hearing - Live Feed
So, to summarize... mere months after Mary Barra took over the reins of GM from a somewhat surprising Dan Akerson exit, she is faced with record high inventories of unsold vehicles of dealer lots, a sales halt, a recall of 2.53 million vehicles (some of which have been alleged to be responsible for at least 12 deaths), potential bankruptcy fraud inquiries (from non-disclosures), and now a Congressional hearing that is rather uncomfortably titled "The GM Ignition Switch Recall: Why Did It Take So Long?" The phrase "under the bus" comes to mind though we wonder just how many times the so far entirely plain-spoken Barra will 'plead da fif' today.
Any questions?
This should simplify things...
How GM determines if they do a recall pic.twitter.com/QaLi28gNRk
— Stalingrad & Poorski (@Stalingrad_Poor) April 1, 2014
It's not just GM's CEO Mary Barra that is speaking. On the other side of the aisle will be NHTSA's David Friedman... grab your popcorn...
Live streaming video by Ustream
Here is the full background on the hearing:
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"The higher up the mountain you climb, the stronger the wind."
And what if that wind....breaks?
She should just say 'What does it matter at this point, Senator? We have dozens of dead Americans, how can matter if GM is responsible or Federal Regulators!'
I wonder what the hourly death count for the government killers is.
This should NOT even be happening because GM should be BANKRUPT and gone!!! Thank you Obammy! Bitchez!
Why don't the criminals in DC have a hearing on themselves? They owned the fucking thing for years. Where were they?
Why did it take "you" so long, we knew about it a long time ago.
Poor Mary is under the bus. Well, I sure hope it isn't a GM bus, because then there would be no chance for survival.
A better question in my mind, "Why is this Congress' business?"
Isn't product liability what the courts are for?
The answer is easy. Congress wants to get involved for two reasons: 1) To look like they're "doing something" and care about their constituents' well-being (HA!). 2) To demonstrate their influence over the market so they can either be bribed or extort businesses later.
Congress should sit down and STFU.
This just in-- "All stock market transactions for the last ten years will be recalled due to known endemic risks and faulty transmission of funds. Crash tests were robosigned and economy estimates were faked."
Logged in at work just to up vote Dollarmedes post about the Congress' desperate attempt to try and appear relevant.
"Winner, winner, chicken dinner."
She is a scapegoat just like Yellen and Obama. When a ship is ready to go down, give the wheel to a minority.
Unfortunately it was Obama who "pursuaded" GM to hire a woman CEO to make things look good.
Also, women are not a minority.
Women CEOs are, though.
I wonder what is going to happen to the ship now captained by a gay black man?!
Moral hazard. You nuke the GM management, bondholders, many dealers then hand the company to UAW. Then this happens. The GM management before the bankruptcy that should have happened was pretty good. Bob Lutz was pretty solid but getting older. Turning the company over to the UAW and Obama's dual citizen puppeteers thanks to Obama was a recipe for disaster.
I also see her as a convenient Fall Gal when things go really bad at GM...
Interesting to think about what "really bad" would be at GM. It's already FAILED, after being bailed out, after going BANKRUPT; after FAILING. what exactly did you have in mind? All the cars spontaneously combusting in the company parking lot ?
Strong winds on higher mounts not made for bitching around.
All this pushing female employees up the corporate ladder
is a demeaning exercise to leave them hapless in positions they should never ever have been promoted to, to prove their incompetence for good measure...
The consumer is on life support and GM products lack innovation and are of poor quality. You've been Yellen'd, Mary, happy fall-guying.
Gummint motors makes nothing I want to own or drive....
Most people driving GM products today are really telling the world "I'm really not happy about where I am in my life right now".
Folks who drive the Volt are screaming "I'm easily influenced".
I've never been more proud to be driving my Ford.
< calmly turns family photo with Pinto in background face down on table, hoping no one notices. >
Anyone still question whether the US media is corrupt to the core? I just recently heard of these problems at GM and they have been going on for years. This information was suppressed while fake news stories were propagated about Toyota to try and help GM.
Repeat, gumming motors makes nothing I wnat to own or drive. I've driven Toyotas since 1970...
