As our commentators debate the wisdom and/or necessity of the new, larger Honda Accord, our good friends over at The Car Connection (TCC) reveal that Bentley is looking at lightening their luxobarges. Well, at least they're talking about it. "They've embarked on an in-depth study that could sharply shift the brand's design and engineering direction," TCC reports. "A reflection of the fact that even the rich must recognize growing concerns about energy prices and global warming." So now you know: environmental sensitivity isn't just for poor people anymore. No really. "'We have to examine whether to change the philosophy of Bentley, which focuses on large, heavy cars with large, torquey engines,' explained [CEO Franz-Josef ] Paefgen." Then again… "The most dangerous thing for us to do would be to react to whatever we read in the papers… If our customers don't accept that (lightweight) approach, we'd be in big trouble." And when will we see these new, kindler, gentler Bentleys; you know, if we do? The new Arnage "may also feature the use of newer, lighter materials, rather than massive lumps of steel." And here I was thinking that was the entire point of the Arnage. 

After more than a week of overtime negotiations, the United Auto Workers (UAW) is on strike at General Motors. For those who think this action signals the beginning of the end for The General: yes and no. On the yes side, the strike will highlight the original sins that led both sides to this point. The executive greed and mismanagement. The union intransigence and denial. The strike will alert the dim-witted media that the Emperor hasn’t been wearing any clothes for decades, ding GM's rep, and make it even more difficult for the carmaker to sell cars. On the no side, GM will settle. A compromise will be reached. The same players will play the same game, poorer but no wiser.

An investment banker once told me business isn't risky. People are risky. One guy can take a dumb as toast business plan and make millions. Another guy can take a slam dunk and forget to throw the ball. Divining where risk lives is a lot harder than it seems. The same biz brain said planning for failure is easy. If Cadillac's new sub-CTS doesn't sell, well, the brand has plenty of experience not selling small cars. But what if the mini-Caddy sells like hotcakes? Could the average Caddy dealer deal? What would it do to the Cadillac brand? Or Buick? Or Chevy? For GM execs who mutter "we should be so lucky," be careful what you wish for. Meanwhile, I wish governments would ease-up on the whole risk elimination business. Even global warming's most vociferous adherents will admit that the possibility of rising ocean levels flooding our coastal conurbations is a risk, not a dead cert. How far are we willing to go to eliminate that risk? Do we really need to force people out of their cars to do so? And who's planning for the potential problems that success would bring? No one. Until I see that kind of thinking on the issue, I'm staying out of it. Well, at least until Monday. 

I've got a couple of bones to pick with BMW designer Chris Bangle. First, I reckon the "flame surfacing" design style that he's inflicted on the brand since the 2002 7-Series has trashed the sina qua non of German automotive elegance. Second, the Ohio-born Bimmer big-wig's insistence on pronouncing perfectly good English words with a German accent (e.g. "owtowmobile" and "schport") strikes me as the worst sort of pistonhead-goes-to-art-school pretentiousness. And now Bangle's really bungled it. On BMW-web-tv, Bangle waxes lyrical about his employer's Geneva auto stand. Ten seconds in, Bangles says "It's kind of an axis of white power here; there are really strong white cars." Now we're not suggesting that Bangle's racist, or that BMW's lack of minorities in their upper executive echelons reflects any kind of ethnic or cultural insensitivity. But that's certainly not the kind of comment you'd expect a car executive to make off the cuff– or fail to realize he had made and order it struck from the record. And the fact that Bangle's axis of white power comment made it onto BMW's website tells us they lack English-speakers, political sensitivity or both. Just sayin'. 

The European Court has announced judgment day for its ruling on the so-called "VW law" thwarting Porsche's takeover plans: 9:30am, October 23. Meanwhile, union bosses at the two automakers are duking it out in the court of public opinion. Just-auto [sub] reports that the head of the Porsche works council, Uwe Hück, has called his opposite number at VW, Bernd Osterloh, an "out of control boxer" [pugilist, not engine]. Hück was responding to Osterloh's assertion that Porsche management had refused to meet with him to discuss future VW worker representation on the Porsche Holding SE's supervisory board. Osterloh's beef: when if Porsche assumes control of VW, both unions get three seats on the new company's board. As far as Osterloh's concerned, this would give "Porsche employees" veto power over Volkswagen employees. As far as Hück is concerned, "Saying that a workforce of 324,000 carries more weight than one of 12,000 is capitalist talk. In a democratic social state, everyone has equal rights, whether they are big, small, fat or thin." What was that about divide and conquer?

