Mike@Ec, apparently a moderator for the European Car website, had a bit of a snit when someone accused him of hating cars.

Read more

There’s a post over at the Automotive.com blog that discuss an article about General Motors looking into entering the small car market globally.

Read more

It seems lately, the Cassandras in the mainstream media have been scouring 24/7 for the latest negative news to come out of Detroit. Whether it’s Chrysler’s (substitute Ford, GM, take your pick) massive quarterly losses, looming layoffs, more manufacturing jobs moving overseas, etc. Now that Ford has become re-engergized with a new CEO and an unconventional marketing approach (Bold Moves), the negative limelight has shifted to its Euro-American compatriot DaimlerChrysler, force-feeding its dealers over-produced inventory, and reconciling its quarterly losses.

Read more

Hitting the late-afternoon lull at work, I browsed around online and checked my personal E-mail, which returned me to the main portal page. On it, I saw the following headline: “Expanding waistlines add to pain at the pump“.

Read more

It seems we’re in the midst of crossover mania lately. But with a few exceptions, there seems to be a common thread, or rather a common thread that’s conspicuous by its absence.

Read more

Okay, I haven’t heard many comments on this, but I can’t help but stating the obvious. I guess sometimes I’m like a little kid like that. Has anyone noticed the nose of the new Suzuki XL-7 bears an uncanny resemblance to Marvin, the morose robot from “Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy?” Perhaps this is a new trend, styling vehicles after movie robots.

Read more

In the newest “Here and Now” version of Monopoly, Hasbro has replaced the old open-wheel race car with a Toyota hybrid Prius. Other game pieces included are a mug of Starbucks Coffee, a New Balance running shoe, a carton of McDonald’s fries, and a laptop.

Read more

Last week, Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez took the podium at the United Nations and proceeded to blast the Bush administration and the United States. He repeatedly called President George W. Bush “the devil” and that the council chambers “still smells of sulfur” all the while genuflecting and looking heavenward. As if this was not enough to convince everyone of his benevolent intentions, he then staged a PR coup at a Harlem church to hand out discounted heating oil contracts to disadvantaged families in America through Citgo, the wholly-owned Venezuelan government oil company.

Read more

If any of you have followed my posts on this site, you know I’m no great fan of the heavy-handed tactics employed by activist governments. I am, for example, philosophically opposed to the smoking ban in cars (as opposed to being pro-tobacco, a fact that seems to be lost on most of you). I’m sure I’m going to get a similar response for my stand on this latest act of lunacy by California State Attorney General Bill Lockyer.

Read more

In the course of casually browsing around online, and looking up “biodiesel” on Wikipedia, I came across a rather stunning figure. While traditional agricultural crops such as corn and soybeans are being aggressively promoted as feedstocks for biofuels such as ethanol and biodiesel, this research report suggests that algae may be a far more effective and efficient feedstock. Corn, it turns out, is the dismal loser in the productivity scale. It will yield a paltry 18 gallons of oil per acre per year. Soybeans are slightly better at 48 gallons. But the potential yield for micro algae is 5,000 to 15,000 gallons.

Read more