How to solve the feud at DEI? Expand the company

	Teresa Earnhardt's quote about Dale Jr. in the 'Wall Street Journal' accused him of being unable to decide if he wants to be a driver or a personality. AP
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Here's a modest proposal to get past the war of words and back to racing at Dale Earnhardt Inc. How about a spinoff -- making two companies out of it?

One part would be the operating company; handling finance and marketing to be controlled by Teresa Earnhardt. The other would be strictly the racing company to be run by Dale Earnhardt Jr. or someone he proposes.

And, to keep both sides committed, they'd have to participate in each other's profits. Let's say 20 percent.

This way Teresa Earnhardt would keep control of the legacy company established by her and late husband, Dale Earnhardt in 1980 and still be involved with NASCAR while Junior could focus on a race team where he has total confidence.

Can you blame Junior for wanting a bigger say on where and how team resources are used? Although some, including Teresa, have accused him being unable to decide whether he wants to a driver or be a personality, his results tell a different story. Although he's not won a Nextel Cup title he's won two Busch series titles, 17 Cup races, including seven on the superspeedways and except for 2005, when he finished 19th in the points, he has been no worse than fifth in the past four seasons.

In the past when performance was an issue radical solutions have been tried and not always succeeded. Take the time when DEI management swapped cars and crews with Junior's then teammate, Michael Waltrip. That could have been taken as insult to both drivers. The lack of results showed and, eventually, the teams were returned to their original drivers.

A driver has to have total confidence in his team and vice versa. Junior has earned the right to have a say in his future and is not being a prima donna when he feels he needs to have his opinions on how the team is run be respected.

It's the how-to-do that is the rub.

He really needs to have a top to bottom consensus. It's unlikely that Teresa wants to sell DEI, which has been a major part of her life since the elder Earnhardt tragically lost his life in 2001. That's why a spinoff of the actual racing team would make sense.

DEI moved forward in the marketing area when it hired Max Siegel, a leading executive in the entertainment industry, to be president of Global Operations. A great financial move, but what about announcements of hiring leading engineers and aerodynamicists?

No one is saying that that DEI is a slouch in car building or preparation, but, despite NASCAR's best efforts to control the costs of racing, teams like Hendrick Motorsports have been expanding and hiring talent from everywhere, including outside of usual NASCAR sources. A team has to move forward, drastically, or be left behind.

Although Earnhardt handily made the Chase in 2006 he missed it in '05. It wouldn't be a surprise if both parties blamed the other -- a little -- for that failure.

Junior carefully guards his words when talking to the press about his current situation because Teresa and he need each other. Just like he acknowledges that for now he has to be driving the DEI owned No. 8 Budweiser car.

If a company, let's call it DEI Motorsports, were to be spun off of DEI, then he could hire and fire racing personnel, direct where the racing budget would go, and, yes, probably have the peace of mind to totally focus on his driving.

Both Teresa and Junior have carved out separate empires under the roof of DEI, but they need each other -- and yet at the same time they appear to have conflicting agendas. It's necessary to end whatever friction exists, and it seems to this writer that the best way is two separate, but related, entities.

Until each can do their own thing, with a company of their own, they'll just be spinning their wheels.