CNN reports that Nashville, TN has run out of gas, after local motorists became convinced that the city was running out of gas, which it then did. “Everybody has just gone nuts,” Mike Williams, executive director of the Tennessee Petroleum Council, told the network. Williams said drivers were bird-dogging gas trucks and lines at some stations were “a mile long.” He said fuel was continuing to enter the city; pipelines were working and barges were coming in. Stories on iReport (take that as you will) chronicle shortages in Asheville, NC, Marietta, GA and Buckhead. Speaking to Forbes, Carol Gifford from the AAA Carolinas office said that some stations may be totally out of gas, while others may have trouble getting certain grades of gasoline. “So what motorists see, is a gas station that once had an outage now has gas. They only have it for a day or so, and then they are out again. That will probably continue until more refineries are back up and operating,” Gifford said. As TTAC pointed-out after hurricane Katrina knocked-out refineries, the big problem is that there’s no one federal standard for gasoline blends. A patchwork of state mandates guarantees supply disruptions when refining capacity is curtailed. Way to go regulators.

Ending a sentence with a preposition is something up with which I will not put. And when this literary faux pas emanates from a professional copywriter, well, how do you say “insupportable!” (Hopefully with Gallic disdain.) Shame on you, Mssr. Vinny Manchillo, chief creative officer of Scott Howell & Company and guest columnist for AdAge. “Electing a public official is almost exactly like working on another type of traditional advertising account. One that, unlike political advertising, everyone is clamoring to work on. Political advertising is just like working on a car account.” Yes, “Barack Obama is a stunning orator and tremendous motivator. More than a candidate, he’s a personality-driven movement. For his supporters, that far outweighs any shortcomings he may have in his experience or voting record. He is a Ferrari.” So what does that make McCain? A Toyota Camry. So much for Obama, then. Take that as gospel from a guy who was a stand-up comic and lawnmower racer before he worked on the Subaru account. Unless you’re Scott Monty, Global Digital Communications guy for Ford Motor Company, who thinks it’s “interesting that you [Vinny] chose two foreign cars for candidates for President of the *United States.*”

Reuters reports that Fitch Ratings has downgraded GM’s credit rating even deeper into junk territory, down to ‘CCC’, the eighth-lowest speculative grade in its corporate rating scale. Fitch based its downgrade on GM’s lack of liquidity. As TTAC predicted, The General’s cash flow– or lack thereof– is reaching a crisis point. “Fitch believes that GM would reach minimum required levels of available liquidity within the next 12 months without access to external capital,” analysts said in a note. “Contributing factors include weakening overseas results and the impact of the credit crisis on GM and GMAC’s ability to finance retail sales.” Fitch reckons GM will score its share of the $25b federal low-interest loans. To no avail. The wording of the agency’s note is as frightening as it is terse: “In all, Fitch believes that GM will be challenged to raise financing in an amount that exceeds $10 billion, and will therefore be unable to offset expected liquidity drains over the next 12 months.”

With new vehicle sales set to tank by over 30 percent this year, Chrysler is casting around for a way to generate a little cash. And the answer is… the after market! “[Chief marketing officer] Meyer said Chrysler’s loyalty study group includes dealers. The group is looking hard at service issues, notably customization. Advances in vehicle telematics and connectivity promote customization, she added. ‘If buyers keep their vehicle longer, do they want to customize it more?’ Meyer said. ‘Do you want something new on the interior or a little something to spiff the car up? There are opportunities for us.'” So, one failing business model (Pep Boys) replaces another (making cars). Oh, and did I mention ChryCo wants to get into the rental  business? “Chrysler also is looking at ways to provide customers occasional-use vehicles, Meyer said. As an example, she described an owner who has unloaded an SUV but ‘you have to move things twice a year for your parents.’ She said Chrysler and its dealers will seek to respond to that need.” Meanwhile, Automotive News [sub] reports that Jim Arrigo, chairman of the Chrysler Jeep National Dealer Council, says customer loyalty “has gone right out the window.”

