IN America's ever-more-democratic society, egalitarianism seeps into everything, even the supposedly severe meritocracy of sport. So almost every college football team that is not dreadful is "bowl eligible." That is why there are 34 bowl games, which is why you might not have noticed Tuesday's Bailout Bowl in which you could have seen your tax dollars at work. Or at play.
The game's real name was the GMAC Bowl. GMAC is known as the "financing affiliate" of General Motors. But Cerberus, the huge private-equity firm that owns 80.1 percent of Chrysler. Washington sternly said that it would allow GMAC to become a bank-holding company only if GMAC managed to increase its capital to $30 billion. When GMAC fell far short of that goal, Washington supplied the shortfall... [snip]
In 2000, the first year of its bowl sponsorship, GMAC paid $500,000. Perhaps the sponsorship makes marketing sense, even today. But though its pockets are bulging with public money, GMAC says, through a spokeswoman on Monday, that it doesn't disclose the specifics of its marketing program.
You might think that a company forfeits a right to such secrecy when it takes the public's money. You would, evidently, be mistaken. Although GMAC is now attached by an umbilical cord to the US Treasury, GMAC's position is that the sponsorship price is none of the public's business...
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