I don’t know about you, but if I’d earned $14m in ONE YEAR, and I’d worked for the same company for thirty-two years, at least eight of which delivered unto me similarly (if not equally) spectacular amounts of pay and benefits, I wouldn’t really be all that worried about what happened next. OK, yes, reputation and all that. But we’re talking about Rick Wagoner, the man that’s flown the GM jumbo jet straight into the dirt without once recognizing that funny looking thing called the yoke. Any reputation that remains is purely in Rick’s head, and the heads of the sycophants who wear their “Pay No Attention To That Man Behind the Curtain” T-shirts with pride, without irony. So don’t expect me to be surprised that USA Today reports “GM, [Wagoner] says, is crouched and ready to pounce if the auto market begins to rebound. ‘We just need to get the storm over, and we’re about ready to go.'”

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When I was a kid, I really thought debtors could end up in prison. My Dad grew up in Old Europe (pre-WWII) and with memories of German hyperinflation, depression and Nazism came a very firm belief in paying cash . . . no matter what. Conservative isn’t the half of it. He simply can’t stand the very idea of investing in any asset that can only depreciate over time. For the last ten years I embraced the same attitude of “neither a borrower or a lender be.” My customer has always been the ‘cash’ customer. That is until the debtor’s economy hit my fleet of automotive mules with a proverbial 2 × 4.

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“We’re placing a high priority on biofuels right now.” Yeah, right. “Hey guys, how’s that congressional viability plan coming? Shhh. We’re working on biofuels.” The man shilling for last year’s green queen is GM’s vice president of research and development. Lest we forget, Laurence Fishburne—sorry, Larry Burns—was The General’s main eco-warrior a little over a year ago. That’s when GM decided to squander some its precious pre-bailout bucks on buying a big piece of a cellulosic ethanol start-up named Coskata. Hyperbole is a dish best served cold. Looking back . . . USA Today: “General Motors says it is investing in a fledgling company that claims its secret process could be able to make ethanol from waste in large quantity as soon as 2010 for $1 a gallon or less, half the cost of making gasoline.” Just out of curiosity, anyone want to guess how much GM plowed into this turkey?

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So, Best and Brightest, what’s the best car an enthusiast can buy—NEW—for under $30k? All in (discounts count). I’m asking because I just hooked-up (in the non-sexual sense) with a new[ish] website called Bestcovery.com. They’ve offering major linkage in exchange for Automotive “best” lists. So I wrote a “Best Porsche” list slamming the Cayenne to see if they were made of the write stuff. Yup. So, after that, I offered your services. Here’s my evil plan: I ask you, The Best and Brightest, to name the best fill-in-the-blank. At some point, I put up a poll of your most convincing nominations (chosen by me). You vote for the best whatever, I write it up and submit it to Bestcovery. What’s in for you? C’mon you love this stuff. And I’m looking into providing contributors with goods and services to test. So, let’s get stuck in, again, shall we? If you had 30Gs to spend on a new car, and you wanted to enjoy driving that car, what would it be? [NB: TTAC has no personal or commercial interest in any of the products or services presented for your consideration. And, yes, I deleted all the comments to the previous versions of this post.]

Efforts of folks like Willie Nelson notwithstanding, the alt-fuel scene used to be pretty uncool. Just picture guys who spend their evenings filtering used grease they get  for free from french-fry factories, or travelling salesmen who’ll drive a detour of 20 miles to fill up with Compressed Natural Gas (CNG). But the supply of pretty good alt-fuel cars is increasing—at least on the right side of the Atlantic, where VW and Opel have recently introduced sexier Euro-CNG-mobiles. VW is now selling a technologically-interesting Passat version that utilizes both a turbocharger and a compressor.

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As GM gets out its begging bowl and approaches the federal bailout buffet for seconds, it’s got to tell Congress something positive about its bloated brand portfolio. The scuttlebutt: GM will declare its intention to kill Saturn—despite the enormous expense and legal hassles (i.e., more expense). Oh, and let the taxpayer pick up the tab (gee, thanks).  BUT, one day in the not too distant future, the artist once known as the world’s largest automaker will file for Chapter 11. And on that fateful day, it will be free to kill brands. So I asked branding guru Al Reis about the maybe decision to deep six Saturn, what GM brands should survive the automaker’s impending C11 and what dangers lie ahead in that regard. The answers may surprise you. Or they may not. But you’re going to have to make the jump to find out.

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GM’s ex-Vice Chairman of Global Product Development left on a sour note. Bob Lutz claimed America is a nation that hates its own auto industry. It’s a remarkably nasty remark that’s almost as paranoid as it is insensitive. But not quite. The truth is much more specific and the other way around: GM executives hated their own customers. Why else would they have treated them with such contempt, selling them non-competitive products and inflicting such abysmal dealer service? (Heard the news?) Never mind. GM has built some tremendous enthusiasts’ cars: Corvette, G8, CTS and more. And now, the U.S. auto industry in general is about to experience a convulsive, cataclysmic change. Is that a good thing?

