Detroit Auto Show: Who is the car czar?

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A mysterious figure has been haunting the meeting rooms and vast showfloor of Detroit’s Cobo Hall, hanging, just beyond sight, around incessant conversations about the industry’s future. Who is that enigmatic soul?

None other than the dreaded, fearsome, terrible ... car czar.

Since autumn, and increasing now that the federal government made $13.7 billion in emergency loans to General Motors and Chrysler, there has been talk of Washington appointing a middleman or quasi-regulator to oversee the crippled U.S. auto industry as it staggers toward some kind of better new day.

Since the idea was hatched, it’s been greeted with suspicion and hostility in Michigan, which has a well-developed sense that Washington knows roughly as much about the auto industry as the Detroit Lions do about winning football games.

Now, with Barack Obama mere days from taking office, the industry is busy playing a high-stakes speculation game on who might be the chosen one. An early candidate was Kenneth Feinberg, a D.C. attorney who ran the Sept. 11 Victim Compensation Fund. But his name hasn’t been heard lately.

The newest name being bandied about? Former Federal Reserve Chairman and octogenarian Paul Volcker. He was name-checked on Sunday night by Ford Executive Chairman Bill Ford Jr., who also took the opportunity to deny that he himself could do the job. ‘My chief loyalty is to the blue oval,’ Ford said.

Bob Lutz, vice chairman of GM, suggested that an auto czar, rather than a nagging hindrance to the industry, could actually be a good thing. ‘To have a person who we can actually dialogue with, I actually think this could be a very beneficial institution,’ said Lutz, adding that he had seen a list of about five possible candidates. He wouldn’t name them, but assured reporters that former Vice President Al Gore was not on the list.

Whispers abound, but there is little clarity on this great unknown. Stay tuned.

--Ken Bensinger

Upper photo: Bill Ford Jr. Lower photo: Bob Lutz. Credit: Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times

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