regfootball

oh fly, you silly bird. even though you might THINK Lexus hasn't been around, you're wrong. Don't you know they have been around since the late 1800's...........they made the first model T....the first automatic transmission, the first SUV......... I'm sure our children will be hearing that.

taurus/sable...LMAO........... malibu

i bet camry is probably near 20% fleet these days. Sonata I bet is over 30%.

figures, 125hp corvettes anyone? well, they can ship the cars from the factory for 150hp and 10 percent better mileage. then let me 'chip' the car to get the real intended hp back. for example. sell my G8 as a holden in AU with 362hp but sell it here with 'only 200hp' and a different chip. When i get my car i can swap the chip with one from AU and viola, screw you you legislators. mpg is more a factor of vehicle weight and aerodynamics than it is of horsepower. if automakers go to far in making cars lighter across the board, then safety suffers. Then I believe the safety mongers and general public will outcry and pit safety vs. mpg. And safety should and always will win out. Now, I am not saying we should drive 6500 pound expeditions that get 10mpg. But I am saying is that we should not give up 3500-4000 pound cars that get 20mpg to try to achieve crackerboxes that weigh 2900 pounds top only get 24mpg. legislators really need to stay out of this. gas taxes and insurance fees should be enough incentive to keep horsepower reasonable and mpg in check. why not divert some govt dollars to tech research to alternative materials to help make carbon fiber cars with wheelmotors or ceramic engines if they are serious about this and keeping mpg high (by keeping weights down).

the Mazda6 is a good buy, and its styling attracts youthful buyers. Mazda must be selling nearly all of them with the Pontiac package these days (cladding and spoilers). They are kind of now what Grand Prixs were 10-15 years ago. They give great deals on them. I think Mazda could still stand to put a much better v6 in them. Still, its amazing considering how dated the M6 design is considering other markets got the car like nearly 2 years before we did. I think having a hatch available helps a lot. I am glad to see the civic losing sales and the mazda3 picking up sales. This renews my faith in people making the proper decisions. Its good to know the video game craze and fast furious culture is finally muted enough so the civic does not benefit in that way anymore. I guess there must not be enough pizza delivery jobs anymore to fit in to a busy gaming schedule these days. I hope they are stealing sales from corolla too. Mazda must have sweetened the pricing on the M3. In any case, this is a deserving car. Good job. The CX-7 and CX-9 sales are early adopters trying to be 'cool'. I do not see either being huge sellers over time. maybe decent and steady, but they are too weird looking and the CX-9 is too expensive to be big market successes. They have been offering great leases on the CX-7 to convince people to take one in spite of its androgynous sexually confused styling and lack of v6.

most Americans who drive small cars would prefer not to. They generally drive a small car because it was cheap to buy or because they would go broke buying fuel. A third concern is lack of parking space or need of manueverability in tight spots (i.e. condo parking garage or inner city parking spot or garage with tight access). Generally, tho, If you asked small car owners if they could move up the size of car they could drive without it costing more, I bet at least 85% of them would. in fact, most people forget that in the US, insurance can often be more spendy with small car rather than a large car. Case in point, full coverage on my 500 for me is about 50 bucks a month. Domestic small cars like Focus etc, for me were about 10 bucks a month more. Japanese small cars were generally 15-20 bucks a month more. Hondas for me were way to expensive to insure. VW's were that much more still. If some small cars required premium fuel, on top of more expensive insurance, they would actually cost more than my larger car. and many small cars don't exceed 25mpg in city driving anyways, so what is the point to their small size? My large car gets 20-22 city on a regular basis. 23-27 highway. not much price to pay yet for a larger, more useful, safer car. Another case in point. The price difference and mpg difference between the 4 cylinder Malibu and the Cobalt like equipped are very small. Most folks would prefer the Malibu simply because its a larger and more substantial car. That Malibu is not going to cost you much more. The folks that actually do prefer small cars usually do because of handling benefits and more nimble feel. A lot of times women or small guys prefer small cars because they are more their scale. i.e. You'll never see a tiny 90 pound Asian woman driving a Monte or a Crown Vic. If you do, get a pic of it and I will send you 5 bucks. In our country, the main reason folks drive small cars is not by choice, but by economics. THAT SAID, if the groove makes market and is packaged right to provide huge interior space in a small box, it could tap into the desire for a car that gives you space and better mpg. I would like to think the PT Cruiser could have tapped that need, but the PT gets crappy real world mpg and actually was fairly expensive for what you get. The Vibe could have tapped that need if it were cheaper and had a real engine under the hood.

we should have both, great mpg and awesome hp. the thing is, the legislators are already probably trying to figure out ways how to legislate out our horsepower.

yeah, but my God if you point that out, you may get struck down. Its bad enough that the automakers have to cater to california's legislative abuse in regards to emissions and such. you'd swear the rest of the nation does not count.

go to GMI someone there did a killer Buick chop on a stateman photo, with a more Enclavish front end and some curvys on the fenders. really a fking sweet looking photo. really sweet. I seriously wonder if the UAW is the big stumbling block to us getting cars like the statesman here pronto. If so, they need to be put to pasture if they are the ones keeping GM from being fully able to freely bring this car in when it is needed so badly.

the pushrod 3.4 in the aztek is fairly well muted most of the time with noise abatement and such which is amazing because in other cars I have driven with the exact same motor (Alero) the thing was a buzzbomb rattler like no other that made you feel like it was going to vibrate the car apart and make you go deaf from the horrible noise. If a stranger drove the Alero and the Aztek back to back there is no way you would ever guess they have the same boat anchor under the hood. The only time its disagreeable in the Aztek is under hard throttle and you get the signature GM pushrod sound (the strained vacuum cleaner noise). Everyone comments about how farily quiet the Aztek is. The 3800 like in my FIL's car and many others I have driven is a bit smoother than the 3.4 in most cases (but still possesses the same strained vacuum cleaner noise). Basically, what it boils down to is that GM invests more in deadening the noise and vibration in some cars, than others for their pushrod buzzbombs. the duratec 3.0 in my 500 has much less noise and vibration abatement. Its probably average to below average in inherent design as well, since the design is so old. The new 35 duratec should be much better and since the 500/taurus whole front end and subframe and powertrain is redesigned (as well as much more sound deadening) I expect to see major improvement in that area. Oddly, my 60 degree v8 SHO which was a derivative of the v6 duratec family had no vibration and was eerily smooth through the rev range. in fact, if you were out driving on a road trip, once the car settled into crusing speeds for an hour or so at 75-80+ mph you simply often could not hear the engine. And you didn't feel it. My 89 v6 SHO was extremely smooth as well and was pretty much dead quiet at crusing speeds all the time. It had brawn and barked like a dog when you wanted it to, but otherwise was like liquid glass. You wouldn't feel or hear it at all. My 95 tbird was actually a bit racous...smooth but it didn't rev as smoothly as my other cars. The modular 4.6 v8 was good but not a jewel. All the Nissan v6's I've driven have been smooth as silk and noise and vibration free. I haven't liked the Accords and Odyseeys I have ridden in or drove because I don't think they shielded enough of the harsh mechanical noise. The one Sienna v6 I drove was ok smooth but not what I would expect of the toyota hype. I really do think most of it has to do with how much they can do with subframe design and noise abatement to make up for what might otherwise be a groaner of an engine. My own rule of thumb is if a car seems loud, check for feel of vibrations in the pedals. If the pedals are buzzy, then likely they just simply haven't drowned out the engine properly. The engine itself could use more NVH engineering, sure, but the cost cutting on damping out whatever NVH exists to begin with is equally criminal.

clarkson is a bit like howard stern reviewing cars but where it falls apart is his affinity for all things brit. that kind of blows his objectivism. but this maylaysian crap should be pointed out as crap if it is crap. if the third worlders want to play with the big boys they should take the heat and STFU

duallies or no, the oinker (turdra) still has timing belts, a non boxed frame, piano black interior trim in a pickup, and a four star crash test rating. oh yeah, and big incentives.

meh. one can be spiritual and religious, but you sure as hell don't have to do everything your religion says you should do. it's ok to disagree with certain things. its all about whether you agree or disagree with the big picture and sometimes you need to ignore the minutia that goes with it. Too many folks use examples like this minutia as a crutch to automatically disagree with the big picture.

