“Politicians and pundits always like simple answers. Unfortunately simple answers, as appealing as they are, are usually wrong. Life is inherently messy and complicated, which is something die-hard conservatives and liberal politicians never seem to understand.” Uh, OK. That’s the coda to an article by Joseph Szcesny. ToMoCo’s rise the top of the global pile and Detroit’s plummet into the depths of bankruptcy (in all but name) inspired the Oakland Press scribe to chastise all and sundry on a mid-winter Sunday. Be that as it may, it’s certainly true that “Toyota Motor Corp. is very likely to replace General Motors Corp. as the world’s largest automaker next month once all the sales for the 2008 are finally totaled up by both companies. Toyota is also expected to emerge for the first as the best selling brand in the U.S. for the first time ever, beating out both Chevrolet and Ford.” In fact, on the world stage, this is a repeat performance. Last year, GM used weasel words to cast aspersions on Toyota’s claim to the world’s largest automaker crown (GM added a minority joint venture in China to their global totals). At the time, GM CEO Rick Wagoner said the title wasn’t important; profits were. You can almost hear Red Ink Rick’s Szcesny-like refrain. Hey! Life’s complicated.

Jaguar XF Diesel S – 3.0 V6 with 271 hp, 442 lb/ft of torque. Will do 0-60 in 5.9, rated at 35 MPG (US) average. A 236 hp version of the same 3.0 liter engine will be available.

Not for North America. (Consolation prize: we will get the 5.0 liter Supercharged gasoline V8 with 503 hp next year). Full embargo-broken press release after the jump.

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Yup, it’s deja vu all over again, as New York Times star columnist and flat earther Thomas L. Friedman once again echoes the Gray Lady’s conviction that a federal gas tax is a good thing. No surprise there. In case you didn’t realize it, Friedman has no problem telling people what to do with their national economies. In fact, it’s clear he feels what was once called noblesse oblige. “I’ve wracked my brain trying to think of ways to retool America around clean-power technologies without a price signal — i.e., a tax — and there are no effective ones. (Toughening energy-effiency [sic] regulations alone won’t do it.) Without a higher gas tax or carbon tax, Obama will lack the leverage to drive critical pieces of his foreign and domestic agendas.” You want him to tax that gas. You need him to tax that gas. “Today’s financial crisis is Obama’s 9/11. The public is ready to be mobilized. Obama is coming in with enormous popularity. This is his best window of opportunity to impose a gas tax. And he could make it painless: offset the gas tax by lowering payroll taxes, or phase it in over two years at 10 cents a month.” And then Tom trots out the “H” word, and you just know someone somewhere is gonna pay.

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These are the stock wheels on two special edition “green” Volvos in Europe. What do you think of ye olde Swedish rims?

Well, at least their hometown media. Our hypermiling pal Sam “Is there a draft out here?” Abuelsamid at Autoblog linked me to the straw that broke this camel’s back: a Christmas Eve column by The Detroit News’ John McCormick. “Maybe it’s time to turn the tables on the South” the title proclaims, proving that prevarication is the first refuge of a journalistic scoundrel. “The unnecessarily long and painful path toward the approval of government bridging loans for General Motors Corp. and Chrysler LLC has exposed a new threat to Detroit. It’s one that Michigan consumers may want to keep in mind as they consider their expenditures, vacation options and even retirement plans.” Breathe Farago. Gentlemen, you won. You got your money. I’m sorry if you found the $66.2b raid on the public purse was a bit… tedious. And embarrassing. But you want to start a boycott? You do realize you’re going back to Uncle Sugar in March, right? Southerners buy a lot of your trucks, yes? Maybe it would be best to just shut the Hell up and be glad that President Bush felt free to ride roughshod over the United States Congress (not to mention the U.S. Constitution). But no. Insult added to injury after the jump.

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Automobile.blog.com offers its readers some car-related trivia for the holidays. There’s some pretty good stuff: “The Monumental Axis in Brazil is the world’s widest road and can accommodate 160 cars side-by-side at a given time.” But the list lacks what the National Enquirer’s editors call a “Hey Martha!” And any pistonhead who doesn’t know that “The Dodge Neon is sold in Europe under the brand name Chrysler Neon” is forgiven for not knowing OR caring. So I’m tasking TTAC’s Best and Brightest to offer more challenging, obscure and entertaining automotive factoids. I’ll start with an easy one (at least for the car historians amongst us): In 1951, a new car was launched whose maker claimed it was so frugal that “every third mile was free.” Hint: it had a supersonic engine. Hint two: new pic.

