Automotive News [sub] reports that JJ’s busy lobbying on behalf of The Big 2.8, helping them secure $25b to $50b in low-interest federal loans. “‘Just how many cities will sink, how many small towns will sink, how many homeowners will be facing foreclosures, and how many kids will have to come out of school?” Jackson said during a conference call with reporters Tuesday, Sept. 16. ‘There is a lot riding on this.'” Not the least of which is Jackson’s ongoing activism re: African-American owned automotive suppliers, dealers and ad agencies. To wit: “Jackson also said the loans should follow federal contract compliance and Equal Employment Opportunity Commission guidelines for the inclusion of minority auto dealers and suppliers.” Huh? Why wouldn’t they? Hang on; I thought the loans are for building fuel efficient vehicles, not a bailout to make sure kids stay in school (go figure). Anyway, Jesse and Motown’s automakers have plenty of history, much of it financially rewarding for Jackson’s organizations. In fact, in October 2007, Rainbow PUSH named GM its Corporation of the Year. According to GM’s Diversity Letter, “Jackson said that Wagoner was a great friend to Rainbow PUSH and that he was ‘a man of sensitivity, vision and integrity.'” Birds of a feather flock together. Makes sense to me.

Ford Chairman Bill Ford is trying desperately to put some daylight between his industry’s bailout request and the ongoing mop-up of what’s left of the U.S. financial system. “People see this as a very separable issue,” Ford told Automotive News [sub] after an epic DC beg-a-thon. As gung-ho as Michigan reps are to see their home state rake in the federal scrilla, there’s indication that even there the “separability” of bailouts may be strained. Rep Candice Miller R-MI, who organized the meeting with Ford and others, said afterwords that some lawmakers still have questions about the loan request– aggravated by the upheaval among major financial institutions over the past days and weeks. These concerns center on analyst predictions that the fed’s decision to allow Lehman Brothers to fail was a line drawn in the sand. Though she calls the new $7.5b cost estimate for the first $25b “too high,” Miller can muster only “cautious optimism” about the future of the bailout push. And while Bill Ford and Mark Fields sing for their supper in DC, bean counters in Dearborn are trying to figure out Ford’s exposure to the bankrupt Lehman Brothers mess. Reuters reports that Lehman Commercial Paper had committed $890m to an $11.5b revolving credit facility under a secured credit agreement reached in December 2006, all of which is presently unfunded. Lehman Brothers Bank FSB also provides $238m of facilities totaling $16.3b that support the retail securitization program of Ford Motor Credit Company. These subsidiaries are not listed in their parent company’s bankruptcy filing. But since Ford mortgaged itself to the hilt in 2006, the unraveling credit-market could still hit Ford where it hurts.

Up to now, it’s been a two-way PHEV cat fight. Within the last 24 hours, Toyota said GM’s lithium-ion approach sucks eggs and took on GM’s Volt-only $7500 federal tax rebate. GM Car Czar Bob Lutz retaliated with “Eat My Dust” comments on his FastLane Blog. And now it’s a three way, with Honda telling the world that it just isn’t feeling the whole EV thing. “For battery-powered vehicles to become more widespread, more popular in the market, we feel battery technology needs to advance further,” Masaaki Kato, president of Honda Motor Co.’s research unit, told Bloomberg in an interview [quoted in The Financial Post]. BANG! “We just don’t see it providing the type of driving performance you get with a gasoline-powered vehicle.” BIFF! “The key is in the end we need to conserve the world’s energy resources and protect the environment for future generations,” said Jerry Chenkin, executive vice-president of Honda Canada Inc. OOOPH! “Honda is concerned that these other plug-in hybrid technologies are not really conserving anything.” ZAP! “Lithium-ion powered cars would not satisfy most consumers, since such batteries are costly and still hold less than half the energy of gasoline by weight, Mr. Kato said in the interview.” ZOWIE!

