• Wall Street Journal, Friday, July 17, 2009 10:32 AM

Criminey, it's hard to keep up with the 77-year-old Bob Lutz, but he's sure good at generating copy (and may he stick around as long as "Around the Net" does). Now the newly dubbed GM marketing and communications chief says "never mind" about his comments earlier this week that the Pontiac G8 might be sold as a Chevy Caprice because it was "just too good to waste." (You'll recall that the Pontiac line is being phased out.)

In a blog item posted yesterday, Sharon Terlep reports, Lutz asks us to "[go] back in time to, oh, about four or five days ago, when the Pontiac G8 was going away." That's because it's going away again.

"With my new 'marketing' hat on, upon further review and careful study, we simply cannot make a business case for such a program. Not in today's market, in this economy, and with fuel regulations what they are and will be," Lutz writes.

Why does marketing require quotes in Lutz' post, you might ask? Perhaps because it seems to be novel term around GM. Let us reblog Business Week's Jon Fine, who reblogs Slate's Mickey Kaus, who picks up NPR's Robert Siegel, who actually talks with Lutz:

SIEGEL: But when you take your eye off the ball for more than 20 years...

LUTZ: Yeah, well, that was bad. ...

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