Jean Todt is a fair man, he would be an excellent candidate and his associations with Ferrari wouldn't cloud his vision...
Are you serious!? Of course his associations would skew his judgments. He would screw every team over and any sane person would see that is a bad thing.
Yes I am serious. He was performing a job at the time. He is a professional above all else.
I used to work for UBS, now I'm working for one of their competitors, can I be trusted simply because I had a job to perform in a past life? Of course I can...
In your job there is accountability. At the FIA, there is not. The FIA President is God almighty. What he says goes. Therefore, having anybody who is related to a team has so much freedom of action, they might just be tempted to favour their former teams or friends over others. That goes for people who are normally honest as well; power corrupts. Moreover, even if somebody was dead straight, they would always be open to allegations of favouritism, so the sport would continue in exactly the same vein in which is doing now and has been for years: McLaren versus Ferrari, the Renault and Toyota spy scandals, the Renault mass damper controversy, the fiasco surrounding the width of the Michelin tyres, the Benetton traction control and launch control row, Senna versus Prost, to name but a few. These silly rows have gone on for too long. The FIA needs to change its operations for the good of the sport.
Agree MF. Also, demure, you work for a competitor, the FIA is not a competitor to any team. JT would still have great allegiance to Ferrari, and, probably still be on the payroll. It is fundamentally wrong that anyone with a 'live' connection to any team should have
any position within the governing body, let alone president, except where, I believe, all teams should have an equal representation on the board. I know that some think that the top teams like Ferrari / McL. should have greater influence than the smaller teams. That is wrong, its a club and, in this respect, all teams should be equal. Indeed, if the smaller teams had more influence I think that it would improve racing, because of cost reduction. For example, I suspect, that even now, Force India achieves more per $ spent than the big teams - because they have to, for one thing ,drivers and staff are paid less. Drivers are probably overpaid.
Strive to be fast, strive to be first but, above all, strive to be alive.
Martin
