CARBIZ

As usual, the media is blowing this all out of proportion. There are inherent costs of doing business in this country (providing everything in French is one of them!) and if this lawsuit is successful, you may see some manufacturers pull out of Canada. Don't laugh: Paramount pictures did it in Quebec about 15 years ago when their draconian language laws forced media companies to open Quebec branch offices. And three people does not make a trend. The posers who want high end vehicles are the first to whine when mommy takes away their milk. Average people don't have the cash. Zero financing on the Impala will save the 'average' person $3k and there is currently a $2k 'stackable credit' on the Impala. Many manufacturers are adjusting the prices quietly, just not on the MSRP. What would happen if the Canadian dollar backslid to .90 and then prices suddenly jumped? Large companies are naturally conservative. Nobody believes the Canadian dollar will stay at $1.03 for very long. Funny, nobody was complaining when the Tahoe was $5k cheaper in Canada, when adjusted for the dollar, five years ago.

Can you imagine anyone deliberately spending $40k for a Kia? Add the 14% combined sales taxes in Ontario and probably another $800 federal gas tax and this vehicle is a real winner!

Another example of the tail wagging the dog. The media has decided that the environment is oh so important now and even the positive pieces have to get their knocks in. GM sells more pick up trucks in a month than Toyota sells Priuses in a year. The market still does not want 'environmentally responsible' vehicles, the media does. Yes, GM has 'come around,' but then as this piece barely points out (with the glossing over of the impact of the hybrid buses), GM never left the game - GM was spending its money on areas where it would have greater impact, while (as usual) Toyota spent it on what was visible. GM has to answer to Wall Street. Toyota does not. If Toyota was selling a million pickups a year and GM was selling hybrids, the media would be singing a different tune.

Jerry, your wife called: the check just arrived from Toyota and she wonders if she should go ahead and deposit it.

HAVE YOU USED DIRECTION AND CONNECTIONS? HAVE YOU USED TURN BY TURN? FOR THAT MATTER, HAVE YOU EVEN USED A NAV SCREEN? Why would I need to know how to get from Santa Monica Blvd to Wilshire? Because that is how useful a Nav Screen is, provided you've paid for the updates. How about parking in an alley (because you are LOST) and getting directions onto the freeway? How about where the nearest Exxon, because you are damned near out of gas and all your other credit cards are maxxed? THERE'S A LOT OF NOISE ON THIS THREAD, BUT NOT MUCH ACTUAL FACTS FROM PEOPLE WHO HAVE USED THESE DEVICES.

OnStar blows Nav systems out of the water. End of story. Honda and others are scrambling to play catch up. I am quite comfortable with change: new HP laptop, Hitachi 42" plasma TV, 7.1 Yamaha surround system...3 iPod, portable XM.....GM is ahead of the curve on this one AND UNTIL YOU HAVE USED TURN BY TURN, I SUGGEST YOU BITE YOUR TONGUE.

And at some point, the Law of Diminishing Return kicks in. Eventually, the marketing people, the engineers and the bean counters have to cry 'enough.' Otherwise, a Malibu will cost $50k to build. To provide a single cab, which may be 5% on a volume of 1 million is 50k units, which is probably worth having, provided the tooling doesn't cost too much. And they don't want to alienate their hard core of contractors who want a cheap truck with 8' box, who have been loyal for 75 years. However, to provide for 5% of 300k (which is probably the most that the Malibu can hope to sell in any given year) is only 15,000 units - and the profit on the Malibu will be decidedly lower than the pick ups, I warrant.

I'll tell you what makes Malibu different: Pontiac and Buick. You want a mid-size Honda, you got ONE choice, the Accord. Or you can jump WAY up to the Acura. GM has to remember what the name Chevrolet brings to the table and get back to its roots. From where I sit, once the payment hits $450 a month, the Buick looks mighty fine. And my point about toys is valid. Young people love to jump on every high tech bandwagon out there. Once wisdom hits, people realize that it isn't necessary to 'upgrade' for the sake of upgrading. If NAV systems were a $299 upgrade (or something like that) and if the updates were automatically downloaded for FREE and if they covered the entire continent, then I would see some value to them. Otherwise, it is the same posers who gush over 20" wheels at $1,000 a pop who can be suckered into nav systems - and yes I will gladly take their money, but if I see any sense between their ears I will talk them out of it.

I thought Chuck was dead. I'm surprised he could stand that long without his walker.

