Last month, Toyota sold more vehicles in North America than Ford. Understandably, The Blue Oval Boys have refrained from public hand-wringing over their displacement in the US sale charts. But there is no underestimating the development’s damage to Ford’s corporate psyche. Newbie CEO Mark Fields was already deep into crisis management. Now, suddenly, it’s obvious that Ford’s turnaround cannot rely on pushing (deeply discounted) products and hoping and waiting for a Hail Mary pass. A brand new plan is set to be hatched at the end of the third quarter. The way forward is now in fast forward.

Although GM’s woes are increasingly well known, the House of Ford is also in dire straits. The Blue Oval’s credit has been downgraded almost as often and deeply as The General’s. FoMoCo’s products– a truck-heavy mix in a time of fuel conscious fervor– languish on dealers’ lots with equal abandon[ment]. Both companies have too many lackluster products, confused brands and mainline dealers. In fact, other than the size of their relative problems, the chief difference between GM and Ford has been the Blue Oval’s bluster, bold moves and all.

For a second consecutive year, GM’s Oshawa production facilities have received J.D. Power and Associates’ “Gold Plant Quality Award.”  The award is given to the production facility with the fewest number of defects per vehicle, as measured by J.D.’s famous “Initial Quality Study.”  Oshawa created cars with just 43 defects per 100 vehicles.  The industry average was 124.  So what do you do if you have the second most productive assembly plant on the continent?  If you’re GM, you do the only logical thing possible: you close it.