“When General Motors shut down Pontiac, it left a lot of enthusiasts wondering why. It was primed with a lineup of powerful, rear-wheel drive models, and seemed like it had a bright future ahead of it. It turns out that GM killed it on government orders, according to former GM Vice Chairman Bob Lutz….

“there’s not much of an explanation yet as to the specific objections the Feds had about Pontiac. The division seemed to be heading in the right direction after years of wayward stumbling. The Pontiac G8 was receiving rave reviews, and a new GTO was in the pipeline.

“Lutz went on to tell Rong that Pontiac was intended to have an all rear-wheel-drive lineup, and that the new Pontiac G6 was supposed to share a platform with the fairly excellent Cadillac ATS.”

Maybe Pontiac was killed because the Obama regime hates rear-wheel-drive cars, favoring instead electric and hybrid cars like the Chevy Volt. In any case, this is what happens when government takes over industry. If GM had been allowed to “fail,” without government interference, it still would have survived a bankruptcy sale, just in a different form than Obama wanted. Likely Pontiac would have been saved — and with it all those thousands of jobs.

Let’s drive down nostalgia lane — Pacific Coast Highway — with Ronnie and the Daytonas: