More testimony over the fate of GM and Chrysler’s culled dealers yesterday revealed possible compromises, although consensus is still elusive. Chrysler VP and Associate General Counsel Lou Ann Van Der Wiele told the House Judiciary Committee (via the NYT) to ignore the pleas of Chrysler’s 789 slashed dealers, explaining that dealer reinstatement would be the end of Chrysler as we’re getting to know it. “Legislation aimed at reversing some of the painful but necessary actions taken during Old Carco’s bankruptcy will simply take Chrysler back to the future that Old Carco faced not long ago—and this time, without the option of a purchaser for substantially all of its assets. Complete liquidation, with all of its dire consequences, could follow.” But then, “complete liquidation with all its dire consequences” could follow if The New Chrysler ate the wrong tuna sandwich.

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File this one under the “stealth bailout” file. GM dumped a number of its own pension obligations onto Delphi when the parts supplier was spun off in 1999. Now, the Detroit News reports that Delphi is abandoning $6.25 billion  worth of obligations to the Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation, the second largest such takeover by amount. But the 70,000 affected Delphi workers and retirees will still miss out on an estimated $800 million in payments. And what does GM have to say about all this? The General’s statement (via webnewswire) betrays a guilty conscience:

There have been questions about General Motors Company’s responsibility toward Delphi’s pension plans, given that many of those covered were GM employees prior to GM spinning off Delphi in 1999. General Motors Corporation made appropriate provisions for the plans at the time of the spin-off, and Delphi became responsible for the plans from that point forward.

See how that works? Who cares that GM spun Delphi off as a means of jettisoning pensions. Once the deal was done it was Delphi’s problem. Move along now, nothing to see here . . .

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Christopher Knittel of UC Davis made this graph of trends in the Honda Accord’s weight, horsepower, torque and fuel economy since its introduction. His entire report Automobiles on Steroids: Product Attribute Trade-Offs and Technological Progress in the Automobile Sector is available for download in PDF format from UC Davis. The data kind of speaks for itself though, doesn’t it?

Cash for clunkers has moved up the “hey, you know about cars, right?” list of questions. Friends and acquaintances with little intrinsic interest in the world of cars have been asking “what the deal is” with the program with surprising regularity. Needless to say, it’s difficult to explain and I usually end up pointing people to the CARS website and Kelly Blue Book’s clunker calculator. And guess what. Despite having been asked about the program by a number of people, I know of nobody who has actually qualified. In other words, the program is already a success. After all, the biggest fans of clunker-culling admit that the current plan has too many strings and not enough money to truly impact new car sales on its own. And yet, everyone knows that the program exists without knowing whether they qualify. The resulting search for information drives curious souls who don’t have automotive blogger friends straight into the arms of dealers. Cash for clunkers is a classic come-on. If there was any doubt before, Chrysler’s latest Big Summer Incentive proves it.

Actually, that’s misleading. “Everyone shopping for a new car or truck qualifies for an incentive of up to $4,500 — even if they don’t have a vehicle that qualifies under the U.S. Government’s program,” says ChryCo Sales VP Steven Beahm in a press release. “This incentive is great in that it’s easy to understand and available to everyone.” Which means that it’s actually nothing like the government’s CARS program, which is difficult to understand and not available to everyone. But, if you do have a qualifying clunker, you get the Chrysler incentive on top of $4,500 bucks from the feds for a total of $9,000 off the qualifying ChryCo product of your choice. But piggybacking on a government program doesn’t exactly improve Chrysler’s welfare queen image. Especially when the program it’s riding is so convoluted, over-hyped and under-delivering. And, like most of the Pentastar’s gimmicks, this incentive is also accompanied by a zero percent interest for 72 months offer. Which may well be a better deal than the buzzword-based cash incentive. But would it be summer without a Chrysler sales gimmick?

TTAC commenter j_slez has worked his magic again, this time on our new Ford monthly sales data. Hit the jump for a comparison with GM and Toyota.

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In prepared testimony before the House Judiciary Subcommittee, Car Czarlet Ron Bloom revealed that the government would no longer back GM and Chrysler warranties. “With the successful emergence of the new companies, consumers can now feel assured that the companies have the financial wherewithal to meet their warranty commitments on a continuing basis,” Bloom said. The $641 million spent by the government on the warranty program has been returned to the Treasury with interest, reveals Bloom. “This achievement represented a prudent short-term use of taxpayer funds,” was his conclusion. GM spokesfolks tell Automotive News [sub] that The General never even tapped the fund, while Chrysler reps are mum on the subject.

