A new General Motors was born yesterday, shedding debt, dealers, disastrous products and I’m sure a few other alliterative entities I can’t think of right now. The new company is leaner, greener, less burdened by debt and with an even labor playing field that should — in theory — allow the automaker to compete in the toughest market it has ever seen.

So after all this cutting and shedding and contracting, what’s left? Quite a bit, really. With four brands the company will have a product portfolio of 34 nameplates. That’s a lot, but no more than Toyota, depending on how you count it. New, better stuff is in the pipeline, and it’s a good bet that even the lowball GM products — such as the Chevy Cobalt — will be replaced within the next 18 to 24 months.

Still, there’s a lot for GM to do, and I’m not just talking about consolidating management structures or reshuffling the titles on various business cards (like retaining Bob Lutz as product czar). There’s still one more huge mountain GM has to climb, one that even this new and improved company may not be able to manage: convincing people my age to buy its cars.
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There are a lot of rumors swirling right now about whether GM, after getting billions in government loans to stave it off, will wind up filing for bankruptcy anyhow. Moody’s is putting the chances at 70 percent, and a recent article in Reuters says that the company is in “intense” and “earnest” preparations for bankruptcy.

Are the rumors true? Is it really going to happen? Will GM get what it needs outside of court? Is Reuters right about GM preparing for an inevitable bankruptcy? What, in short, is going on?

There are three possible likely scenarios: It’s all true, it’s kind of true, and it’s a bluff.

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