Kia’s Soul has hit the shores of Britain, and early feedback from the last bastion of English-language automotive print journalism credibility is looking promising. The Soul faces stiff competition in Old Blighty, taking on a pallette of available small cars, wagons and CUVs that American buyers can only imagine. And with European expectations for small car quality as high as they are, if the Soul is going to fall flat the Brits would sure let us know ahead of time. Instead, the reviews seem to indicate that the Soul is no less brand-redefining than Hyundai’s Genesis.

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Lord love a duck, but sometimes the most idiotic things surface on the internet. And a certain piece favorably comparing Ferrari’s environmental impact to that of the Prius doesn’t have the excuse of coming from some blogspot-based Private Snafu in the Army of Davids. No, it comes from Car And Driver. Print Media. The Big Boys. Etcetera. And since they don’t have the decency to expose their own baldfaced disingenuousness and sensationalist ignorance-peddling until after the jump, we’ll return the favor. Car And Driver’s Steve Siler is an idiot, and that’s all we’ll say unless you bump our page views by hitting the jump.

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The team behind the Eliica is currently seeking corporate sponsorship so they can build this car at an estimated price tag of $225k. That buys you a 0-60 mph time of four seconds, and a 0-100 mph of seven seconds flat. Oh yeah, and eight wheels. Because six wheels is weak sauce and 10 wheels is just plain ostentatious. (via Jalopnik)

The bailout-beggar line just got a little longer, as Green Car Congress reports that the US Fuel Cell Council is requesting a cool $1.17b of your hard-earned tax dollars (kudos for making the smallest handout request in months!). The money would come in the form of full funding for a number of programs authorized in the 2005 Energy Policy Act, including deployment programs; development of a refueling infrastructure; learning demonstrations; building domestic manufacturing capability; accelerating public-private research; and investing in fuel cell transit programs. And they aren’t leaving it there, either. A July 2008 study by the National Research Council estimated that a total public-private investment of about $200 billion would be required from 2008 to 2023 to support a transition from gasoline to hydrogen fuel cell vehicles, at which point fuel cell vehicles would become competitive with gasoline-powered vehicles. Or, as we find so many causes for repeating, not. Though hydrogen fuel cells offer more long-term promise than say, ethanol, we’re still talking about some serious pie in the sky. At an appropriately astronomical cost too. Sorry kids, but if we’re to spend government money on something like this, I’d like to see it go towards lithium-ion battery development, which shows more medium-term promise and doesn’t require a new ground-up infrastructure.

Not for us though. We’ve had the luxury of several pre-bailout months of foreknowledge of this particular $33m white elephant. The kids at Fox News, on the other hand, seem to have only just found out about the UAW’s Reuther Family Education Center, and they’re downright apoplectic. The $33m resort, nestled on “1,000 heavily forested acres” has lost $23m over the past five years, despite charging as much as $85 in green fees. Besides improving the UAW’s collective handicap, the Family Education Center provides accomodations for retreats and conferences which give members “a deeper understanding of the UAW and the union movement away from the routine of their daily lives,” according to the Center’s website. All of which has Fox reaching for the “union-basher” volume of its rolodex.

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Oregon’s governor Ted Kulongoski is currently getting some flack in our comments section over his pay-per-mile road tax scheme. But this is not the only green-oriented plan Kulongoski is floating, having already confirmed that Nissan will provide EVs for the state fleet in 2010. Another controversial transportation proposal of Kulongoski’s is to replace the $1,500 hybrid tax credit with a $5k credit towards the purchase of an all-electric car. If this plan does go into effect, it will make your Tesla Roadster (or Nissan Better Place-mobile) a little more affordable, just be prepared to have your doors blown off by a Datsun 1200 when you hit the road. Check out Oregon Field Guide’s visit with White Zombie, the zero-emissions ass kicker you never saw coming.

Automotive News [sub] reports that, thanks to you the taxpayer, GM is offering 0 percent financing through Monday, Jan. 5, on the discontinued Chevrolet TrailBlazer, GMC Envoy and Saab 9-7X, 9-3 and 9-5. “We’ve been trying to hold onto market share with one arm tied behind our back,” says GM Marketing individual Mark LaNeve. “Any tool they can get to make credit available and put deals together is a good thing.” Especially when taxpayers pick up the bill. But Mr LaNeve, what do you say to critics who argue that artificially low rates and subprime lending is what got this country and your firm into trouble in the first place?  “Six hundred twenty (FICO) is not a subprime score,” argues LaNeve. “That’s a very creditworthy buyer. Hopefully, we’ll have access to more of the market that is out there.” Meanwhile, Saab dealers aren’t exactly thrilling over the decision. “We need product, and we need a clear decision made” on Saab’s future, one Saab dealer tells AN. Either “we’re going to continue to be a part of General Motors’ family, or we have a buyer lined up, and here’s the buyer.” And though that decision doesn’t seem to be immediately forthcoming, at least everyone can pretend like it’s the nineties for another week. Trailblazer at zero percent interest? If that doesn’t get the nostalgia flowing, I don’t know what will.