According to a Winnipeg, Canada court ruling issued last month, “work zone” speed camera tickets are invalid if they are issued in an empty work zone. Judicial Justice of the Peace Norman Sundstrom tossed citations issued to nine defendants who traveled through workerless work zones without exceeding the normal speed limit for the road they were on. The decision was based on a nuanced reading of the interplay between the provincial photo radar law and the law governing construction zone warning signs.

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Fitch Ratings is the world’s bankruptcy alert agency. If you want to know whether someone (say a large company or small country) will be able to pay his/its bills, talk to Fitch. Currently, Fitch doesn’t think it a good idea to extend credit to anyone in the automotive industry. Fitch Ratings [sub] describes the global outlook for the automotive industry in 2009 as negative. “Weak GDP growth and the effects of the international financial crisis will continue to have a significant impact on the global auto industry, creating downwards pressure on carmakers’ credit profiles in the short to medium term,” says Emmanuel Bulle, Senior Director in Fitch’s Automotive team. “In addition, the length and severity of the current crisis are still unknown, whilst manufacturers’ responses to the crisis are still evolving.” Translation: Nobody knows how long this will be going on, and nobody knows what they are doing. Time for triage . . .
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The rest of the automotive industry might be watching in horror As the World Downturns, but Ferrari had a bit of a giggle all the way to the bank last year. The FIAT division ended 2008 some $437.7m ahead, on sales of 6587 vehicles (up two percent). While sales in Ferrari’s biggest market (that’s US) remained flat, they swelled in Eastern European (+23 percent), China (+20 percent), the Middle East and South Africa (+12 percent). With the feds capping salaries, and austerity chic sweeping Spago’s (“I’ll just have the lettuce leaf”), it’s entirely possible that that Ferrari’s ’08 sales surge represents a dead cat bounce. And there’s a seguire il denaro story behind the story . . .

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A word to the wise (or The Detroit News): if you’re a cheerleader, stay away from irony. Irony is the discrepancy between expectation and reality. It’s a rapier specifically forged for cynical nasty bastards like . . . us. If you’re pro anything, it’s a blunderbuss for blundering buffoons. For example, The DetN’s automotive editor has penned a tongue-in-cheek essay on why he should be car czar. The result is earnest and scary, rather than droll and pointed. Our take: a federal car czar is a crazy cherry nesting in a gloppy pile of whipped insanity sitting atop a huge slice of death by delusion cake. Manny’s take:

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I’m paraphrasing of course, in the grand TTAC style. But what are we to make of GM’s pre-bailout beg-a-thon announcement that Chevy’s electric/gas plug-in hybrid Volt will be easier to upgrade than a “conventional” car? Automotive News reckons Frank Weber’s assertion means “GM eyes fast gains with future Volt models.” But then we’re Garth to their Michael, and they still illustrate their Volt stories with the slammed concept car. Oh, hell, you be the judge. “This is almost like getting software updates into your car,” asserts the Volt’s global vehicle line executive. “This is not a mechanical world. So, even within a vehicle lifecycle you will see updates that are very significant.” How vague is that? Predictably so, given “GM expects to begin production of the Volt in 2010. The company has not said when it expects to roll out the second generation of the vehicle, but plans to focus on cutting the size and cost of the battery are a top priority. GM has not said how long it will take to produce an offshoot of the Volt.” Nor how much it will cost, if it really will go 40 miles on battery power alone, how long it will take to recharge, etc. But we do know one VERY important fact: GM will not make money on the Volt v1. AN programs the reminder . . .

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An 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. WAS is being filed from Beijing until further notice.

Japanese bondage: Toyota plans to procure 100 billion yen or so by issuing about 50 billion yen each in five- and 10-year straight bonds as early as this month, the Nikkei [sub]. The issuance of straight bonds will be the automaker’s first since September 2002. The rating on Toyota’s long-term debt has been downgraded by both Moody’s Investors Service Inc. and Standard & Poor’s, each by one notch from the highest grade. This sets Toyota apart from other automakers who are treated by banks like lepers.

Nissan going for greener pastures: Nissan’s Carlos Ghosn talked up plans for mass-producing electric cars in the U.S., Europe and China, the Nikkei [sub] reports. Chief Operating Officer Toshiyuki Shiga admits that he would like to see Nissan’s electric cars made in Japan. But with the financial crisis crimping Nissan’s ability to raise capital, the US and Europe, which have introduced subsidies for environmentally friendly cars, are more attractive venues. Nissan would be the first Japanese automaker to apply for the US government’s 25 billion dollar program of low-interest loans to develop green cars.
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