From time to time, even those of us on the inside of TTAC forget that one of our primary missions to help you make smart, informed purchases. Some of you might remember my friend who was torn between a slightly used Honda Accord and a slightly more used Infiniti G35 (she would up with a brand new Mazda 3 thanks largely to our 10 Best list). However, she ain’t a TTAC reader. You are. But, in addition to TTAC, you probably read other stuff. Like maybe a newspaper. And that newspaper might have informed you that thanks to Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch and AIG getting so smacked by the sub-prime mess that your 401K is now puny and sad. I know that’s what happened to me. However, I also know that lots of good folks are desperate to get out of their big ole SUVs and into cars that suck a little less gasoline. I know it ain’t news (or is it?) but times are tough. Personally, I was pretty desperate to get my girl out of her rapidly dying 2001 Ford Focus and into a brand new Mazda Miata. But then I fixed her cooling system and we’ve decided to wait until the Focus kills itself. I give it 18-months. But what about you? Bought anything new lately? And if you have, has TTAC (or someone else) helped you make that decision?

Tesla Motors says it’s secured 90 acres between San Jose and Santa Clara, CA to build its world headquarters. Oh, and production facilities for its (supposedly) upcoming Model S (nee White Star) sedan. The announcement is creating all kinds of excitement among the kind of people who use terms like “green collar jobs” and “cleantech.” “It’s not just another solar company,” says San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed. “It’s an electric car, which has tremendous upside for us, and a whole new area of job potential.” And of course that excitement translates into taxpayer handout. The San Jose Mercury reports that the City of San Jose will sign a 40-year lease with Tesla for the land, providing the first 10 years rent-free. “In years 11 to 20, Tesla will pay $1.5 million a year for the property, and then see rent increases of 2 percent a year in years 21 to 40. Tesla will pay the usual development fees… but the city will look for a way to rebate them over time once tax revenues start flowing in from the company.” Governator Schwarzenegger has already offered to waive sales taxes on the first $100m of equipment purchased for the factory (angering not a few non-automotive manufacturers). And the plant is being built using a $150m federal Department of Energy loan guarantee. Hey, what happened to the whole Tesla in New Mexico deal? Nothing.

“You’ll see some V-8s in trucks and high performance cars in the future, but they’ll be priced to discourage people from buying them,” GM Car Czar Bob Lutz told reporters in a recent interview. “In 5 to 10 years, the 4-cylinder will be the predominant engine.” This maximum prognostication is hardly a shocker when applied to GM’s mass-market offerings. But what about Cadillac? Motor Trend reports that The Standard of the World is working on a new model to replace the laughable, deeply unloved, front wheel-drive, Euro-spec, Saab 9-3-based Cadillac BLS. GM’s next attempt to take on the 3-Series couldn’t possibly do any worse will be based on GM’s new rear wheel-drive “Alpha” platform. According to Automotive News [sub], the new Caddy will be offered with, gasp, a turbocharged four-cylinder engine. Or not. “There is a big debate as to whether it is four only. I think that is a bridge too far,” says Cadillac General Manager Jim Taylor. “There is a piece of the team who is thinking, ‘Well, with this whole fuel economy and gas thing, we ought to go all the way, say, to fours.’ We are resisting that at this stage.” As the BLS and BLS wagon prove beyond a shadow of a doubt, at GM, resistance is futile.

There’s more news re: Chrysler’s mysterious-yet-overhyped 2010 model line, this time from former Treasury Secretary and current Cerberus bigwig John Snow. Despite earlier conflicting reports from John Campi and Jim Press on the number of 2010 model releases, Snow says there will be seven new Chryslers come the mythical year. The International Herald Tribune credulously summarizes Snow’s assertions with the methinks-the-lady-doth-protest-too-much headline: “Cerberus: New Chrysler Products Will Have Appeal.” What form this appeal will assume is left to our imagination. Anyway… “I know there’s a deep commitment here to putting out better products,” says Snow. “In the end, this comes down to producing cars that people want at attractive prices, and having your dealers in concert with the manufacturer. I think we’re going to get that right. I really do.” Really, you do? Because right now the only thing indicating that Chrysler’s woeful quality will improve is the fact that at least one model in the upcoming “product revolution” (product revulsion?) will be a rebadged Nissan Versa. Otherwise, we’re just getting more of the “quality improvement” executive chatter we’ve been hearing since (then Chrysler employee) Bob Lutz famously remarked that “there is no other area in the field of human communications that is as rife with disinformation as the story on Chrysler quality.”

