Ward of the state gets new warden

Nationalistic euro-goofyness is still everything:

The appointment will see power over EADS's most important subsidiary consolidated in the hands of a single French executive. A similar proposal was fiercely resisted by the aerospace group's German shareholder DaimlerChrysler just over a year ago when it was mooted by the former Airbus chief and EADS executive Noel Forgeard, who left after a share dealing controversy this summer.

However people close [to him in] DaimlerChrysler said Mr Gallois was "a different character". A long-time civil servant who led the restructuring of France's rail group SNCF, ...

A complex structure of cross-reporting, with French executives reporting to German and vice versa, has been blamed for perpetuating national rivalries which have contributed to the group's recent troubles. Moreover the personal ambitions of former Airbus executives such as Mr Forgeard have created an atmosphere of mistrust between the aircraft maker and its parent which has affected the group's performance.

A different character being a government type taking a mad romp through the carnival ride of this strange new thing called capitalism, excerpt the company is rigged up in such a way that it fail all it wants, but never go out of business.

It is understood the French government, which has 15 per cent stake in EADS, agreed to Mr Streiff's departure yesterday afternoon after initially supporting him. However, the deal was reached only after the EADS shareholders agreed Mr Gallois could retain both his EADS role as co-chief executive as well as the Airbus post.

Alas, the state is everything, and everything for the state – but there’s another subtext: a fight over the national controlling the ship been getting in the taxpayers’ aft for 4 decades.