It would have been better if the American auto industry hadn't looked down its nose at the Japanese market 60 years ago. Back when America was dictating terms to Japan, if Ford or GM had seen any potential to the Japanese market, things would have turned out quite differently. However, at that time everything Japanese was deemed 'junk.' American industry (like the military in 1938!) vastly underestimated the tenacity and will of the Japanese people. Unlike the West, which likes to apologize and contemplate every move, the East moves in unison. The U.S. was more concerned about acquiring 'rights' to building military bases on Japanese soil to monitor China than worrying about what Japan was really up to. Seen through the eyes of 1950 America, who could blame them?

But they don't..........Who will buy a Malibu? Do they want a stick? Do they want Nav? No. They want safety (six air bags), comfort, value and are probably the most risk adverse group out there. As long as Malibu can deliver on those items, it will be a winner. The posers can rush out and spend $600 a month on a Bimmer lease - that's what they're for.

And therein lays another secret about Japan Inc. - in fact, imports in general: they have successfully trained their customers over decades of programming to always bring their vehicles in to the dealer for servicing. Therefore, when minor hiccups occur, the dealer has a chance to correct them while the unawares customer is in having a oil change, tire rotation or whatever. They started that from the beginning. Detroit, on the other hand, was hobbled with the fact that 40 years ago, most people did their own regular maintenance, so as vehicles became more complicated in the '70s and '80s, people like my father never returned their vehicle to the dealer and 'minor' issues or service bulletins never got addressed. Domestic cars minor problems would become major issues while the imported cars were seen 3 or 4 times a year by the dealer and I am sure in many cases were nearly rebuilt without the owner's knowledge! Forensic accounting has only made matters worse. Any kind of warranty anamoly will immediately show up on the OEM's computer and they can trace problems back to part suppliers, then dispatch service bulletins so that 'possibly' effected vehicles can be nabbed when they come in for routine maintenance. Honda and Toyota have been masters at this. GM and Ford are only now cluing into how important a factor this has been for Japan Inc. It is not a 'dirty secret' or conspiracy on the part of Japan Inc., only the good luck of having no customers, a clean slate and being in on the ground floor of a technological upheaval that turned the dealer service industry on its ear.

But I wonder how many young people (who love every techno goody on the market and will pay virtually anything for them) would jump from their 10 year old Intrepid into a brand new Malibu anyway? They may even break down and buy the base Mazda 3, but you can't get the nav system in that, either. At least OnStar is standard in the Malibu BASE and you can upgrade for $100 to the turn by turn - DOESN'T THAT SOMEHOW MAKE GM THE HERO HERE? Isn't that what this silly argument has turned into? Just that, silly. The people with real money aren't buying the Malibu, they're buying BMWs and Caddys (where the nav system is available or standard) and the kids who think nav systems are 'all-that-and-a-bag-of-chips' can't afford either the nav system, nor the cars they should be available in. Since Chevrolet used to be 'every-man's' car, providing standard OnStar to EVERYONE and allowing for a cheap upgrade to Directions and Connections (which would satisfy the thrill seekers, who we all know get bored of every gadget in six months anyway) is a cheap and effective way to address the target market for the vehicle AND keep costs down.

True enough, but in since the bottom dropped out 2 years ago and Toyota took off the gloves (after years of pretending to be just another 'gosh, gee-whiz' polite car company), there has never been such a tide of negativity and alarm coming from the North American media about teflon Toyota, has there? Two years ago, Toyota could walk on water, but now even the illustrious CR is having second thoughts. Most shockingly, CR has even admitted to giving Toyota a free pass all these years. So, while the momentum may still seem to be with Toyota, remember that it still took the Titanic a mile or so before it came to a stop after hitting the iceberg.

Don't believe the hype, sir: most of the cross-border shoppers importing vehicles are wholesalers who are buying the cars on behalf of dealers, then selling them back here. The media is jumping on the bandwagon, like they do in every other ill-researched 'issue of the month' news item. Very few people have the cash, the know-how and the patience (having to fax the title to the border 72 hours ahead of time, for example.) The only people who care about big ticket items, like vehicles, are the people who can pay cash and since they are such a miniscule part of the market (even the truly rich prefer to lease!) I doubt anybody here is losing sleep over it. The auto manufacturers are concentrating on subvented rates and 'freebies' like free sunroofs on this side of the border, because that is where the market is. In truth, Canada is such a small market that most manufacturers treat us as little more than a branch office. Multinationals like Sony, Toyota, VW and others barely acknowledge our existance. The cost of doing business here is far greater than most other places they do business in (California buys more cars than all of Canada, for example) so do not expect price parity ever. If manufacturers were forced to do that (like the Quebec government tried with media companies in the '80s), they would just drop Canada as a market altogether.