Toyotas and Hondas in the Bearing family since 1990.
you may want to check Toyota's record on recalls then, since you insist on swinging from their nuts telling everyone how great they are... fool
I bought a 2001 Chevy Venture in 2002. Paid 15k for a one year old vehicle which sold new for 24k. ( Should have been by first clue.) Drove this for 6 years and during that time everything slowly broke down. Cruise control, rear wiper and washer, power sliding door, rear heating control, AC. etc.
When I went to trade it in I was offered $1500! For a 7 year old vehicle with 80,000 miles on it! The dealer didn't even know about the above mentioned problems yet and that was the offer right out of the gate. I cut my losses and bought a used Toyota 4Runner that I haven't had a single problem with. I bought the Toyota for 13k and it still books at 10.
I will never buy another GM.
Mercedes AMG or nothing!
I like my diesels a bit more comfortable though I always specify hd shocks. They have the travel of the regular comfort shock with the firmness of the sport shock. They are meant for use in Africa or some such place. That makes them perfect for me blasting down the flat roads of (mostly) western europe never getting tired. I am not one for those big rims with the low tires, if I wanted sporty I'd get a 911.
The Ventures seemed to be pretty decent vehicles, looking at them on the lot. Quality control was a problem. Ours had some problems pretty quickly as well, the worst being a blown head gasket.
We had it fixed & sold it at a pretty large discount. Hopefully things were better for the new owner.
Toyota just paid a $1.5 B fine for killing people with faulty controllers for years. http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2014/03/19/toyota-settlement-un... Independent investigators called their software some of the worst ever conceived by man.
They paid the fine not because their controllers were faulty, but because they knew the controllers were faulty and shipped them anyway. Thats first degree murder.
Law without sanction is merely advice.
Hey, all you brain-dead feminists (pleonasm), the men are throwing this bitch "Under Da Bus". Where are all of you? Remember, "If Only Women Were In Charge"?
Obama was elected by women, so we know exactly what would happen if women were in charge.
http://www.gm.com/company/corporate-officers/mary-barra
Mary Barra was named Chief Executive Officer of General Motors effective January 15, 2014. Under her leadership, GM is driving to become the global industry leader in automotive design and technology, product quality, customer care and business results. She is also a member of the GM Board of Directors.
Prior to her current position, Barra served as Executive Vice President, Global Product Development, Purchasing & Supply Chain since August 2013, and as Senior Vice President, Global Product Development since February 2011. In these roles, she was responsible for the design, engineering, program management and quality of GM vehicles around the world. She was also a member of the GM Executive Operations Committee and the Adam Opel AG Supervisory Board.
Previously, Barra served as GM Vice President, Global Human Resources; Vice President, Global Manufacturing Engineering; Plant Manager, Detroit Hamtramck Assembly; Executive Director of Competitive Operations Engineering; and in several engineering and staff positions.
In 1990, Barra graduated with a Masters in Business Administration from the Stanford Graduate School of Business after receiving a GM fellowship in 1988.
Barra began her career with GM in 1980 as a General Motors Institute (Kettering University) co-op student at the Pontiac Motor Division. She graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering.
Barra serves on the General Dynamics Board of Directors and the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute Board of Directors. In 2012, she and her husband, Tony, chaired the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute’s 30th annual dinner, which raised nearly $1.7 million for cancer research.
Barra serves on the Kettering University Board of Trustees and is GM’s Key Executive for Stanford University and the University of California-Berkeley. She has been elected to the Stanford Graduate School of Business Advisory Council effective May 2014. Barra will also serve as Vice Chair of the Kennedy Center’s Corporate Fund Board beginning March 1, 2014.
...
http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/people/person.asp?pers...
...
Ms. Barra served as an Executive Director of Vehicle Manufacturing Engineering of General Motors Corporation (now Motors Liquidation Company) until July 2009. She served as Vice President of Global Manufacturing Engineering at Motors Liquidation Company from February 1, 2008 to July 2009.
...
This should be an interesting little bit of theater to watch now that you know the background. Ignorance of the problem isn't going to cut it as an excuse.
"Barra serves on the General Dynamics Board of Directors"
GD = Lester Crown - one of Obama's earliest contributors. Got the huge and controversial F-111 contract (Fort Worth) from LBJ just before JFK was whacked....MIC...LBJ then greased the skids for Gulf of Tonkin to start Vietnam.
