Motorola Inc. (NYSE: MOT) seems to be in the midst of a crisis, even as it prepares to split itself into two companies to give shareholders more visibility into just how bad one part of its business can be while the other piece can be, well, not so bad. Of course, I'm talking about the wireless giant's cellphone division, which is still in the top three worldwide in terms of sales. It's sinking faster than a rock, though. How did this come to pass?

After reading a missive by a former Motorola employee, Numair Faraz, who worked closely with the late Geoffrey Frost -- Motorola's former Chief Marketing Officer and father of the RAZR handset -- one has to wonder about a few things. For example, just what kind of incompetence has brewed in the corner office for the last three years? From reading Faraz's words, both former CEO Ed Zander is pitched as a complete idiot and slave driver who literally worked Frost to death and current CEO Greg Brown is pitched as a technological moron who can't even use email (his secretary prints off messages to read to him later). Are these truths? They sure could be.

Zander, who was highly regarded when he came back in 2004 to take over for CEO (and grandson of company founder) Chris Galvin, seemed to have everything going for him. Looking back, nothing ever went right for Zander. The RAZR that gave Motorola its two-year recognition was in the works before he arrived. What did Zander -- a former president of Sun Microsystems (NASDAQ: JAVA) -- do during his tenure with Motorola?

Swipe big chunks of compensation while churning out middling performance, according to many on Wall Street and Faraz as well. Maybe Galvin was not such a bad CEO after all, right? When Faraz said in 2003 that "Motorola's biggest problem is that Samsung kicks ass," he wasn't kidding -- and that's precisely what happened. Seems to be another example of very sub-par performance being rewarded with a golden parachute, while shareholders get shafted once again. Motorola stood at under $10 a share early today.