Yada yada yada. “And then out of nowhere came the ZR1, which has a supercharged V8 that manages to be both docile and extraordinarily savage all at the same time. I’ve been trying to think of a dog that pulls off a similar trick, but there isn’t one. And anyway, this car is not a dog.

“Oh, it’s not built very well. After just three days in my care, the boot lock disintegrated and the keyless go system refused to acknowledge the keys were in the car, but I didn’t mind because there is simply no other car that looks this good, goes this fast – in a straight line and around corners – and that most of the time bumbles about like a forgetful uncle. And when you throw in the price tag of just £106,690 – lots for a Corvette but modest next to a similarly powerful Ferrari – the case for the defence can sit down and put up its feet knowing that the prosecutor simply has nowhere to go.

It is an epic car and I’m only sad that unless the healthcare and pensions company that makes it can be turned around, it will be the last of the breed.”

A short overview of what happened in other parts of the world while you were in bed. TTAC provides round-the-clock coverage of everything that has wheels. Or has its wheels coming off. For the next two weeks, WAS will be filed from Tokyo.

Good news! Nothing, absolutely nothing newsworthy and car related happened while you slept. Europe is officially closed as of a week ago. Japan turned the key last Friday evening. Even the Chinese car industry took advantage of the fact that all the expats of the joint ventures are home with mother-in-law and apple pie – and did nothing.

What’s left to report? That in Japan “domestic prices for used cars are declining due to shrinking exports to such destinations as the vital Russian market,” as the Nikkei‘s only car story of the day is? That a company in Singapore bought a taxi company in Beijing, as Gasgoo has it? That BMW’s Mini brand “aims to grow next year in albeit deteriorating market conditions,” as Reuters reports? That Oman Air appoints GM customer service? Or that Eon Musk [sic] is featured in “a series of profiles on prominent business leaders in the Bay Area who are managing their way through the severe economic downturn,” which the SF Chronicle launched as a sign of utter desperation?

The only newsworthy story would be that Honda was rescued by a Mexican for a dollar. But that’s against TTAC editorial policy, and you know the story already anyway. Can’t miss it. It runs unopposed. These days, no news is good news. Enjoy it. Or go back to bed.

“Larry Hall is the editor of Northwest Auto News Service and a freelance journalist based in Olympia, Wash. For more than 20 years, he’s covered the automotive industry for numerous trade journals, newspapers and business publications.” Who? The what? A Google search on “NWA” reveals plenty of interesting links, from Northwest Airlines to Niggaz with Attitude, The National Wrestling Alliance and The National Weather Association (“promoting excellence in operational meteorology and related activities”). A search of “Northwest Auto News Service” reveals… nothing. Which is sort of strange, as this attribution comes from MSN Autos’ review of the GMC Sierra Hybrid. Turns out ole Lar’ works for Newcartestdrive.com, the most corrupt group of automotive journalists money can buy. So that pretty much tells you all you need to know about MSN’s review of the GMC Sierra Hybrid. They love it! O.K., a taste… “Unlike Tahoe Hybrids I’ve driven [Ed: they made more than one?], this pickup could never reach the mid-20 mph range in electric-only operation. As for running just four cylinders at 50, 55 and 60 mph, unlike the Tahoe, it would do so only for very short times. Engineers are still calibrating the control system that optimizes the transmission for best performance and economy, and I was told this was an anomaly to the specific vehicle I drove.” And I love the strapline: “With a little practice, this pickup can go 500 miles between fill-ups.” Practice makes perfect, eh Larry?

One evening, whilst dining at a Turkish restaurant in Mayfair, I watched my server nearly trip over another waiter’s leg. (The staff member whose appendage had caused the offense was kneeling by the desert cart.) The burly fellow who’d almost lost his balance looked at his compatriot with dagger-filled eyes. Waiter number two stared straight back. “Yes. I am trying to kill you,” he said with deadpan earnestness. Reading Scott Burgess’ review of the Shelby GT500KR, it seems pretty clear that the 540hp ‘Stang is equally intent on eliminating its driver. Which is to say not intentionally, but what difference does that make? “The 2008 Ford Shelby GT500 King of the Road scares me,” Burgess admits from the git-go. “The first ‘incident’ occurred along Gibraltar Road when I started to pass a minivan poking its way up the same straightaway. With no oncoming traffic and the lane open, I dropped the six-speed manual into third and kicked out to the left. The moment I mashed the pedal to the floor and listened to that supercharged whirl come from under the hood, the SVT light on the speedometer lit up and the back end of the KR jumped to the left and shuddered — full power, full torque ripping through the rear axle. ‘Oh, sassafras’ — that’s paraphrased — blurted out of my mouth.” Incident number two after the jump.