LBJ called off US Navy F-4 fighter bombers from attacking during the attack on the USS Liberty. McCain's old man was also involved.
The biggest company in Phoenix/Scottsdale? General Dynamics. Crown is a big AIPAC supporter and probably dual citizen.
Sounds like she probably has some blood on her hands.
I don't care what anyone says. I think she's super attractive.
Well then watching her get screwed should be a real turn on for you.
Didn't junk ya.
at first glance not bad. watch her more closely though she is a heartless bitch with no soul which is not attractive imo.
My first thought when seeing her is, "incredibly generic-looking". Typical "strong-woman-manager" look. Very generic.
"I was not in the loop." Or if that doesn't work there is always the old favorite: "Well, excuuuse me!"
And there is hope. Maybe the bus was made by GM and the rear differential will lock up.
some of which have been alleged to be responsible for at least 12 deaths
The real number of deaths is at least one order of magnitude higher:
GM officials claim they now know of 13 fatalities connected to the defect, but the real number is likely higher. The New York Times reports that the NHTSA received more than 260 consumer complaints about GM vehicles whose engines shut down while the cars were being driven. A review of NHTSA records by the consumer group Center for Auto Safety found 303 deaths between 2002 and 2012 in crashes involving the Cobalt and Ion in which airbags failed to deploy.
http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2014/04/01/pers-a01.html
Goes right along with Janet "under the bus" Yellen. Since Lord Stanley is the one pulling her strings. His are pulled by someone else, unnamed as of yet.
Actually, I owned one of the cars with the ignition switch problem. It was scary when the car shutdown at 60 MPH on the freeway. I had to pay to get the ignition switch replaced. GM figured that the more they delayed then the more people would have to have the problem fixed and GM would not have to pay.
Thank goodness you lived. 60mph, then shutdown. Sounds like engineering by Central Planning.
And the families of the dead might need to buy a new car.
Bullish!
Ancient societies sacrificed people on the altar; we do it with cars and pointless wars.
U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.!
She should try the ole, "At this point, what difference does it make!" line..
+1, Congress should be familiar with that line.
A new car built by my company leaves somewhere traveling at 60 mph. The rear differential locks up. The car crashes and burns with everyone trapped inside. Now, should we initiate a recall? Take the number of vehicles in the field, A, multiply by the probable rate of failure, B, multiply by the average out-of-court settlement, C. A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the cost of a recall, we don't do one. [/fight club]
There is no way Barra is thrown under the bus. She was based on her previous job titles responsible for the switch issue. Maybe this is karma? She played tough purchasing bitch and look what it got her. GM has always screwed suppliers.
The Chevy Cobalt is a vehicular crime against humanity. If you are a Cobalt owner your sense of existential dread is well deserved. Nothing speaks of self hate and loathing like walking into a GM dealership and saying,in the words of Mary Barra, "Give me a Cobalt and give it to me hard."
Hilarious
It seems to be a pattern to put a woman into place when things are about to collapse. In Canada we had Kim Cambell as PM, the province of Ontario currently has some bull dyke as provincial premier just as TSHTF on some multi billion dollar payout to foreign companies on work that never got done (penalties for cancelling a gas power plant). This soccer mum from GM today.
I'm really looking forward to the moment the shoe drops for Janet Yellin, until then this is just a warm up.
P.S. that Congressman Waxman looks like one thousand kinds of pyschopathic creep.
Bull Dike.. lol
Ralph Nader should be able to milk this one.
FightClub side-reference. nice.
Oh God, more CONgressional theater.
Families with pictures of their dead loved ones leaning on the rail of the back wall.
And what the fuck is the bought CONgress going to do? Absofuckinglutely nothing!!!
These are the same harpies and warlocks who bailed out the piece of shit GM to begin with!!!
If those families want to display the pictures of their dead loved ones it should be on the steps of the Marriner S. Eccles building!
I hate fucking Garbage Motors, everything that's associated with them is sleazy, and just downright fucking fucking scum from top to bottom. I do like some of their older vehicles, but I wouldn't take a new camaro or silverado for free and If I had to, I would sell the fucker.
Statistically, I think you would not get much for it if you did...
Who is going to loan you the money on a used GM car in a years time... now thats the question... lol
I offer this as a 'maybe'.