It’s the new Saab 9-4X! The fact that Fourex is an American brand of condoms and an Australian lager shouldn’t get [both remaining] fans of the brand up in arms (or wherever). Thanks to a “premature leak” on Saab’s Chilean website (David Hasselhoff is big down there too), The Motor Authority reveals an SUV-lite that looks reasonably appealing. And we’re willing to bet the key willl be between the seats. That said, the ostensibly Swedish model (built in Ramos, Mexico) could well suffer the same fate as the abortive 9-2X (Saabaru) and 9-7X (Saablazer), based as it is on Caddy’s new SRX platform. In fact, this time ’round, the Saabillac will be competing with a nearly identical iteration in the same GM “sales channel” (i.e. HUMMER, Cadillac and Saab). It could even appear in the same showroom. How great is that?

GM, GMnext, General Motors,Ed Welburn on the Volt

Why is GM Car Czar Bob “I Stopped Making Sense Years Ago” Lutz so damn defensive about the Volt’s design? Writing on the FastLane Blog, Maximum Bob wants to tell all those naysayers (oh me! choose me!) to shut the Hell up. “The Volt is going to be bought… for the emotion tied to the technology contained therein.” And while he’s at it, Bob takes yet another sideways swipe at Toyota (who are none to pleased with The General‘s alt prop lobbying these days). “In terms of the impact of Volt on the automobile industry, I think you’ll see lithium-ion technology filter out to the rest of the industry, even to our competitors who initially said it wouldn’t work,” MB hints hubristically. “I think they’ve figured out that we may well be onto a winning formula here, with 40 miles of driving powered by electricity from a battery and a small engine — powered by gasoline or E85 — to create additional electricity to power the vehicle for several hundred additional miles. I suspect most of our competitors will have vehicles with technology similar to the Volt within four or five years.” Bob touts the patriotic side of the project, and then gives TTAC (et al) the middle finger. “With the Volt, you go home, you plug it in, and you’re done. And for roughly 80 cents’ worth of electricity, you’ve got a fully-charged battery, ready to take on another forty miles of gas-free and tailpipe-emission-free driving. If that’s greenwashing, then come on in — the water’s fine.” What, into the washing machine?

Despite The Big 2.8’s best efforts, the mainstream media never bought into the idea that the $25b – $50b low-interest federal loans for “retooling” (included in last year’s Energy Bill) were anything more than bailout by another name. (Since the loans only apply to Motown, why would they?) As previously mentioned, the automakers’ “it’s a hand up not a handout” approach has created some severe cognitive dissonance– which helps Detroit’s efforts to secure the bucks not a bit. For example, Bill Ford met with DC legislators yesterday and swore up, down and sideways the loans were NOT a bailout. And then this [via Reuters] “Bill Ford said the money, if approved, would help his company accelerate its turnaround plan and meet government mandates for the industry to improve fuel efficiency by 40 percent by 2020.” Accelerate, eh? GM’s CEO has moved even further away from his opening gambit. “Speaking to reporters on Tuesday night after addressing the Washington Economic Club, [Wagoner] said the loan amount that GM might receive… would help with capital spending but also improve the company’s poor finances. ‘It would help us with other funding sources — maybe not in today’s market conditions, but over time.'” In fact, Wagoner’s desperation is increasingly apparent. When asked if GM needs the money before Congress pisses off for the election, Wagoner replied “I’m not sure of the value in waiting.”

In all this heady Volt-o-mania, it should be remembered that GM is trying to boldly go where no lithium-ion battery has gone before. The vehicle’s success (i.e. its ability to live-up to the performance-related hype perpetrated its corporate shills) depends entirely on its li-ion battery pack’s ability to hold a suitable charge, discharge that charge, recharge that charge, and do so for a good long time, without losing its ability to charge, discharge and recharge appropriately. A Reuters article [via Planet Ark] kinda makes you wonder about all that… “Among the challenges to overcome are extending the life of high-power lithium batteries and bringing down their relatively high cost, Tien Duong of the US Department of Energy said on the sidelines of a lithium battery conference held at this government laboratory. ‘Life means 10 years, plus. For hybrids we know (their batteries) last 10 years plus. For the PHEV (plug-in electric vehicle), we don’t know… One of the phenomenons that cuts short the life of the battery is power. You may have a lot of energy, but if you run out of power, that’s no good.'” You might even say it’s bad. Speaking of which, “Toyota is making quite an effort to build a lithium-ion battery,” Toyota’s Noboru Kikuchi told the attendees. “Simply giving up nickel metal hydride batteries seems like a bad idea.” And so they’re not going to do it. [thanks to JT for the link]

