The press conference we need

LEBANON, Kansas - The American people said on Saturday they were having trouble finding enough skilled CEOs to fill all the top spots in corporations that are needed to cope with increased globalization.

"We're having trouble finding the numbers that we need with the skills that are required to do these jobs," the people told the world in Lebanon, Kansas, the geographic center of the 48 states.

So far, these CEOs have failed to retain jobs in the United States, and the promised savings to consumers and returns to shareholders have not been realized, as the CEOs have siphoned off much of the increased corporate values for themselves. Between 2005 and 2006, the last years for which figures are available, the CEOs of America's biggest companies saw a pay increase of 38%, according to Forbes.

The people, who face rising prices, particularly in such necessities as food and gasoline, and declining assets, due largely to a falling housing market, saw no such gain in their compensation.

"At least half of the CEOs perform below the market; if we had a business that half the product we turned out was defective, we would shut that business down," they said.

Gone are the days when we have to draw our CEOs solely from American talent, they said. "Only 2 of the 11 richest people in the world are Americans, and 4 of the top 8 are from India. It seems clear that there is a lot of business talent in the world, and it doesn't all come from Harvard Business School."

"I know you don't like hearing that, but that's the way it is," they said.

The people cited several well-known cases of CEO failure, including:

• Bill Gates, 52, who is the third-richest man in the world despite the fact that his company, Microsoft, has consistently failed to deliver software on time with the promised functionality. It has also been reported that, at least twice, he has lied in testimony before the Congress of the United States.
• Carly Fiorina, 53, the former CEO of Hewlett-Packard, who held a great deal of responsibility for the decline of once-proud Lucent Technologies through her vendor financing schemes. After leaving Lucent in a huff because she didn't get the top job, she took over HP, continued their drop in quality while merging it with equally decrepit Compaq; upon failing to make the combined company work, Fiorina was dismissed by the HP board. She is now rumored, for no reason anyone can understand, to be a possible candidate for the vice presidency under John McCain.
• Robert Nardelli, 59, the current CEO of Chrysler, who as CEO of Home Depot, during the biggest housing market in history, managed to guide the stock to a lower price over his six-year tenure. For that performance and alienating shareholders, he received a parting gift of $210 million.
• Randall Stephenson, 47, the CEO of AT&T, who received $22 million in 2007, despite an inability to understand basic economics. After promising customers in 2006 that he would bring 5,000 service jobs back to the U.S., he recently confessed that he couldn't find sufficient qualified workers. Apparently no one told him that, when you are having trouble hiring people for dead-end jobs, you might try offering more money.

The people said, "If those folks can have prominent, well-paying jobs despite their clear failures, we obviously are not attracting the talent we need to these important positions. Maybe we need to look elsewhere."

(The reporter would like to thank Randall Stephenson for his help with this article.)