A first-time-ever lady now leads both GM and the Fed. As a nation, I reckon, we more readily believe in male villains than in female villains.
So, maybe a defense alignment?
Re. the Fed. http://patrick.net/forum/?p=1230886
Had GM been allowed to go Bankrupt, a lot of those deaths would have been avoided...
Just saying...
Some months ago I had a free Saturday morning and strolled on down to the GM dealer a couple of miles down the street to test drive a Corvette. The dealer made me take it on city roads only, no highway (he said "our customers don't like these cars with lots of miles on them" - I guess he really wanted to make that sale, huh?) and when we got back to the dealership he sat me down briefly to make his pitch.
They still had 2012 models on the lot, tons of 2013 models, and the 14s were coming in soon. Without me even opening my mouth, he offered to discount a $70k+ vehicle down to the high $50s. And that's before negotiating. I believe it was a Corvette Grand Sport, if memory serves.
What kind of reputable car maker offers 15-20% discounts on their vehicles from the list price? They're making complicated machines, not socks, for crying out loud!
Since the new corvette (c7) is out, they are discounting the c6's quite nicely. The corvette is a nice car, finally has an updated interior but the motor is still an ancient wonder (the new mustang 5.0 has a better engine it). You could have gotten that Grand Sport for 49K or less imo with some good negotating.
That blows my mind. I usually go German so when they started knocking down the list price like that my jaw almost dropped. I'm not accustomed to that. I guess record high inventories will do that...either way, a new unsold but about-to-become-a-year-old BMW or Audi would not discount for anywhere near that percentage.
I liked the motor in the car, most of the rest of it felt a little cheaply put together though. Unfortunately I couldn't get the car past 1500 RPM, even at 50-55mph (city streets). Didn't have room to give that big V8 and the chassis some pushing.
I've created and revised 10's of thousands of Bills of Material. NEVER NEVER NEVER can you change a component and NOT change it's code. It's evidence of fraud. The only reason for doing so is to hide something. It makes finding the part impossible, either in inventory or installed in cars.
Not the same thing.
The part number represents a design or purpose, you can have several slightly different parts with the same part number, they fulfil the same purpose and there are lots of reasons for changing parts frome fixing problems to being lighter, cheaper.
Someone should tap Mary on the shoulder and tell her she has a booger in her nose.
Does Waxman represent Who-ville?
I wonder if Congress will be as hard as they were on Toyota? NOT!
Oh Lord, they have props too.
94 Chevy Berretta, brakes would fail...off and on off and on. Taken to dealership 4 times. Selenoid issues...was never resolved. Sold it and never bought another GM since.
Bullish!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
massively bullish!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
GM sucks and has for decades.
GM needs to hire MOAR of those unionized assholes to fix things for good - bankruptcy and dissolution.
Standard & Poors 5,000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Where the hell are the prior CEO’s of GM. If Congress really cared about answers instead of grandstanding, they would have all those accountable present. But they were probably all donors to their campaigns.
Amen. Da lady is not the one to grill...
Set up just like the patsies in the whitehut.
Meet Ivy Starnes.
"what difference at this point does it make", {screaming} you bimbos
Female CEO = Bus Tires to the Face!
Does GM make busses? Do they come standard with Spinner Rims and Channel Stuffing?
Just check GM related forum sites and you will see that the recall cover ups go back long way. I have an Express Van from the mid 2000's where the side door hinge rusted shut. You cannot open the side door anymore. Might that be a safety issue for those traveling in the back? No recall - just a lot of home grown solutions on the forums or a $2,000 dealer hinge replacement. And no, I have not considered buying any GM products since...
"The Honorable David Friedman
Acting Administrator National Highway Transportation Safety Administration"
This asswipe Friedman is about as honorable as Gary Gollum Gensler looking after his Goldman buddy Corzine while providing regulatory oversight at the CFTC.
Rarely is a mechanical failure as clean and obvious as this in this case. The NHTSA should simply be abolished. They are a giant shitsack of federal useless eaters.
Hear ! Hear ! I love it when they introduce anyone as "the honorable" in Washington; and you know fucking well they're there for the kickbacks and the Bene's. Too sick.
Uh, this is going to happen when you put a woman in charge... duh!
Yes, perfect scape goat.
#GeneralManslaughter ?