The Five Dumbest Things on Wall Street This Week

5. Women Drive GM Crazy

For anyone who wonders whether automakers can improve their relationship with female customers, we have an answer.

It lies in comments made recently by General Motors (GM) Vice Chairman Bob Lutz.

Lutz, Reuters reports, was asked whether the design of a car's interior wasn't as important as a car's exterior in making the auto desirable.

"What do you want in a female companion?" Reuters reports him as responding. "What is the first thing that attracts you? Her ability to cook and keep house or is it the way she looks?"

Continued Lutz, "It's not politically correct, GM hates it when I draw that analogy. But it's absolutely correct. ... The initial pull comes from the exterior appearance."

Whether GM hates it or not, we don't know; a GM spokesman declined to comment on Lutz's comments.

But we've got a few comments of our own. For starters, can that really be Lutz's idea of what lies beneath the surface of a woman? Her ability to cook and clean? Is that all he thinks there is?

Or, given that the issue was about a car's exterior vs. its interior design, wouldn't Lutz's proper analogy be to a female companion's physical appearance vs. a CAT scan of her internal organs?

Maybe the reason GM hates the analogy has nothing to do with political correctness; maybe it's because the analogy makes no sense.

We notice that GM sporadically makes an effort to reach out to female car buyers -- for example, in a pamphlet entitled "Women in the Driver's Seat."

Available online, the guide, among other things, suggests women avoid dealerships where "you are being patronized or 'talked to.'"

Or, we might add, where the salesman is talking crazy.

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Answers to Martha Stewart quiz:

1. e; 2. d; 3. c; 4. a; 5. f; 6. b.

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