That's it in a nutshell.

A friend of mine was telling me how his first new car was a 1976 Toyota Corolla. When he bought it, the salesman told him Toyota was going to be the #1 car manufacturer in 30 years. Of course my friend laughed at him - he loved the car, but still thought like every one else you'd have to be insane to think some little piece of 4 cylinder tin can car manufacturer would take a big bite out of big block Detroit iron.


If Toyota knew back then they could win market share beating Detroit on their own home turf, and GM and Ford knew Japan was slowly creeping up on them, you can only blame Ford and GM for not heeding the warning signs over the last 30 years. And GM's financial status as of last Friday is a culmination of their actions (or lack thereof) over those 30 years.