Bob Lutz kissing babies and pleading for votes? For a fleeting moment, General Motors' retired vice chairman says he considered a run for governor of Michigan.
Then a Republican apparatchik filled him in on what would be involved.
"The endless meetings and events around the state," Lutz told the Detroit Free Press. "And then he told me how much I would have to raise and how much I would personally have to spend on it. I said, "No way.' "
This was prior to the 2010 election, when Michigan's Democratic governor was prohibited from running because of term limits, and Lutz, a Republican, was heading toward the door at GM. Lutz thought the state's economic problems called for a Republican of the stature of -- well, Bob Lutz.
(Another Republican businessman, Rick Snyder, ran and won.)
Of the 2012 presidential race, Lutz says he's not ready to forgive GOP front-runner Mitt Romney, who argued against government help for the ailing domestic auto industry in 2009.
"I have a long memory," Lutz said of Romney's willingness to see GM and Chrysler go under without government help.
"These people who were against the loans forget there was no money available for debtor-in-possession financing. The banks were out of money," he said.
"Without the loans, GM and Chrysler would have closed. Then the suppliers, then Ford. Hundreds of thousands, if not millions, would have been unemployed."
