Evidence that Obama has run GM based on political considerations

Early after the government took over GM, President Obama promised that he wouldn't be interfering with the company's business decisions. Yet, while the government has owned the company, GM clearly stopped lobbying against new government regulations it viewed as being against the company's interests.

General Motors Co. has stepped up its lobbying in Washington in recent months, federal records show, as Detroit's two rescued auto makers unwind their ties to the government and return to pursuing their own interests—which sometimes are at odds with the Obama administration.

GM spent nearly $3.6 million on lobbying in the first quarter of 2011, more than twice what it spent in the three months after it emerged from a restructuring in bankruptcy court in 2009, according to its lobbying disclosure forms.

It also outspent Ford Motor Co., the only one of the Detroit three to avoid a bailout and trip through bankruptcy court. Ford spent about $1.7 million on lobbying in this year's first quarter and $5.6 million in all of 2010.

In recent months, GM—still partly owned by American taxpayers—has lobbied to shape proposed emissions and fuel-mileage standards, influence implementation of a new financial-overhaul law, and lift limits on its executive pay.

That's a stark contrast to a couple of years ago, when GM, in the wake of a $50 billion government bailout, treaded lightly around some hot-button issues. . . .

It is the kind of advocacy GM shied away from in the months following the bailout, when it even scrapped, at the White House's behest, a money-saving plan to move its headquarters out of Detroit. . . .