Mr President, does this mean we can fire you too?

A White House official told FOX Business that Wagoner was asked by the Administration to step down as a precondition for the company to continue to get help with its restructuring.

"This does not surprise me... Rick has seen good and bad times and it seems that a fresh face is needed,” said Mike Green, president of United Auto Workers Local 652 in Lansing, Mich. "There are a lot of smart, capable people inside GM and this will not muck up anything moving forward."

Wagoner, 56 years old, began his GM career as an analyst in the company's Treasurer's Office in New York in 1977. He had been CEO of the auto maker since 2000.

News of Wagoner’s departure comes as the Obama Administration prepares to brief some people on Capitol Hill about its plans for the auto industry on Sunday evening, in advance of a formal announcement on Monday.

The plans will come from a task force put together by President Obama to figure out what the long-term plans for the auto industry should be, after GM received $13.4 billion and Chrysler, which is owned by private-equity firm Cerberus Capital Management, received $4 billion in bridge loans amid one of the worst downturns the auto industry has ever experienced.

GM in particular has been hemorrhaging cash, losing $9.6 billion in the fourth quarter of 2008 alone.

"We think we can have a successful U.S. auto industry," President Obama said on CBS's "Face the Nation" on Sunday. "But it's got to be one that's realistically designed to weather this storm and to emerge… much more lean, mean and competitive than it currently is."

Mr President, stick to your Marlboro's. This is absolute Socialism. When the White House can trump the stockholders when it comes to better business decisions, there's a HUGE problem. Allowing companies to fail is important. When companies cease to produce affordable, reliable products fail, something or someone else will come in to fill the void. That's what has made this country's markets the most competitive and dynamic in all of the world. The changing time we're in now has left us in a world of government interference, bail-outs, etc. The shareholders should speak to their board, not the White House. This makes me sick. Having the President ask a CEO to stepdown is the most unamerican thing I can think of. Again, if you're not angry, you're either not paying attention, or too stupid to know the difference.

Despite My Cantankerous View Toward a Bailout, This is Eye Opening.

My problem with this whole bailout proposal is the American Auto makers' approach to car manufacturing since the Japanese explosion of the late 70's and early 80's. Year after year sales revenues were in drastic decline, but American car makers weren't addressing the problems. American cars have fallen behind in fuel efficiency, safety, design, and thus popularity. They have continued to ask premium prices for generic quality. "The Big Three" have no one to blame but themselves. I feel for the hundreds of thousands of Americans that gave their blood, their sweat, and some, their lives for a pension that they thought would be secure. I can't imagine going to an assembly line and sweating for 25 years. These are the people that built this great nation one car at a time. American car makers should be held accountable. They need a drastic overhaul in their design and their distribution processes. The AIG bailout has shown American taxpayers that these corperations don't value our money. The iniquitous approach in which these executives execute their businesses has already been proven inefffective. Let's remember, they're coming to us for help. The car manufacturers are no different. Why should billions of hard to earn tax dollars go to bail out car makers that have been and will continue to give American consumers substandard quality and safety compared to their oversees competitors. They have ignored the needs of the American consumer for 25 years and there needs to be changes. My father worked on the assembly line at GM in the late 60's and early 70's. Cars were built to stand the test of time. They were big and full of muscle, but times have changed and their business model did not. I'm convinved people will buy American made vehicles, but they will not buy cars for equal value that exhibit substandard quality and reliability.



Albeit Michael Keaton, this is art imitating life.