...no, just not for $5 an hour, that's all. There'd be lots of takers to pick apples in Thornbury for double what they pay the Jamaicans that come up there every year to do it. LIke I said, the economic conservatives and cultural liberals make strange bedfellows when it comes to immigration issues. Wal-Mart wants immigration to put downward pressure on labor prices and 4th year university Arts grads want immigration to attone for all the 'sins' white folk commited on the Indians. That's being somewhat simplistic, but that pretty much sums it up.

History is always written by the victors, not the vanquished. Americans are vastly ignorant of Canadian history, even though the two are intertwined. In fact, Canada was born as a result of a growing fear that the U.S. would attack 'British North AMerica' after the American Civil War in retaliation for the British being on the 'wrong side.' It was figured at the time that if Canada became 'independent' the U.S. would look silly attacking it, so in 1867 Canada was born. Thank you, United States. The above article was a good read. Aren't Japan and China always squabbling over the Japanese revising their roles in WWII? We have so many modern examples of 'revisionist' history: the way Israel was created, the treatment of the North American Indians. Hell, I've seen articles where Columbus' arrival on these shores is a day of infamy! It goes all the way back to the Bible. Scholars who have read original Hebrew texts still cannot agree on what some sections really translated as.

And still a whopping...what? 5% of the market? Like, it's so hard to find it from home and to work and back. The trouble is, leave the city and they are useless. Don't get the updates, and they are useless. Go to a strange city (where you could really use help) and....they are USELESS. At least OnStar Turn by Turn follows you everywhere, even to places where you've never been and could use guidance. Just like the bouncing graphs that were oh so popular on Technics and other FINE stereo systems 15 years ago. Funny how that fad died, too. While we're on the subject, the Malibu doesn't have Xenon lights, heated rear seats or digital dash..........

We missed you.

Let's see if Nav screens are still around in 5 years. It's just another fad. The marketing boys/gals have figurd out how to squeeze $2k out of suckers who want to have the latest and greatest. The same snobs who have to be in a BMW are the ones clamoring for a Nav screen. Makes me wonder if they have any clue how to use it, though. Just lots of flashing lights on the dash. Pretty cool, huh?

Look, every 50 years, this subject has reared its ugly head. At the beginning of the last century, it was the damned Poles, Germans, Portuguese, whatever (I guess Irish in the U.S.!). I know the Italians were spoken badly of by my parents when I was a kid. (Toronto had at one point the largest concentration of Italians outside of Italy) There are some significant differences between then and now. 1) Social support nets. Healthcare, ESL classes, community centers - all funded by our taxes. These are being strained. The poor eastern Europeans who came here in the teens were dumped into Saskatchewan to sink or swim. No welfare, no healthcare, nothing. 2) Internet, $5 phone cards, internet banking. They have no need to commit to our way of life or language. They can speak with their family, swap photos, keep in touch with their communities back home with ease. Why do they need us at all? They can support their entire family with a few keystrokes and transfer thousands of dollars out of the country. 3) $1,000 and you can fly anywhere in the world inside of 24 hours. Compare that to a 3 week ship/train ride 100 years ago. 4) The 'average' Canadian/American 100 years ago was not very educated or well off either. Today, our embassies are lying to these people. Communication is everything and you cannot drive a truck without a highschool diploma. But I would have to agree that 'Europeans' of whatever nationality, have for the most part become a part of our society. They may have seemed a little odd at the time, but they have melded well. I am less optimistic about the past 25 years. The current round of immigrants are less concerned about becoming 'Canadian' or 'American' and more about changing us to their ways of thinking - and we are so paralyzed with our own PC way of thinking that they are winning, I am afraid. We keep being brainwashed into thinking that all immigration is good and that we must have it for the health of our economies, yet whenever questions are asked about the true costs of immigration, the usual suspects shout the opposition down with cries of 'racism.' Our local newspapers are filled with issues that 15 years ago were only things that happened in distant lands: tribal warfares, hate crimes - all things that have been brought to our doorsteps by peoples who, historically, just cannot get along. One recent example that stands out in my mind is the current Air India fiasco that has occupied our press here for 15 years. A group of Sikh extremists blew up an Air India plane and the Canadian government has spent tens and tens of millions of MY tax dollars investigating and passing the buck. These were all 'Canadians' involved, but I have to ask myself what is the true cost of multiculturalism when this is brought into my livingroom every day.

