General Motor's Image?

Dear editor:

General Motors has taken a position and has made what they feel is an emotionally safe, politically correct, financially uplifting and convincing advertising safe decision. They have dumped Tiger Woods as their spokesman. Why? Because he no longer represents the “image” that the company is trying to sell to the public. GM’s “image?” They have to be kidding.

This from the company that lost its leadership position in the auto industry that took decades to build. This from the company that has now been forced, due to poor management, to drop long standing major brand names; Oldsmobile, Pontiac, Saturn and Saab. This from the company that is trying to sell a majority stake in their Opel, Vauxhall and Hummer lines. This from the company that went into bankruptcy in June of this year. This from the company that forced a major number of dealerships around the country to close and put so many people out of work during the worst recession since the Great Depression of 1929. This from the company that had to sell its majority stock ownership to the United States Government after borrowing $57.6 billion of our tax money. This from the company that closed so many manufacturing operations around the country and Canada causing so many to be put on unemployment lines after years of loyal service.

And they dropped Tiger Woods because he is hurting their “image?” You have to have a good image to hurt it, and GM surely doesn’t fit that description. I think, in order for them to sound half way intelligent they have to find a better whipping boy than Tiger.

Ridiculous Bowl Season

Dear editor:

I’ve always been a college football fan. I went to Georgia Tech which not only is one of the world’s top engineering and science schools (rated #4 in the US and in the top 12 worldwide) but also has had a pretty good football history, which includes coaches with the likes of John Heisman and Bobby Dodd, and a few national championships. But today I have to ask a question which continues to bother me and many other people I speak to. And that is, “Is money completely corrupting college football?” What especially brings this up now is the bowl season, which has grown to a ridiculous size and in no way represents only America’s top college football schools.

During earlier years there were four bowls. That’s right, not major bowls but the only bowls. Competition was great to be one of the top eight teams in the nation to play in the Rose, Cotton, Sugar or Orange Bowls. All four were played on New Year’s Day and it was a time for parties with at least three TV sets going so you did not miss any of the action. In the late 50’s the Gator Bowl was added as a “secondary bowl.” Let’s face it, you had to be excellent to get invited to one of these games and the team had to have at least a 7-3 record (schools only played 10 regular season games in those days.) Today if you have a ridiculously poor record against no nothing teams you get invited to a bowl. Why? For the money.

You can’t even recognize who or what these so-called bowls are. And their names are nothing more than advertising gigs. Look at them…Eagle Bank Bowl, Champs Sports Bowl, Chick Filet Bowl, GMAC Bowl, Citi Bowl, Papa John’s Bowl, Capital One Bowl, Insight Bowl, Little Caesar’s Bowl, Outback Bowl etc, etc. Makes you wonder if next year there will be a Joe’s Hardware and Towing Bowl.

Money? There are hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars being spent to sponsor these games (plus the TV money) and the schools are grabbing it up in an effort to pay those ridiculous salaries paid to head coaches and the facilities they build. Just look at the Florida coach who gave up a $4 million contract, but now will be back next year. Any major school pays the head football coach more than the school’s president and more than the governor of the state or even the President of the United States.

And while a number of these athletes are excellent students total teams do not deserve to be called “student athletes.” NCAA football teams are just the minor leagues of the NFL. I know this will upset many well meaning college football fans and alumni, but we have to face the truth. If this direction of money continues the game of college football is in danger somewhere down the line.

The "No" Party Adds Ridiculous Blame

Dear editor:

The “NO” party leaders are at it again, to the point that they ought to change the name of their party from GOP to “NO”P. Now they are blaming the president himself for the unsuccessful close call on Northwest Airlines Flight 253 when Umar Farouk Abdelmutallab tried to blow up the plane as it was approaching Detroit Airport. Perhaps with weird thinking like this we ought to blame the successful attacks of 9/11 on President Bush. Ridiculous? Of course it is. Partisan and hurtful to our democratic process? Absolutely. And true in both cases. Blame like this accomplishes nothing other than giving comfort to our enemies.

Michigan’s Peter Hoekstra, the Republican’s ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee, declared on Fox News Sunday that the Obama administration should be held accountable for this aborted attack on our country. He asserted that this was a troubling pattern of administration neglect on preparedness stemming from a failure to recognize essential dangers. This is nothing more than “Cheneythink” which will say anything, using any derogatory terms to strike out at the president and the majority party.

Let me remind Rep. Hoekstra of a saying that the Grand Old Party said over and over again to Democrats after the 2000 debacle of the presidential election….”you lost, now get over it.” And may I add, get to work.