As I mentioned in a previous post, Justin and I had a sit down with the boffins who serve the server and manipulate WordPress (WP) on our mutual behalf. While we discussed all sorts of pie-in-the-sky stuff, we eventually brought it down to a “here’s what we can afford to do” shortlist. There are only two large alterations afoot. First, we will have photo galleries, dammit. WP can create a thumbnail gallery, but it lacks convenience (browser back button? no way!). The cumbersomosity of the WP system would aggravate the B&B and kill rather than encourage page views (yum!). So the guys are building a system that’s similar to, say, Autoblog’s. The other, even more significant change: we’re going to run ALL items in the center column. In other words, there will be 15 (up from 10) posts in the center stack in chronological order, regardless of catagory (editorial, review, blog). Our hard core audience has been asking for this for years (the original TTAC format). And so it will come to pass. There are other bells and whistles in the offing: the return of product reviews, a “Best of TTAC” box, a “view all comments” button (all comments on all posts in chronological order), search by author, direct email to authors, etc. Unfortunately, I can’t open this post up for a “wish list,” ’cause our development budget’s tapped out. But now’s a good time to tell us what we’re doing wrong, and what we can do to make sure we don’t screw-up in the future. Meanwhile, thanks for reading.

The facelifted Audi A6 is the first of Ingolstadt’s machines to abandon conventional front indicators; instead, they’re located on the side mirrors. Other brands are set to follow suit. This is a bad, even stupid, idea. When you hold a conversation with somebody, do you look at their ears? Of course not. You look into their eyes and try to interpret their facial expression. This is hard-wired into people’s brains, so we’re pretty good at it. Cars have faces too and car makers go long ways to make them expressive and individual. Some are supposed to be cute. BMWs for the supposed benefit of [überho] prestige are supposed to look masculine. And some are unintentionally genital. But it’s not a stretch to say that all intend to be recognizable. So why make them less readable? You’re in traffic, you want to see what the other guy is going to do, so you look at his car’s front, hoping for a signal. Sure, blinking mirrors are better than no blinkers at all. But I surmise that the average driver sees them a  split-second later than he would front-mounted ones. And locating indicators on mirrors sucks anyway. They are more prone to break in normal driving conditions than fender-mounted indicators. Will you be able to get a replacement high-tech-mirror for your Audi 15 years hence? I doubt it. And some side blinkers are downright dangerous; the ones on the VW Golf glare into your peripheral vision in rainy or foggy driving conditions. Car makers should stop introducing empty styling gimmicks.

Surprise! The Detroit News published not one, not two but THREE PR puff pieces to accompany the “launch” of GM’s plug-in electric – gas hybrid Volt– an unveiling that’s two years ahead of sales (where IS that Camaro?). Scott Burgess gets the top slot, with “Jolting expectations: Inviting electric car is rare example of reality outdoing the concept.” Burgess begins his ode to Voltage by discounting the discrepancy between the endlessly touted concept car and the now-endlessly touted (if non-functional) “production” version. Yada, yada, yada. “GM has pushed through every checkpoint and remains on schedule to deliver a car that is a true game-changer.” Next up: “Volt turnaround proves U.S. automakers’ mettle” by Auto Editor Manny Lopez. “Any questions about what the American auto industry can do were answered Tuesday at the Renaissance Center when a production model of the Chevrolet Volt rolled into the automotive universe.” You know, other than “can you guys avoid bankruptcy?” “Is the Volt the answer?” Manny pretends to ask. “Not alone. But when paired with other new products such as the Chevy Cruze, which GM says will get 45 miles per gallon, or the Ford Fiesta or the next generation pickups from all three automakers, the domestic industry’s offerings look pretty good.” KBISFB. And finally, Robert Snell’s more news-oriented take (hence it’s postition at the bottom of the deck). Snell simply repeats all the suits’ n’ analysts’ hype, finishing with a bit of unintentional foreshadowing. “”It is not a niche product,” Alex Cattelan, the Volt’s assistant chief engineer opines. “It is the tip of the iceberg.”