Even if GM clears bankruptcy quickly …

The current market for automotive sales is likely to be no better a year from now:

Ferdinand Dudenhoeffer, director of the Center for Automotive Research in Gelsenkirchen, Germany, said capacity will need to shift to emerging markets such as India and China, not saturated markets like the United States and Europe, where most of the dealmaking is centered.

All the changes brings to mind past unhappy auto mergers: Ford with Land Rover and Jaguar, Chrysler with Germany's Daimler AG, and General Motors with Fiat.

A big exception, Dudenhoeffer said, is Volkswagen AG, which gathers multiple brands from Bentley to Lamborghini to Skoda under one roof. "But it took 20 years to bring them onto the same technical platforms," he said.

This should, but won’t, give pause to boisterous Saturn buyer Roger Penske, who is planning on using Saturn dealerships as a platform to sell multiple brands of foreign cars. Indy Roger says that will only happen when those unspecified brands meet GM quality before he’ll sell their cars through Saturn as a multi-brand dealer network. Besides the laughableness of that, with many foreign brands already ahead of GM, one that isn’t yet is working on that.

When India’s Tata is looking at coming to America, not the other way around, Roger Penske should shut up until he can prove something.

‘Bad GM’? No, just what GM wrecked, on sale

Besides GM selling its Hummer brand, the General also claims it has 16 buyers for Saturn and three for Saab. Neither of these falls into the idea of “bad GM,” other than they are divisions that GM wrecked.

After buying Saab, GM slowly, but inexorably and ineptly, crushed every iota of uniqueness out of it. With Saturn, the one-time independent entity was dragged back into the GM fold, probably in part because it was making the rest of GM look bad.

GM didn’t name any of the potential buyers, but I can think of a couple.

Either Magna, the apparent buyer of GM’s European arm, Opel, or Fiat, who backed off Opel after GM wanted some extra last-minute money, could be interested in it. Fiat might also be one of those 16 potential Saturn buyers.

Yes, the dealers may be losing money on Saturn, but probably not for different reasons than other Shrinking Three dealers.

The General’s big mistake there was bringing Saturn the carmaker back into the generic fold without trying to shut Saturn dealers then or roll them into other brands. Well, now that the National Automotive Dealers Association has less of a leg to stand on, Saturn’s buyer will do just that.

And, while conservatives hammer the UAW, and liberals, greenish types in particular, slam GM itself, why doesn’t NADA get more blame? Doesn’t the acronym say it all?

At the same time, speaking of closing or selling off lines, why doesn’t the General get rid of GMC? Really, are diehard GMC aficionados going to go buy Fords? Let alone Toyotas?

GM stupidity alone is death-deserving

GM, I guess, just can’t help being GM, management idiocy and all, as it cannibalizes itself in a last-gasp attempt to get gussied up for either a structured bankruptcy, more sucking at the government teat, or a free-fall funeral in style.

For example –

Phasing out Saturn, GM’s red-headed stepchild? That shows, in a capsule, or under a microscope, the history of GM’s short-sightedness with the once free-standing car line. The GM brand name that probably STILL has the most customer loyalty of any GM nameplate, or at least, of any GM nameplate below Cadillac, and one individual car, the Corvette.

That all said, the Wall Street Journal notes some Saturn dealers are trying to keep their brand alive by selling Indian or Chinese cars under that nameplate.

Carmakers in both those countries are surely salivating at the idea.

And, if you’ll look at the WSJ graphic, it’s perplexing as to why GM would ax Saturn; it’s sales, like all carmakers not named Hyundai, are off, but they’re better than any other GM division except Chevy. And, outside the aforementioned Corvette, and trucks, which tend to have higher brand loyalty, is there any Chevy product which jumps out at you, or the general public?

This looks like the EV-1 all over.

Instead, kill GMC Trucks. Yes, trucks are a big moneymaker, still, but irrationalism of a nameplate aside, it is a tweaked-out Chevy, for doorknob’s sake! Kill Pontiac rather than just cutting it back. Tweak Buick more. Throw Pontiac's edgier vehicles to Saturn.

But, noooo ...

So, maybe we need to kill GM off. The government pension plan insurance hit would probably be less than the bailout hit. As first creditor, take GM physical plant and resell it. Use the bankruptcy for further pension plan reform.