Honest-to-God, I couldn’t care less what Megan Fox drives. All I know is that she’s an actress playing a car savvy babe, not a car savvy babe. To wit: “We still drive an SUV but we’re gonna get rid of it,” Ms. Fox told green gossip site Ecorazzi. “Tesla’s coming with some of these little electric cars that I want to get as soon as they’re out.” Cute? Little? Ecorazzi? Doesn’t that sound like an unforunate combination of “eco” and “Nazi?” Hey! Did you know they’re going to make another Transformers movie? I know. Why bother right? ‘Cause Megan needs money to buy that cute little what’s it called again? Taster? Taser? Who knows? Anyway, your money’s no good at Tesla, Megan. And therein lies the tale.

Displaying a knack for euphemisms, The Detroit News reports that the Securities and Exchange Commission have banned short sales of General Motors stock until October 2, “a move aimed at preventing the stock from being driven down amid rocky market conditions.” (As the DeTN puts it, “Investors who engage in short sales attempt to profit from falling stock prices. They sell borrowed shares, hoping the price will drop so they can repurchase the stock later at a cheaper price and pocket the difference.”) GM joins a second wave of around 90 companies added to the list of 799 companies whose stocks can no longer be purchased in the hope/plan/acknowledgement that their share price is headed for the crapper. So why is GM on this list? “The SEC said the temporary move was needed to ‘prevent short selling from being used to drive down the share prices of issuers even where there is no fundamental basis for a price decline other than general market conditions.'” Again, so why is GM on this list? [As of 1:55pm, GM’s stock price was at $12.40, having dipped below $10 several times this year.]

The Detroit Free Press finally offers us a timeline on when GM, Ford and Chrysler might get their share of $25b worth of federal low-interest loans. While congressional funding will most probably slip through this week, cash-in-hand is a whole ‘nother matter. “The Bush administration must still write the rules that will govern how the loans will be handed out, and the U.S. Department of Energy has said the process may not be done by the end of the year. After Congress set up a loan guarantee program to develop clean energy sources in August 2005, the DOE took more than two years to write the rules for it, and no money has been lent yet. With a new administration taking a couple of months to fill key jobs and restart the work, auto executives worry that without quick action on the rules, they would not see any money from the loans until mid-2009 at the earliest.” To his credit, The Freep’s Justin Hyde spells it out. “Given the estimates of slow auto sales through 2010, that kind of delay could make Detroit’s troubles look more like Wall Street’s.”

God forbid The Detroit Free Press should question the intellectual basis upon which bailout proponents stake their claim to $25b worth of taxpayer funded low-interest loans. (Or more.) No, the hometown paper feels obliged– obliged I tell you– to offer its own summary of how The Big 2.8 should argue their case for bailout bucks during this “challenging” time. Justin Hyde of their Washington staff reckons Wall Street’s financial meltdown helps Motown by blessing them with three talking points: “automakers and parts suppliers are pledging to pay back the money they receive;” the loans are “small change” and “helping blue-collar factory workers carries more political cachet than riding to the rescue of bankers.” And now the really good news! “Democratic leaders have said they likely will put the auto industry’s request into the budget resolution that keeps the government open through the elections — the only veto-proof bill that Congress must pass before it adjourns. That bill is expected to come to the floor sometime later this week, depending on how far lawmakers get on other matters.” Bad news to follow…

Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) is a formidable political force. As you’d expect, the group supports police “sobriety checkpoints,” a .08 blood alcohol content threshhold for drunk driving convictions and ignition interlocks for convicted drunk drivers. As we’ve reported before, the American Beverage Institute (ABI) opposes random roadblocks and believes that the .08 level is set too low. And they’re not happy about ignition interlocks for anyone convicted of drunk driving. Obviously, this means war. MADD has opened a new front in their anti-ABI campaign. A press release names ABI members and completely mis-characterizes the trade group’s position on drink driving (“ABI’s consistent stand is that America’s drunk driving laws are too strict and should not be enforced) and intimates that ALL “family restaurants” (quotation marks theirs) should quit the organization. “The American public wants to know why these so called ‘family-friendly’ restaurants appear to be putting alcohol profits ahead of public safety,” said Laura Dean-Mooney, national president of MADD. “We call upon these restaurants to explain to the public why they oppose laws proven to keep drunk drivers off the road or, preferably, to support these life-saving measures.” Ends. Means. Justification?

