By Ken Shepherd | January 31, 2011 | 5:04 PM EST

As I've noted previously, the Washington Post has repeatedly buried stories about Steven Rattner's late legal woes with the SEC and then-N.Y. Attorney General Andrew Cuomo.

The former Obama's "car czar," was accused last year of bribing "a political consultant to win business from New York's pension fund for his former investment firm." The liberal Democratic financier subsequently worked out settlements with the SEC and the state of New York in November and December of last year respectively. In the SEC settlement, Rattner agreed to "a two-year ban from associating with investment advisors or broker dealers" although Rattner "admit[ted] no wrong doing." The agreement with the state of New York came with a similar "a five-year ban from working with any New York public pension fund."

Well, today Rattner got some ink in the Washington Post in a much more favorable form: an op-ed he penned wherein he defended Obama's 2009 stimulus package.

By Tom Blumer | May 11, 2010 | 9:43 PM EDT

RattnerInDetroitForFed051010If a conservative or Republican uttered the nonsense to be revealed shortly, we'd justifiably never hear the end of it on the late-night comedy shows and elsewhere. As it is, former car czar Steve Rattner's "creative" term for fibbing has and probably will continue to get little coverage outside of Detroit.

Rattner's risible rendition of reality spewed forth before he spoke at a Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago-Detroit District conference. Here are excerpts from the coverage by the Detroit News's Robert Snell (HT Laura Ingraham), with help from David "I think Toyota bragged about avoiding safety recalls, so they did" Shepardson (bolds are mine):

General Motors Co. Chairman and Chief Executive Ed Whitacre may have stretched the truth in a commercial saying the automaker had repaid its federal obligations, former autos czar Steve Rattner said today.

GM "may have slightly elasticized the reality of things," Rattner told reporters ahead of a speech today.

By Tom Blumer | June 10, 2009 | 5:00 PM EDT

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You can't make this stuff up. The titled quote comes from a Bloomberg story today about new GM Chairman Ed Whitacre. You also can't make up most of the media's calm acceptance of yet another person heavily involved with running General Motors, aka Government Motors, who knows next to nothing about cars except as a consumer who drives them.

At least it's refreshing that this guy has experience running a business, which is more than you can say about the other two architects of the company as it currently subsists.

On May 31, the New York Times put out a fawning portrayal of the a Mr. Brian Deese, the guy who was the only full-timer on President-elect and then President Obama's car team from Election Night until mid-February.

Fasten your seat belts, this guy's lack of any kind of pedigree will have you death-gripping the steering wheel, as will the smug dismissiveness of a business system that has been the most successful in human history: