A Horse With No Name

Or a Suburban! Chris

I can't blame you. If they ever come off of that 59 I'll PM you. Chris

...and I can't speak for him, but I think he is thinking of perhaps Autocrossing the Bimmer. Not sure of what class in the SCCA the CTS or Saab run in, but that may very well be in the back of his mind. Chris

My son has several friends that are 6'1 to 6'3, and my 18 year old daughter has a few friends that are 6'0 to 6'1 of the female variety. Looked a a beautiful white CTS, but couldn't fit tall teenagers in the back and keep them comfy, so it was a no go. It was a clean used 1st gen CTS, which was quite affordable. BTW, have you ever seen a CTS in the flesh in white? It really is a beautiful car in that color. Chris

At Bob McDorman Chevrolet here in Columbus, there is a big Corvette show the first weekend in September every year. He has a 59 El-Camino with a 348 Tri-power that is just pristine, as well as one of the largest collections of old Neon and old vintage gas station signs this side of the Mississippi. I had a chance to buy a 59 El-Camino once, it was black with a blue interior and a really nice warmed over 350. An older preacher had it up in Medina, Ohio. He had taken really good care of it and was getting ready to retire, IIRC. That was back when I had both the 55 Chevy and the 71 Chevelle and I had no more room in the garage. Believe me, I see the attraction. Chris

He's already got one Camaro in the fleet. My only real gripe with the CTS is the current gen and prev. gen car have not much more room in the back seat than the RX-8 when you get the CTS with a sunroof. Chris

But getting back to buying American, it doesn't matter if axoid buys a bmw 1 series. I would encourage everyone here (even gm4life!) to try a few "foreign" cars. At the same time, I am really impressed with how far the American cars have really come. My younger son wanted to go look at cars after a Boy Scout activity (yes, I am raising my kids to be gearheads). We went and looked at a Ford Fusion. From a fit and finish standpoint, I would say that it was honestly better than the Accord one of my wife's friends just bought. I'm really thinking we need to get Americans into American cars, and fast. Our automakers have really done their homework. Chris

Curious about that B-59. thought about you guys, I went to look at an Iroc camaro yesterday at a storage building. They had two 59 caddy ragtops, two 60 caddy ragtops, a 59 El-camino, and a 59 Chevy Sedan Delivery. Needless to say, you guys were the first people I thought of when I saw those cars. Keep us posted, balthazar. Chris

Exactly. Chris

I actually like the idea of the 1 series that we were talking about earlier. My wife and I like to go places, and it would be small enough to park anywhere, it is a great looking car, and it is more user friendly on a day to day basis that the Porsche or Acura you brought up. Chris

Sadly, I would pretty much agree. It is intersting talking to women of my mothers era. They fondly remember going on dates in cars back in the 50's and 60's, and they can tell you fondly about what "he" drove. But their current husbands Camry/Accord/Malibu/Sebring or whatever has about the same level of affection as the washing machine or the clothes dryer. If Detroit wants to win back market share, it would be cool if it could do so by winning back the hearts and minds of the fair sex. But that's just my opinion. After all, now she will be working as well to make those 60 low, monthly payments. Might as well get her something she is really happy with and proud of. Just my two cents. Although there are several modern cars that I do like. Chris

Actually an interesting intellectual counterfactual is "what would have happened had we not bailed out the big financial institutions?" I think that most buisiness would then have become small. People would operate largely on a local level. And wealth would flow, over a 10 or 20 year period, to a new class of small start up's. It would be the end of all of this wealth flowing to the elite, and the end of the growing wealth of the 1/2 of 1% at the top. Which, in my opinion, is why a lot of members of Congress and the president were in such a hurry to bail out the big banks. Chris

Don't worry, we won't for long. Chris

96 M3 is a wonderful car. I prefer the E-30 chasis M3 (prev. gen) but they are a little "high strung" for a lot of people. There is a car lot near one of our clients that specializes in older european cars, and they have older, clean M3's from time to time. I may own one yet. Chris

G37 isn't all that sporty, and is more of a Japanese thunderbird IMHO. (but I still like the thunderbird ford built in 64 better for a "luxury touring car") R32 is AWD, with an excellent AWD system but like a lot of Audi's it is biased towards FWD. Lancer Evo, we've got some guys in the Miata Club that own them as their "other than Miata" and I don't think that they are a well packaged car. The RX8 I've driven in anger on an autocross course, and it really does need more tourque. Great car, phenomenal chasis...but needs tourque. This is the car my son Joel wants once he gets out of high school, and he has wanted one for several years. CTS-V is an amzing car but it is about 25K more than a BMW 1 series, IIRC. Chris

...and let me give a brief, totally shameless plug. If your ever in Ohio, come to an OVR event and watch axoid drive. Seriously. He is soooo smooth with that Camaro... Chris

Bingo. In a better economy, a Solstice would be under a car cover in my garage right now. Chris

Yes it is. I also see the point of the BMW one series. We had a blue 2 door coupe (1 series) show up at our Miata club autocross. That is an amazing car. As is the Cobalt SS. I don't think that there is anything wrong with buying a BMW, my wife and I have owned something like 23 vehicles, and 20 of them have been "American." (Like I've been saying, I'm in lust over the Solstice and I want one badly.) Chris

We can't expect buisiness to be profitable without educated workers. Which is why I don't buy into the mantra that all we need to do is cut taxes. I'll gladly pay taxes so teachers can have a liveable salary. Chris

Yes it does. Chris

Actually I'll probably get banned for saying this but of the above, I'd take the Saab. Chris

It isn't the party that it was say in the 50's or the 60's...most people buy cars for comfort rather than say styling now. Which is indeed a shame. I would love for it to be like the 1950's again where people are actually excited by the styles of cars. Chris

Actually, I find a sustainable world with local production to be a much more jsut world and a much "better" world to live in. Chris

This is a huge part of the problem also. the wealthy elites control the news media, and tell us what they want us to hear and what we want to hear, and neither one is the truth. Chris

I would agree. Chris