Say what you will about the evils of globalism. One thing’s for sure: if you’re a global playa, there’s no escaping the market’s judgment. The Washington Post reports that sure, falling oil prices have taken their toll on the Russian economy. But Vlad the Inhaler’s power-grab is the real deal. “Analysts say Russia faces continuing doubts about the investment climate, given the Kremlin’s concentration of political power. These concerns were exacerbated by Russia’s war with Georgia last month. Putin’s tough, anti-Western rhetoric raised fears of a turn against foreign investors and even greater state control of the economy. Investors pulled nearly $35 billion out of the country in the weeks after the war.” Translation: GM’s highly-touted Russian investments are not looking so good, these days. “Rising inflation is a political problem. Most analysts expect inflation to hit 14 or 15 percent this year, which for the first time in Putin’s rule would leave the average Russian worse off at the end of the year than at the start.” Oh, and Putin’s regime has increased Russia’s roadways by .1 percent. [thanks to wludavid for the link]

Well he would, wouldn’t he? As usual, George F. Will takes his sweet time getting to the meat of the matter: his final position on Uncle Sam’s $25b low-interest loans for The Big 2.8. And when he does, Will’s irony meter pegs out at 10. “Lemon socialism — the subsidization of the weak — is supposedly needed lest a U.S. automaker file for bankruptcy, causing the sort of civil disorder and social chaos that accompanied the disappearance of Studebaker, Packard, American Motors and others.” Will’s summation hedges his rhetorical bets, but the message couldn’t be any different from Washington Post stablemate and nominal car critic Warren Brown. “Detroit says, correctly, that some of its problems stem from fuel economy and other mandates imposed by the 535 automotive engineers on Capitol Hill. But that is beside the point, which is: No one thinks that the failure of an auto manufacturer would pose systemic risk to the economy. Americans would just buy a different mix of cars.” In fact, day after day, month after month, year after year, they already are. [thanks to loads o’ folks for the link]

“Their overriding challenge is: How do you manage eight different brands?” Well exactly. Dan Gorrell, founder of consultant AutoStratagem, understands that there’s only so much GM can do to promote any one brand or model when there are eight (minus HUMMER seven) hungry mouths (with over 40 models) to feed. No news there. The General’s inability to to trim its American ambitions has long passed the point where they can do much of anything about it (i.e. close or sell brands)– at least without without declaring C11. So the wind-down of what was once the world’s largest automaker continues on all fronts. Advertising Age reports the damage: “General Motors Corp. plans to cut its digital-media budget after dramatically increasing it in the past few years, the automaker’s North American marketing chief told Advertising Age.” Cutting as in no replacement. The Academy Awards are gone. GM Style at the LA and Detroit auto shows is gone. The Super Bowl is gone. So how much of GM’s $2b+ ad spend is left? GM’s Marketing Maven is characteristically cagey. “Mr. LaNeve said last week that GM has already implemented more than half the ad spending cuts it planned for the remainder of 2008. When asked where the reductions were, he said, “It’s 100 things. It’s a consolidation of promotions and getting out of some. It’s production, media, agencies, outsourcing contracts, structural costs and people.”

After presidential candidate John McCain took a ration of you-know-what for his daughter’s Japanese-built Toyota Prius, Newsweek‘s revelation that the McCains own 13 cars is bound to put the Arizona senator in the firing line. “McCain’s personal ride, a 2004 Cadillac CTS, is no gas sipper, but it should make Detroit happy because it’s made by General Motors. ‘I’ve bought American literally all my life and I’m proud,’ McCain said in the interview with Detroit’s WXYZ-TV. But the rest of his fleet is not all-American. There’s a 2005 Volkswagen convertible in the garage along with a 2001 Honda sedan. Otherwise, there’s a 2007 half-ton Ford pickup truck, which might come in handy on the Sedona ranch; a vintage 1960 Willys Jeep; a 2008 Jeep Wrangler; a 2000 Lincoln; and a 2001 GMC SUV. The McCains also own three 2000 NEV Gem electric vehicles, which are bubble-shaped cars popular in retirement communities.” And here’s the kicker: Johny’s Caddy is the only car registered in his name. “Cindy McCain’s name is on 11 vehicles, though not the one she actually drives. That car, a Lexus, is registered to her family’s beer-distributor business and is outfitted with personalized plates that read MS BUD.” Meanwhile, the Obamas own a Ford Escape Hyrbrid, after Barack took some heat for his “gas-guzzling” (Canadian-built) Chrysler 300C.