Showing posts with label Washington. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Washington. Show all posts

Monday, December 03, 2012

Was nice knowing ya, Chief!

US CEOs face uncertain times, & it's not just their companies that worry them

“Beggars can’t be choosers,” says a famous adage. Nowadays, that adage extends to some CEOs too, for they sure have quite a few things to beg for; now that economic downturn can't be wished away.

Well, if not choosers, they can certainly make the best of their predicament by begging in style, at least till it lasts. The top honchos of Detroit’s trio, viz Rick Wagoner, General Motors; Alan Mulally, Ford Motors; and Robert Nardelli, Chrysler, are a case in point. Imagine using luxury private jets to land in Washington, seeking a $25 billion bailout option to save their respective companies!

But why luxury jets? Well, obviously because of “security reasons.” After posting pathetically low profit figures (combined net loss of the three exceeded $5 billion for the quarter ending September 30, 2008), they definitely need protection from stakeholders! And if these humungous losses were not enough, the three have also been extremely successful in eroding the share price of their stocks (from January 1, 2008, General Motors has come down by 85.29%, while Ford Motors’ stock price has fallen by 76.36% till November 24, 2008).

And its not just the auto CEOs who face such overwhelming dilemmas. CEOs across the board are making news nowadays for reasons entirely different from what they had ever imagined. Some CEOs have seen their companies go underwater like Philip J. Schoonover, CEO, Circuit City (which recently Chapter 11’ed itself); some are stepping down like Jerry Yang, CEO, Yahoo! (per force exited); some are announcing a sizeable lay-off (Vikram Pandit, CEO, Citi Group announced to axe as many as 52,000 jobs); and we also have a macabre incident where one of them Sid Agrawal, CEO, SiPort has been shot dead by a revengeful employee. God bless his soul.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.


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Tuesday, August 14, 2012

ILAN BERMAN, VICE PRESIDENT, AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY COUNCIL, WASHINGTON, DC

The clandestine war in the Middle East may soon become an open warfare

Here, Washington’s opinion matters a great deal. For years, Israeli officials have been sounding the alarm over Iran’s nuclear capability. For just as long they have been pressured by US administrations, Democrat and Republican alike, to allow time for the emergence of an international coalition to contain, deter and pressure Iran. Increasingly, however, such a laissez-faire approach is not possible. That’s because, over the past year, the Obama administration abandoned serious pressure on Iran in favour of an ambitious diplomatic outreach intended to change the behaviour of its leaders. This effort is now understood to have reaped few dividends; Iran viewed US attempts at “engagement” with skepticism and deftly used the strategic pause afforded by American outreach to forge ahead with its nuclear endeavour. As a result, the policy debate in Washington today has shifted in the favour of economic sanctions. But observers in Israel, as elsewhere, seem skeptical that the application of such measures now will have the power to convince Iran’s Ayatollahs to give up their nuclear drive.

Relations between Jerusalem and Washington, meanwhile, are on the rocks. Israel’s ill-timed announcement this March of future housing construction in East Jerusalem was taken as a personal affront by a White House eager to restart the Middle East peace process. From there, relations between the two countries have deteriorated to depths not seen since the formal inauguration of the “special relationship” in the early 1980s. The current crisis (in the Middle East) has profoundly upset the political understanding that previously prevailed between Washington and Jerusalem on a range of issues – Iran chief among them.

As a result, whether Israel will act against Iran is now an open – and hotly-debated – question. If it does, the resulting conflict could re-configure the balance of power in the Middle East. If it does not, the results could be equally profound – ranging from a new arms race in the region (as Arab states seek a counterweight to Iran’s emerging bomb) to the rise of a nuclear-armed Shi’a hegemony in the Persian Gulf. Either way, the international community could soon see the current cold war between Israel and Iran become a hot one.




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