Finbarr J. O'Neill, Mitsubishi. With Mitsubishi in free fall, Fin O'Neill is trying to resuscitate the brand. In Fara Warner's piece in today's New York Times, Fin makes some revealing comments, like, "We were a brand on sale. Now we need to establish natural demand for the products." Like he did at his stint running Hyundai, O'Neill introduced a 100,000-mile warranty on Mitsubishi vehicles. "I want to get rid of any objections that people may have had with our cars," O'Neill said to Warner. But Fin is also asking the right billion-dollar question, apparently, as he told Warner the company had to focus on "what is Mitsubishi's reason for existence?" He also told Warner that he wants Mitsubishi's vehicles to be performance-driven alternatives to some of the country's most respected brands. Hmmm, you mean like Mazda? Good luck establishing that "brand authenticity," Fin. At least O'Neill is asking the right questions, unlike some other car company executives. He did stretch it a bit too far by suggesting that, "I like to think there's a little bit of Evo in all of our cars." If more people knew about the Evo, that might be a noble goal at some point, Fin - but that's way down the road...