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In between long stints behind the keyboard and the wheel of an Audi, I’ve been reading Robert Lacey’s epic Ford: The Men and the Machine. Catching up on the story of Ford, one can’t help but wonder what would have happened if Crazy Henry had somehow cheated death and was still around to witness the recent travails of his company. Ford’s deep commitment to basic transportation may have been a liability in the heyday of the American automobile, but things seem to be coming full circle. The decades of glamor and expression in automotive design and marketing launched GM to dizzying heights and threatened to leave stolid old Ford behind. But Ford never completely embraced the planned obsolescence and marketing-heavy development patterns that defined GM’s success. The Blue Oval’s best products always had a certain affordable and rugged charm that seems to be coming back in style. Ford now finds itself positioned to become the first American automaker with a lineup weighted towards competitive small and mid-sized cars. If it can succeed with this strategy and stay focused, Ford has a chance to reinterpret its original brand appeal and vindicate Henry Ford’s philosophy in a thoroughly 21st Century fashion.

Ford got a whole lotta love around here yesterday for agreeing to hook up TTAC’s staff with better press fleet access. Though the move shows that Ford is more willing to face the truth than its Detroit competition, the announcement generated perhaps a bit more optimism about the firm’s fortunes than the data warrants. One commenter got so carried away by the good vibes that he opined “the Ford brand pretty much has a good car in every segment there is, with the exception of the minivan.” Not quite. Let’s turn to our XLS spreadsheets of Ford monthly sales since 2003, shall we? [Thanks to bumpy ii for the spreadsheet]

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joemoc1 writes:

Should Hollywood decide to remake of Bullitt, who would play Frank Bullitt, and should they still still use a Mustang? A Bullitt Mustang? And would the bad guys still drive a black Dodge Charger?

Vijay Ravindran at the WaPo’s Achenblog details his own descent into Camaro buying hell:

“I wanted a Chevy Camaro.

I’d never really liked American sports cars before. But the 2010 Camaro — a revival Chevrolet has been talking up since 2006 — is so much more sleek than your typical muscle car. And since my BMW 330 started showing its age (nine) around the same time that the death of the U.S. auto industry hit the headlines, I thought: Why not do a little something to help?”

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An Automotive News [sub] piece on Toyota’s efforts to rethink its North American manufacturing strategy reveals Toyota NA President Yoshimi Inaba’s potential willingness to apply for US retooling loans. Though Inaba states that the Obama administration would not play a “material” role in Toyota’s return to profitability, he refused to rule out applying for Department of Energy retooling loans. Nissan has already secured $1.6b worth of the so-called “136 loans,” and is moving away from its current strategy of sourcing hybrid components from Toyota, according to Reuters. And whether it takes money from the government or not, Toyota is sounding the same PR notes as its recently-rescued competitors. “Our sense has been always that we listen to the market, we listen to customers, we listen to the dealer. That element is a little bit lost,” admits Inaba in the WSJ. Inaba also concedes that Ford is better positioned to exploit GM and Chrysler’s bankruptcy-bailouts, adding that “we certainly want a good chunk of it. As the dust settles down a little bit we would also like to go after any incremental volume.”

“With this new brand manifesto campaign, we set out to reintroduce Scion to young, urban consumers by reinforcing the company’s unique position as an authentic brand that is all about creativity and individuality.”

Simon Needham of of Attik, creator of Scion’s new “Brand Manifesto” campaign. Which makes Scion look like that drunk guy at the party who’s met you three times but doesn’t remember. Just play along. Oh, you’re into big wheels and bodykits? How interesting. “Become one of us by becoming none of us?” How individual. On the other hand, at least Scion’s repetition is better than those NSFW hamsters.

As Robert posted below, TTAC is redoubling its efforts to get timely road tests by reaching out to the very manufacturers we lay into on a daily basis. But why, you might ask, would these giant firms feed the mouth that bites them?

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The Washington state Department of Licensing has pulled O&J Sales’ license after finding 22 cars were contaminated by methamphetamine, reports The Whidby News Times. The cars, worth $70,000, were crushed due to the high cost of cleaning them to state standards. And those high state standards (0.1 micrograms per 100 square centimeters, 15 times the California standard) are a cause of frustration for the lot’s owner. “If the standards were applied to every car dealership in the state, most of them would go out of business,” says O&J owner Mark Brown, noting that one of the crushed vehicles was bought from a state police auction. Unfortunately for Brown, his lot was raided in March, when police found 94 grams of meth. This led to the arrest of Brown’s son, the lot’s manager. The O&J building tested at 5,200 times the legal limit for meth on a swab test. The shutdown of O&J is the first meth contamination-based closure on record.