subaru is notorious in my mind with tiny cabins in proportion to the car's size. visually and spacially. they always have short doors, tiny windows......firewalls and windshields pushed too far back. I'm glad this won't be a Saab 9-2.

argh......what can I depend on in this world? there are no more constants......arggggggg

the statesman is a hellova a lot more nicer looking car than the hyundai bmw-finiti thing piece of crap ok, gripe.....window switches need to go on the door where God intended them to be, and cupholders need to move up and in better reach and hopefully not conflicting with the shifter. the arm rest then should be lengthened accordingly.

it already is. go to buick china website and you will see it is the new chinese park avenue. and the us dealers don't want it? that interior is perfect. i could lick it, its so luscious. that is my car. i would pimp my wife out for this car......(if it had AWD). Lutz and Wagner ought to be called on the carpet for this. This car can be had in China, AU, Saudi Arabia, Korea apparently, but not here. A big goddam shame. PITIFUL, actually. There is NO EXCUSE for this car to not be here. NONE.

wow, burger king must be expanding.

we all know its about width, or so i am told

that's why i said it looks all S80. its like Ford has no original ideas, they have make a volvo lite look that does not succeed and loses a lot in translation.

where's the mileage numbers on the diesel

WILL YOU MARRY ME? A MAN WITH COMMON SENSE AND WISDOM! are you secretly from the midwest? those are midwest family values, man.

hippie/extreme liberal urbanites make corollas family cars. i still laugh on every thanksgiving when i see packed corollas on the beltway. its so obvious these people only use their cars on those 2 days a year when daddy says they won't hurt the environment by consuming gas because they need to see evil grandma in the nursing home. mom dad and 2 kids jammed in the corolla and the driver does not know how to merge with traffic or keep up speed on the roads. good times, good times. its obviously too cold for all 5 or 4 to ride their bikes to grammas on such a brisk day. so much for bikes saving the ecosystem. the city buses must have scared them too...... GM will never be able to take back share until they make some sort of marketing perception breakthrough. CR prints more copies each month than GM can advertise on TV. Its a losing battle. GM needs a 'big idea' on how to cut through customer's perceptions. A good start would be pointing out how -Toyota doubling capacity of tundras to suck more fuel, while increasing GM's own mpg across the board on trucks -massive toyota recalls -tundra terrible front crash ratings and lack of boxed frame. timing belts in the engine (wise for a truck!). -the whiplash monster has arrived even though its a new design (avalon) -small junky cars (yaris, check the press reviews) -massive incentives and fleet sales toyo is the new fleet king -why no 100k warranties toyota? -toyota is not a US company -toyota is part of japan which prefers to manipulate currency and other tactics in unfair economic warfare -toyota would love to cut wages and benefits so its workers make as much as burger king and probably will -toyota ASSEMBLES cars here but still sources majority from outside US and doesn't employ near the people as US companies do Strangely enough, 'big city dwellers' need to think they are atop the curve and better in their decision making will get the best of them. In most segments where Toyota has a big seller, there is a better or equally capable entry that deserves to sell more. With all the fine cars out there, Toyota really doesn't deserve to sell like they do, because they are so one dimensional. But stubborn and correct people like city dwellers never have the capacity to adjust their thinking on the fly. I would be curious to know of how people say Japanese cars hold up better than US cars have actually owned a Japanese car beyond 50k miles. to watch it rust sooner. to watch the tranny go bad and cost $$$$$$$$. to pay 600 bucks for an alternator. to see the timing belt go. I've put 235,000 miles on 4 domestic GM or Ford cars that i got new or just barely used. I've never had to fix anything. Worst thing that happened was to replace a battery. My Aztek is at 63,000 and I still have original tires and brakes. No trannies, no engines, no major components. Tbird was 75k and no tires or brakes or anything. No toyota sludge, no TL tranny blowups. Help me, I just don't understand why that is so bad.

maybe Caddy will do a Zeta crossover to add to or replace the SRX, with better styling. Maybe Saab could get a version of that also.

i like the groove and the beat.