Wow, where do I start? First model year? What part? The door handles? The engine, the platform, the tranny, pretty much everything is borrowed or outright stolen from either the Aura or the current Malibu, so other than maybe the guages on the dash, everything else is parts bin. However, yes, until probably March, the new Malibu will be expensive, so the current Malibu will be a far better 'deal.' Undoubtedly, she is spoiled by the Maxx which does have a pretty decent ride and handling characteristics. The Cobalt would pale next to the Maxx, for sure. However, it is a travesty to say that it is not an improvement over the Cavalier. I drove pretty much every model of Cavalier from '99 onward, and the tweaks that have been made to the '07 Cobalt (suspension, steering) make it an improvement even over the '06 Cobalt. After the last major refresh on the Cavalier ('03), it actually became a decent car, although I have always maintained that GM's 'Achilles Heel' has been the seats. The Cobalt seats are noticeably better, but the cloth is ghastly (except on the coupes where the 'sport' cloth' is much better). I had a (then new) '01 Cavalier for about 3 months (I guess I must have pissed off the manager) and it had no trouble doing 140+ km/hr on trips to my sister's. The 2.2 pushrod was not a glamorous engine, but it was willing. When they dropped the ecotec into the Cavalier in '03, it finally made the Corolla look bad - but then that isn't saying much either! The Cavalier was quite noisy on the highway, however. The Cobalt is better, the Malibu 4 cylinder is a little noisier ('07 at least) and the Impala much much nicer. A lot of times people's first impressions spoil everything. I've had people refuse to even get in a car that they didn't like the color of, but then see the identical car on the lot in a different car and get all excited over it. Different strokes for different folks. When a lady tells me her '87 Caravelle rides better than anything she has driven since, I just shut up.

It's going to get worse, I'm afraid. Twenty percent is a big chunk of a small country's population. Canada's numbers are similar, and its beginning to show when entire neighborhoods have drastically changed in a matter of a decade or so. I think 'multi-culturalism' looks great on paper, but when a country (or in the case of Europe, countries) absorb a large chunk of 'different' people in a relatively short time, there are bound to be problems. I think it is particularly interesting that the 'economic right' promotes immigration for the purposes of cheap labor, whereas the 'social right' shuns immigration on the basis of irreconcilable cultural differences. The U.S is having its own upheavals. I was frankly shocked at the number of obviously Spanish peoples I saw in Nevada and California when I was there. With 40 million Hispanics in the U.S. and many of those having arrived in the past 15 years or so, that is rapidly approaching 20% of the population. As 'civilized' societies, we like to feel superior and tsk, tsk when we read articles about apparent racism, but under the guise of 'national security' and 'overwhelmed' schools and hospitals, citizens and, indeed, governments everywhere are beginning to question the wisdom of the past couple decades of open borders. We must remember that there are obvious reasons 'they' want to come here, and why 'here' has so painfully grown to be so desired a place to live. If we forget that, then 'here' will become just as bad as 'there' and nobody will want to come 'here' any more.

Anybody who doesn't think we are headed for a Police State, had better give themselves a shake. I used to live in Wasaga Beach (a quiet little resort town that swells to over 100k people in the summer) where they would hire 20 or so extra cops every April to augment the force over the summer crowds, but what would they do during the quiet weeknights leading up to the summer? Road blocks, Soviet-style. All traffic funneled into the Lion's Club parking lot, for a 'spot' check. Great fun for the locals coming home late from work, getting stopped night after night. Oh, and on my trip to California two weeks ago, I was stuck in a 45 minute traffic snarl (crawling at 15 mph, start and stop) on hwy 15 into California from Vegas, for (get ready for this) an 'agricultual inspection.' That's right: a 20 mile back up of traffic so they can arrest some fruit and vegetables. In America, the Land of the Free. It's a slippery slope, my friend. It isn't a matter of having 'nothing to hide:" it's a matter of the right to free movement and giving the police wide, discretionary powers in the name of 'safety' or 'security.' We live in countries where not too long ago, having too many male names in a personal phone book was enough for being refused entry into the country. I, for one, am not overly thrilled with giving the police too many powers. OnStar is a great concept, but what seems 'cool' today will be 'demanded' in the future.

PLEASE READ THE POSTS BEFORE ADDING YOUR 2 CENTS: ON THE '08 MALIBU, THE 'DIRECTIONS AND CONNECTIONS' UPGRADE IS $100 FOR THE YEAR. Since OnStar is already FREE for the first year, go ahead and SPLURGE - spend the $100. I guarantee you will be bored of your DVD screen long before that anyway. At least you won't have wasted $2k.