Dow should fire Andrew Liveris

Some readers may ask why we spend time looking at and opining about Dow Chemical Co.

Since much of our audience lies in far off lands and never has set foot in the heart of the Petrochemical Underarm of Texas, this is an understandable question.

See, Dow Chemical Co. is why there is a Brazosport.

Dow built the burgh of Lake Jackson so it could have a place for its workers to live, and in due time, the subsequent confederacy of municipaligies that sprung up around the area that today comprise "Brazosport" owe their existence, not to mention their paychecks, to Dow and the affiliated petrochemical-related enterprises that support and feed off it.

So there's the answer to the question.

(What would this place be like if Dow had never set roots here? That's an interesting topic for conjecture, but not one we'll tackle now; still, if we had our druthers, we like to fantasize it as an idyllic sanctuary for wildlife where men and women could bird watch, fish, hunt, surf, boogy board, swim and, yes, even play some golf, or at at least a spirited game of croquet... oh well.)

Today, looking at Dow, it's clear the multinational behemoth is in a ditch, and if the buck stops at the top, like Harry Truman once said, the blame for it lies in the lap of Andrew Liveris, the Australian-born head of the company.

He made a deal for Dow to take over Romn & Haas in a move that hinged on the success of Dow joining forces with Kuwait's national oil company for form a joint venture, but then the Kuwaitis got cold feed and backed out, leaving Dow in the lurch to come up with the money to complete the Rohm & Haas acquisition.

Now the lawyer have ahold of it.

All these manuevers were undertaken in the midst of a worldwide credit crunch and recession, when people who pull the money strings were retreating to their bunkers and the workers of the world were waiting and watching for pink slips to be delivered.

None of this inspires confidence in the man at the top of the Dow food chain (and we're not even bringing up the shabby treatment Dow has given the citizens of India over the Bhopal disaster.)

The next shoe to drop will be Dow cutting its almight stock dividend, which Liveris previously had pledged was sacrosanct, while Dow's stock price continues to move in the $13 to $14 price range (previous 52-week high was $43.43.

So Liveris (pictured above with wife) deserves to be laid off just like all the other Dow workers who are getting laid off.

Will this happen? We don't know. But we're Brazosport Proud to be the first to call for it.