In our last installment of the Volkswagen Golf Sportwagen saga, I’d received the Golf back with some issues after its second headliner replacement in less than two years.

Let’s pick up from there, shall we? Today is Part I of… we’ll see how many.

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According to a report in Automotive News, Volkswagen Auto Group is about to sell its stake in Electrify America, a company that builds chargers for electric vehicles.

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The New York Times went deep over the weekend on a subject that has long been talked about in this industry — Tesla’s Autopilot and its failures.

In this case, the paper of record goes in-depth and talks to people who are suing the company over crashes in which Autopilot is alleged to have failed.

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Kia’s Sportage has slipped a bit below the radar recently, thanks to the brand’s mega-popular Telluride and a strong media push to get the news about the new Sorento out there.

Yet it hasn’t been forgotten. Indeed, it’s slated for updates for 2023. (Read More…)

We reported last fall how Volkswagen-owned Bugatti had its future products on hold, given the financially turbulent and awful year which was 2020. In addition to the global pandemic cutting production, sales, profits, and everything else, VW was pouring lots of development money into its I.D. electric vehicle lineup.

At the time, there were mumblings that EV startup Rimac was in talks to purchase the brand from VW. News broke yesterday of a merger, where Volkswagen and Porsche are not entirely out of the picture.

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Mercedes-Benz built the R107 SL-class, in all its stodgy-yet-sporty glory, from the 1971 through 1989 model years. I have documented quite a few of those iconic SLs and SLCs in car graveyards over the years, but have not paid much attention to their successor: the R129, built from 1989 through 2001. Today, we fill in some junkyard-history blanks with a mid-production R129, found in a San Francisco Bay Area self-service yard last month. (Read More…)

It’s about time to celebrate America’s independence.

Which means fireworks, booze (don’t drink and drive), and barbecues.

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Earlier today, I gave you my take on how Jeep should fight off the challenge posed to the Wrangler from the new Ford Bronco.

Now it’s your turn.

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The new Ford Bronco is here. It got glowing reviews from most of the automotive media this week, and while I’d like to think our review was fairly balanced, it tilted positive. The rig is pretty good. Jeep and its Wrangler need to fight back.

How?

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Given the constant hassles of Volkswagen Golf ownership lately, and how every media outlet is shouting “Highest Used Car Pricing Ever” as loudly as possible, I’ve been pondering selling the Golf to a dealer. No Facebook idiots, no trade-in for something else, just a sale.

Here in The Current Year, there are many companies that purport to give you both the best deal possible and make the car selling process seamless. I found out this week what five such companies are like in the early stages.

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There are competing philosophies when it comes to shifting the market to electric vehicles.

There’s the free-market philosophy, which says the market will get there on its own. There’s the incentive philosophy, which suggests incentivizing consumers will accelerate the transition away from the internal combustion engine. Consider that one to be the carrot approach.

Finally, we have the philosophy that if regulations don’t force automakers to make more EVs, they won’t, at least not quickly enough to address climate change. The free market and/or incentives won’t be enough. Consider this to be the stick.

Guess which philosophy President Joe Biden seems to be embracing?

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Carscoops is reminding us that a law passed in 2019 is mandating that new cars introduced after 2022 must be fitted with speed limiters.

Here’s the good news, at least for us Yanks and Canucks — the law was passed by the European Union and applies to, well, Europe.

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Seeing the response to a Right Spec analysis to last week’s Wrangler, our fancy-pants Managing Ed rightly suggested we go ahead and examine the Bronco. Fresh off a couple of days wheeling it around the sagebrush of Texas, he was ready to declare the long-awaited Blue Oval bruiser lives up to all the hype.

But what the correct mix of options? What’s the Right Spec? Let’s crack open the configurator and find out.

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Today’s Rare Ride is a one-off bespoke build of an already very limited-run car. A 2000 7-Series BMW was not enough for one Mr. Lagerfeld, so he sat down with BMW Individual to work his car into something very special.

The result was intense Germanic luxury with a heavy helping of Regency Elite. Let’s go.

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Outside of the Bronco, Ford’s Maverick has gotten a lot of attention recently. And Hyundai’s Santa Cruz is upcoming — media drives are set for August.

This got me thinking — if we’re on the cusp of a return to truly “compact” trucks (well, relatively compact), which other brands should be getting in on the action, and soon?

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