Well to respond to the Original post of Lord Sidious, I think Vince won't succeed being someone like Dixie, not that Dixie is not doing her job well,because it works for her and the Company she is running, but I don't thing it will work for Vince and let explain why.
The enviroments are completely different from one another, I mean I know both are Pro-wrestling companies but from within they are different.
Dixie's character works (and was in part performed by Vince during late 1996 to late 1997, will get into tat in a minute) because the reality is that as successful as TNA has become, it is still a struggling company that is Number two in the business and will be for a long time. TNA does not need an Authority figure that puts down talent by any means now because they haven't succeed in their battle to become a completely stable company, Like they put it on Dixie's interview, they have won and they need to continuing winning one fan at the time, They need to keep fightig and until they succeed to be stable and reach their goal, The novelty as you have exposed it (maybe I got it wrong, so please tell me if I did) goes with Dixie doing what it's best for her company to survive since they are not completely out of danger.
Vince played this kind of role for a while, most notoriously at the time Bret came back from retirement. Mostly keeping himself as an announcer but still also playing the guy who sometimes had to make the top decisions, no mather how hard the decision was.
Example of this was the storyline between Stone Cold Steve Austin and the late Owen Hart: Austin got injured for real, but the story played like Slaughter suspended him to heal from that injury, he reacted by put a Stunner on him and every authority figure, then Vince in acceptance of his charge and role, tried to talk to Austin, making the point that they were trying to do what was best for Austin not to end in a wheel chair or worse, not playing a determined character but the one of a Owner looking up for his employees and for his fans, then Austin attacked him. Even with that, Vince kept his c and gave Austin what he wanted since there was no way to reason with him, he told him that if he wanted to risk his life he would allowed him to do so.
Something similar happened with Vince and Bret when he was about to become a heel. Bret felt frustrated about how nothing was going his way and started blaming Vince, but during most of that time, Vince kept his composture and did hwat was best for the company (storyline wise), even when after the 1997 Royal Rumble Bret quit, he then went to the back and fixed thing for Bret to stay.
Actually the real deployment of "Mr. McMahon" as was known started way after 1997 Survivor Series, right before Wrestlemania 14., Vince had his hands tied, (Storyline wise again) His last two champions were the people who caused him more headches than anyone and on top of it all, the guy who had attacked him with no remorse and disrespected him was about to get a shot at the highest price, and he couldn't do anything to stop it. In an interview by J. R. Vince tried to avoid the topic but it came up "Do you want Austin as WWF Champion?" And Vince had to answer and he did taking a deep breath "Hell No".
Then after Austin won, WWE had started to win the Ratings war (Not really, but stopped the streak of weeks that WCW was carrying) he WWF was getting out of the water and this little power struggle was getting interesting that is when the Evil guy came up, but that was until the Company actually made it once again, they were Number one again, not really struggling that much and Hell, the background of the character was completely solid.
The best heels are the ones that some how are justified to become bad guys, in this case, Vince had enough of Wrestlers running him like a piece of crap, According to him, he made the company and the wrestlers were only tools and that he had done everything to make the company succesful, after all It was his Company and only one ruler was about to run it...Vince McMahon.
From there, is very difficult to go back to be the CEO that only look for the good of the company and the fans, Vince has made it and his company is not struggling to survive at all, I mean maybe the business is down in USA but Vince has use it to capitalize on Foreing Markets and is succeding, maybe TNA is getting better in England but unless you have cable on other markets, WWE is on Free TV and on Cable, and tickets outside the States for house shows are very expensive, but they usually sell out.
The last paragrafh was actually to point out that actually Mr. McMahon is probably the best character to turn into a regular CEO, after seeing his Dark side is very, very difficult to see him comming back to the character that is just neutral.
Personally I thing it does not longer suits him and that is what the GM are there for. Raw has the Guest Host thing, so most of the time The good guys are in the lead, Smackdown has 2 GMs, well kind of, Vicke, the evil one and Teddy Log, everyones puppet, good or bad.
I think the nearest character to Dixie's is Tiffany's as GM, The comparison seems odd but just hear me out.
Tifanny, eventhough is Face GM, has taken small decisions tha does not fit her, like allowing Regal to have some control over the brand, making the Homecoming tournament, giving Paul Burchill a second chance eventhough she knew who he was behind the Mask, She knows the brand is not really near Raw or Smackdown so she does the best she can to keep it above water.
McMahon, well, cannot just simply go and be the silent boss he once was, The same company and storyline has put him above it and eventhough that could change, that won't make it believable.
Same will happen to Dixie at some point if they put her into the storylines, she can't be always the silent one and has started to show that, Her character is the beginning stage of the character Vince had at the end of 1997, hopefully TNA turned into something positive and not a copy of what that character became.
