Cars! Cars! Cars!

Ripoff Protection

Thanks to our rapidly aging baby boomers, we're seeing a resurgence not only in modern-day muscle cars; we're also seeing dem old cars being sucked up like (Mr. Peterson, enter something in here before publication.... And please put your dishes in the dishwasher. WTF!). Our buddy Phil came across a site to help make sure you're buying an original muscle car dealie: Now: A Money-Saving Tool for Muscle Car Buyers.

Ouch!

Wear Your Seatbelt! Autoblog reports: VIDEO: European drivers vs. concrete pillar. Check out this video, and pay very careful attention to the driver of the last vehicle shown. And his windshield. Ouch!

Dear Ford: We Don't Care

AutoWeek reports: Will it Work? (Way Forward, version 3, is on the way). Ford can't possibly think we care about its turnaround plans or its little TV show dealie anymore, right?

If two versions of your turnaround plans haven't done anything, why would the third? You guys got something special up your sleeves?

Here's a plan: Rework the Fusion. The Fusion is fine; make it fantastic. The Edge is "eh"; make it exemplary. The Five Hundred is... oh, we did F's already (and technically, we barely did E).

No one wants to read about your ways forward. We want to buy a Ford and have it mean something.

That's a snap of the 2007 Ford Fusion. It's a fun car, but we're worried Ford will let it wither and die. So buy one now while it's decent.

This Is Bullshit

The NY Times (registration required) reports: U.S. Drops Bid Over Royalties From Chevron. Gas prices go out of control for two years in a row, Exxon Mobil makes profits like nobody's business, and now we read the oil companies aren't paying their full fare? This is some fucked-up doin's:

In return for the right to drill on federal lands and in federal waters, energy companies are required to pay the government a share of their proceeds. Last year, businesses producing natural gas paid $5.15 billion in government royalties.

But the Bush administration has come under fire on Capitol Hill for its record on collecting payments. While the Interior Department has sweetened incentives for exploration and pushed to open wilderness areas for drilling, it has also cut back on full-scale audits of companies intended to make sure they are paying their full share.

Administration officials knew that dozens of companies had incorrectly claimed exemptions from royalties since 2003, but they waited until December 2005 to send letters demanding about $500 million in repayments.

In February, the Interior Department acknowledged that oil companies could escape more than $7 billion in payments because of mistakes in leases signed in the 1990s. Top officials are trying to renegotiate those deals, but some Republicans and Democrats have complained that the administration is dragging its feet.

This is totally unfair. When will people realize that we're all being taken to the cleaners?

Competitive Disadvantage

The Car Connection reports: Bush to Meet with Domestics. Blah, blah, blah.

Automakers and their partisans have made the argument that neither the Detroit automakers' Japanese nor German competitors are saddled with the healthcare burden, which now exceeds $1500 per vehicle. Healthcare costs have now become the single largest competitive disadvantage the American car industry faces, they add.

Gee, we thought the single largest competitive disadvantage the American car industry faced was building cars no one wanted to buy.

Ford: No Cars For You!

Ford will slash production in '07. Automotive News is one of them pay-for sites, so...

First-half output may fall 12%; new products will help later Ford Motor Co. expects to slash North American production by as much as 12 percent for the first six months of 2007, then rebound after midyear. The forecast suggests the company expects its automotive business to bottom out next summer. Although production is expected to rise later that year, Ford's vehicle output in 2007 could be as much as 5 percent lower than this year's total.

Man, fewer Fords for sale. Gotta be grim in the hallways of Ford right now.

Black Boxes In Cars

The Detroit News reports: Black boxes spark uproar. We're not 100% against this whole black box movement, but we want to make sure everything is on the up and up.

Car buyers should know they're in there, what they record, and under what circumstances the data will retrieved (aka used against them in a court of law).

What do you think of these black boxes? You cool with one being in your car?

Toyota: More North American Manufacturing Plants For You!

Man, the irony. Ford closes a plant and ceases production of the Taurus, meanwhile CNN/Money reports: Toyota to build 2 plants in North America. That's gotta be pretty hurty. Toyota should take Ford's feelings into account as it (Toyota) rises to dominance. Rather than being so successful and prospering under the "competition system" it (Toyota) should limit production capacity to only a certain amount, say none, so that American companies can prosper with shitty vehicles.

One of the manufacturing plants Toyota is planning on building will build the Yaris. That says a lot about Toyota's plans for future Yariseseses. Meanwhile, Ford has no car in that market segment. So, ex-Ford employees, if you got a hankerin' for car buildin', send your resumes to Toyota. And start packin'.

It's not irony? Maybe it's contrast then. Stupid Alanis Morissette. We'll give you a jagged little pill! Oh, that's a snap of the 2007 Toyota Yaris in case you haven't seen one.

Queue

Autoblog reports: Line to buy Ford's Aston Martin grows. Look for more of this from Ford. There is no way they are going to keep Jaguar and Land Rover. After the sale of Aston Martin goes through (we bet before end of 2007), we expect to see more people taking a closer look at Jaguar/Land Rover combo.

Any Brits out there want to take back what's rightfully England's?

Pretty Karmann

No, not that Carmen, this Karmann: The Forgotten Karmann Ghia. You know, that is a sweet-looking ride.

We drove a 1979 Fiat X1/9 many, many, sigh, many years ago and we always liked the shape of it. We didn't like our ability to roll backwards into cars, stall at lights, buck and shake in front of Sue Sherba as we pulled out of a level parking spot. Crap, what the hell is wrong with us? Can't we just pull out of the spot without having Sue point and laugh? Then lean over to her girlfriends and laugh some more while drawing really insulting caricatures? And, really, was the wedgie necessary?... Why did we like this car again? It was a mid-engine, targa-topped box of coolness. It was the only car we've owned that was cooler than we were (which really goes to show what beaters we've driven since we're about as far from cool as Alison is close to sweetdamnhotness).

So, which car is too cool to be forgotten?

That's a snap of a '78 Fiat X1/9. Ours was white and therefore cooler.