New GM CEO's Chicago Links : William Daley and Rahm Emanuel Ties

Barron's reports:

DON'T BE HARD ON GM'S NEW CHAIRMAN EDWARD WHITACRE for confessing during an interview last week that he knows nothing about cars. He simply suffered a Joe Biden moment. Texans often tumble over their tongues when taking a stab at humility. In fact, few car companies, let alone their CEOs, know how to build cars, which is why so many of them are conking out. The Obama administration, in my view, picked Whitacre to run General Motors (ticker: GM) because he has a more important talent: He knows how to play Chicago-style politics.

Whitacre predominantly donates money to GOP causes, but he is no party purist. While serving as chairman and chief executive of SBC, the regional Bell that grew under his leadership into AT&T, Whitacre helped a couple of influential Chicago Democrats -- both friends of President Barack Obama -- enrich themselves between political gigs. He gave former commerce secretary Bill Daley a very sweet job and White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel a very sweet investment-banking opportunity.

You'll want to read the whole article. The Chicago Way is going national.Just a reminder, William Daley was on the board of Fannie Mae. Rahm Emanuel was on the board of Freddie Mac.