GM’s new CEO Fritz Henderson is sounding more amenable to the bankruptcy option. There is good reason for that. Shikha Dalmia argues:

If there is any intelligent life left at General Motors, it should run – not walk – to bankruptcy court. That may be the company’s only chance to free itself from the triple vise of unions, creditors and, now, President Barack Obama, who is by no means the least life-threatening of the lot.

Really, this has puzzled many of us for some time: Why not seek the haven of bankruptcy to shed the union contract and administer that “haircut” to bondholders? Rick Wagoner understandably didn’t want to lose his job, but he lost it anyway. Consumers might be frightened off, but they are already frightened.

If there wasn’t good enough reason to do it before, there is now. As Dalmia puts it, bankruptcy will help GM “escape from Obama’s thumb.” The car manufacturer might not want to pursue the financially unfeasible left-wing dream of producing mini greenmobiles Americans won’t buy. GM won’t, however, avoid the CAFE standards or the California emissions standards that the Obama administration has unleashed. So bankruptcy won’t allow for a completely clean slate.

Still, the prospect of a committee of political appointees running the company should  send shivers down the spines of those who survived the first round of executive firings at the hands of the Obama administration. GM has problems enough without trying to create a car line that pleases Tim Geithner and Nancy Pelosi. And after witnessing the fate of those unfortunate AIG execs, the company may conclude executive recruitment and retention will go a heck of a lot more smoothly without the White House and Congress retroactively determining bonuses. At least a bankruptcy court won’t threaten to release the names of executives so the mob can descend.

Bankruptcy is orderly, rational and a-political. Everything the current set-up is not. No wonder it’s looking better every day.