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“It’s not a good situation, no matter what.” These bleak words come from Christopher Whalen, managing director of Institutional Risk Analytics [via compareshares.com.au]. Whalen is wailin’ on the impact of the Fed granting GMAC bank status, should the lender complete its debt-for-equity swap. And what’s up with that? The deal was supposed to be done by 11:59 last night. So far not a peep from GMAC, the Fed, Cerberus (who owns 51 percent of the troubled lender) or any of The Wall Street Journal’s people close to the people who need people are the luckiest people in the world. To paraphrase our own John Horner, uh-oh. Meanwhile, back to our notable quotable, who points out the blindingly obvious: “Christopher Whalen, managing director of Institutional Risk Analytics, said would-be customers are simply not buying cars. Noting that Toyota has just forecast its first operating loss in 70 years, Whalen sees no end to the slowdown… The difficulty many homeowners have had in paying mortgage bills has been spreading to credit cards and other forms of borrowing, including auto financing, Alpert said. ‘I don’t see that coming back anytime soon – people with impaired credit suddenly getting credit,’ Alpert said. ‘That, I think, is what has showed itself across the board with consumer spending.'”

While occasional NYT carmudgeon Ezra Dyer’s busy celebrating high horsepower motor cars, his paymaster’s editorial board has announced their desire to have the incoming administration tax the bejesus out of the go-juice fueling Dyer’s cool whips (Bryan?). After bemoaning the lowered price of fuel’s dampening effect on Americans’ desire to buy the fuel-efficient vehicles that Uncle Sam, in his infinite wisdom, has mandated, The Times gets down to business. “There are several ways to tax gas. One would be to devise a variable consumption tax in such a way that a gallon of unleaded gasoline at the pump would never go below a floor of $4 or $5 (in 2008 dollars), fluctuating to accommodate changing oil prices and other costs. Robert Lawrence, an economist at Harvard, proposes a variable tariff on imported oil to achieve the same effect and also to stimulate the development of domestic energy sources.” BUT WHAT ABOUT THE POOR PEOPLE? “In both cases, the fuel taxes could be offset with tax credits to protect vulnerable segments of the population.” Uh, is a major recession really the best time to raise the price of a basic commodity? No but…

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“Ezra, baby, we love your style! You’re the next P.J. Hunter Clarkson! But listen; we need something a little upbeat for the year’s end. A little sugar to sprinkle on top of all that rancid offal coming out of Motown. How about 2008 cars you love? Thanks… Uh, Ezra this is a list of muscle cars and sports cars. And they’re all powered by gas for Christ’s sake. This is the New York Times! Tell you what: write me a couple of hundred word intro on alt power stuff. What’s that battery-powered thing? Taser? Dazzler? Put that one in there. We’ll call it ‘Gas guzzling rocket ships are great but we can’t say that.” No, no. We’ll call it “Last Call for Horsepower.” You know, cake and eat it deal. Awesome. What’s that? Cars that suck? What do you think we are TTAC? Sigh. OK, list ’em at the end, be gentle and we’ll call it “not in my garage.” OK? And I’ll get back to you on the driving to Alaska in a Ferrari thing later. Love ya! [Ezra’s Reasons to be Cheerful Part One Through Eight after the jump]

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In our coverage of lender GMAC’s struggle to become a bank (i.e. suckle on Uncle Sugar to avoid bankruptcy), we pretty much assumed it was a done deal. The Fed’s decision to grant GMAC bank status if/when they completed a mega-debt-for-equity swap seemed like the come-on reluctant investors needed to take their chances with the U.S. taxpayer, rather than a bankruptcy judge. The dealine for the d-for-e swap expired last night at 11:59. If GMAC made it, it’s just another step down the road to recovery, or nationalization, depending on your perspective. If they didn’t, all HELL will break loose. GM simply can’t survive without GMAC covering its dealers’ floorplan costs (loans for inventory). If GMAC goes down, thousands of GM dealers go belly-up. While that’s exactly what GM needs, they don’t need it all at once. The market would be flooded with hundreds of thousands of units of unsold inventory, supplier confidence would disappear, etc. So which way did it go, then? “We have not yet issued final results,” GM spinmeister Gina Proia told the AP. “But intend to in the near term. I have no further comment on the exchange until then.” Someone somewhere is holding their breath.