Do you suppose that GM’s public-relations department had a long chat with Rick Wagoner this week? After several days of insisting that huge multinational corporations need to beg for taxpayer dollars while flying private jets, GM finally acknowledged that the optics didn’t quite fit the desperation CEO Wagoner claimed:
General Motors said today that its CEO Rick Wagoner will not be flying on the company’s private jet when he returns to Washington next week for more hearings on the possible $25 billion bailout for the troubled auto industry.
Just last week, after a flurry of criticism following an ABC News report that the CEOs of the big three car companies flew on private jets to seek public funding, GM announced that it would put two out of the five private jets it leases out of service. But even last Friday the company was saying that Wagoner and the other two top executives at GM will continue to fly private for all business and personal travel because of a stipulation by the board of directors.
Today, however, a company spokesperson said, “We’ve gotten the message,” and that Wagoner would not return to Washington on the corporate jet. The decision was first reported by the Detroit News.
What’s truly amazing isn’t that Wagoner got the message, but that it took several days for him to figure out that traveling to DC in a private jet to ask for a taxpayer bailout amounts to panhandling from the rear seat of a Rolls-Royce. What’s even more amazing is that Ford and Chrysler still haven’t gotten the message.
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