GM Chief ousted by Obama

Is this micro-management?

The cold and grey in snowy Detroit is an accurate reflection of the mood here as people wake up to the idea that their industrial landscape has changed again. President Obama has swept aside one of the pillars of the car industry here.

Mr Wagoner was a GM veteran, so on local talk shows his resignation was met with some incredulity that he could be forced out by Washington, with one caller insisting he was the victim of and not the creator of the global recession.

Both in urban Detroit and surrounding rural Michigan there is a deep set conservatism that instinctively dislikes this level of government intervention.

But there is mounting nervousness too. Mr Wagoner had already pledged to cut a fifth of GM's global workforce and close 14 factories. By forcing him to go, President Obama is clearly saying is, that's not enough.