Shortly after receiving its second bailout of the month (first Chrysler, then GMAC), Cerberus Capital Management announced that it is limiting investor redemptions. Finalternatives reports that Cerberus recently notified investors that gate provisions on its Cerberus Partners hedge fund were triggered after clients sought to withdraw more than 16.5% of the fund’s assets. Investors will be allowed to withdraw one-fifth of their year-end redemptions, and Cerberus is magnanimously waiving 60 percent of its incentive fee for one year after it recoups losses. Cerberus lost over 18 percent in October and November alone, and its Chrysler investment is likely a total loss. “This is a very hard decision for us, and the realization that taking these steps is now necessary is deeply disappointing,” says Cerberus top dog Stephen Feinberg.

So opens a guest commentary by Ira Lacher in today’s Des Moines Register. And if you believe the Detroit line, you might assume this voice from the middle American heartland would answer in the affirmative. You’d be wrong. Lacher describes his impression of American cars as being “designed and put together by committee – a bunch of parts cobbled together. The steering wheel felt as if it were just sticking out of the dashboard. The gas and brake pedals seemed mere appendages to the floor. The seats were uncomfortable frames covered with cheap cloth. This wasn’t a car; it was a homemade personal computer! By contrast, every rented Honda, Toyota, Mazda and Nissan seemed like a machine that functioned like one machine.” But when he recently purchased a Hyundai, Lacher clearly felt at least a few pangs of guilt.

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From the “there but for the grace of god go I” file comes the story of one GMAC debtor who can’t catch a break from the company that is catching breaks left and right. The New York Daily News profiles the plight of Chastity Strawder, an unemployed schoolteacher who is falling behind on lease payments for her Pontiac G6. Having leased two G6s (after all the usual credit checks), Strawder developed health problems and lost her job. Now falling behind on lease payments, Strawder is being treated to a series of angry phone calls from GMAC who want their freaking money, man. And Strawder seems to believe that since she and GMAC are in the same boat (“can’t make ends meet”), they might treat her with the same generosity that she (as a taxpayer) is showing them. Apparently not. $6b of public funding or not, GMAC is still in it for GMAC. Or is that Cerberus? Either way, the moral of the story is that bailouts won’t weaken the world’s most powerful force: compound interest.

Automotive News [sub] reports that GM is claiming to have 10k pre-orders for its neo-pony car. Too bad they might not arrive on time. Still, that’s about 5k commitments per year of relentless hype. Not too shabby.

When Toyota told the world that it didn’t want to see any of its American competitors go bankrupt, they meant it. And not purely out of fear of an anti-import backlash either. Toyota’s North American operations rely on many of the same suppliers as Detroit, and if GM were to go bankrupt, many of those suppliers could go under. This is especially dangerous for Toyota with its “just-in-time” production techniques, which is why contingency planning is underway at Toyota City to keep ToMoCo’s supply chain independently solvent. But as Bloomberg reports, that very contingency planning could eliminate the efficiency gains of the Toyota system, once dubbed “The Machine That Changed The World.” The lean, “just-in-time” system was developed on the model of American supermarkets, with components arriving as they are needed for the production process, rather than being mass-produced and stored until needed. Emergency planning includes possibly building up component inventories, which strikes at the heart of the “just-in-time” system’s competitive advantage. Still, a supplier bankruptcy would wreak even more havoc, holding up production lines until more parts arrive. The Japanese automakers have recently learned firsthand of the cost of supply disruption, especially among specialized (tier two and three) component makers. Last July, piston-ring maker Riken’s shut-down due to earthquake damaged forced eight of Japan’s 12 carmakers to temporarily suspend or cut manufacturing, leading to a total output reduction of at least 120,000 vehicles.

According to Automotive News [sub], investor Kirk Kerkorian’s Tracinda Corp sold off its 133.5m share position in the Ford Motor Company. Tracinda first revealed that it would divest its Ford holdings in regulatory documents filed in October. It has now confirmed the complete sale. Tracinda spent over $1b on Ford stake beginning in April, paying an average of $7.10 per share. At the time of writing, Ford is selling at $2.22 per share and falling. Kerkorian’s losses in Ford are estimated at over $660m. Still, the ninety-year-old money man can take the hit. Not only because he’s close enough to the end of his life to not give a dman, but also because Forbes rates “the Lion of Las Vegas'” current net worth at a $16b. Ford was the third Detroit automaker to attract Kerkorian’s attention; the sale marks the end of his tortured involvement the major domestic auto OEMs. Of course, when they file, Kirk or his minions might go bargain hunting…

Auto Motor und Sport hears that Mazda will debut a gas/hydrogen powertrain on its 2012 rotary-sportster, the RX-9. This got the German lads so excited they comissioned Mark Stehrenberg to sketch up this rendering of a potential next-gen RX. Keep in mind that all Stehrenberg had to go on was the Taiki showcar and news that the wankel engine would power the rear wheels only. As for the dual-fuel hydrogen system (think BMW Hydrogen 7), Mazda is already testing the powertrain on RX-8 mules. Although Mazda will probably improve on the BMW system’s many shortcomings by 2012, it will be interesting to see what Lithium-Ion batteries will be capable of by then. Or if there will even be hydrogen refueling stations outside of LA. Elsewhere in 2012, I’ll be stalking the used CRZ market for my slice of eco-friendly fun.