The European Union may soon force automakers to include health/global warming warnings on their car advertisements, similar to the list of possible side effects required on US drug ads. MotorTrader (MT) reports that English MEP (Member European Parliament) Chris Davies has submitted a report on the proposal to EU chiefs, who will debate the idea in October. Davies' report also calls for a Euro-wide ban on any car ad that promotes a vehicle's high speed performance (as is currently in place in the UK) and ban the sale of cars that can drive faster than 101mph. According to MT, Davies "noted that the power of new cars increased by 28 per cent between 1994 and 2004, making them heavier and thus increasing the amount of CO2 output. This increase is completely unnecessary, the MEP said, as no country has raised its speed limit to allow cars to use this additional power."  

Who'd a thunk a car insurance company would have the stones to challenge the value of tomorrow's ever-so-PC International Car Free Day? And get this: the company in question is ibuyeco, the "eco-friendly UK car insurance company" [Customers' premiums include a carbon offsetting fee donated to The CarbonNeutral Company for eco-friendly projects]. The insurer's survey of 1500 Brits reveals that the anti-car (or pro non-automotive) event is flying well beneath the radar of the average UK motorist. Only 12 percent were aware of International Car Free Day (although they jolly well will be if and when they face the resulting traffic jams). When told of the global initiative, 72 percent of respondents said they wouldn't even "consider" taking part. When the survey takers asked recalcitrant motorists why they wouldn't give up their cars, work, shopping and visiting family topped the list. Three quarters of all respondents said public transport was not a viable alternative to using the car, citing time implications, delays, cost and lack of convenience.  

[Interview with Jim Hawker of ibuyeco below.] 

Private equity firm Cerberus ain't had enough fun. Despite (or becuase of) their enormous investment in Chrysler, the business brains at the three-headed dog have just cut another billion dollar deal, scarfing Swedish paper maker Stora Enso Oyj's ailing North American operations. Adding paper mills in Wisconsin, Minnesota and Canada to their NewPage Holding Corp. unit cost Cerberus $2.07b. Analysts are not yet convinced that the big deal is a Big Deal. "It's encouraging as it's the first billion-plus deal we've seen in recent weeks,'' Peter Taylor told Bloomberg. The managing partner at buyout firm Duke Street Capital Ltd. notes that the deal is significant, but not necessarily trend-setting. "It's probably too early to say if it's a turning point. It's in a specialist industry in the U.S." IF the move means credit is loosening-up again, it will have important implications for the game of musical chairs over at Ford's Premier Automotive Group and… elsewhere. If not, not. 

Few people will recognize the name Salman Rushdie. Those who do will know know Rushdie as the Indian-born fiction writer whose novel The Satanic Verses inspired the Ayatollah Khomeini to issue a death sentence against its author. After attempting to read the work in question, I can tell you that it's far more likely that the the fatwa was, in truth, an act of literary criticism, rather than a divinely-inspired retribution for Koranic blasphemy. Suffice it to say, the rest of Rushdie's literary canon can be safely placed in that special category pretentious people call "challenging." In fact, Rushdie's greatest work was penned when he worked as advertising copywriter for Ogilvy & Mather. The headline above is one such Rushdie meisterwerk, written for the UK's Egg Council. He also wrote "Naughty but Nice" for a cake maker. But just try and find a bio that gives proper credit for these bon mots, or explains the creative process they required. As Justin and I dissect ad slogans on this podcast, try to remember that it takes a blazing talent to find a few words that can carry a car brand into the hearts and minds of consumers. And a great company to recognize and embrace them. 

A couple of days ago, we published an editorial taking English auto scribe James May to task for flaming American cars. For this, we were flamed. Despite TTAC’s blanket ban on comments that diss the website, and our ban on [off topic] comments questioning our editorial stance or style, many of you cried foul. How could Mr. Swanson accuse a British writer of an anti-American car bias when TTAC [obviously] shared this same prejudice? After damping down the flames of perceived hypocrisy, I promised to provide offended readers a place to fire at will. And here it is.

TTAC scribe Stein X Leikanger previously reported on Dutch planner Hans Moderman's "shared space" traffic management philosophy, which says that removing signs and traditional barriers between cars and other road users increases safety. The Independent reports that the German town of Bohmte joins the Dutch town of Drachten  as another proving ground for the controversial theory. With a European Union grant of £1.6m– who said minimalism was cheap?– the estimated 13.5k vehicles passing through the German hamlet now do so without any indication of who should go where when and how. While the scheme's backers claim shared space reduces accidents, congestion and emissions, it seems Bohmte's motivation was a little more prosaic. The town grabbed the EU cash in an attempt to reduce the number of trucks rumbling through town. Mayor Klaus Goedejohann provides the straight dope: "With our version of shared space, we hope that Bohmte will gain a reputation among lorry drivers as a town to be avoided."

The Detroit News reports that Ford has extended the bidding deadline for the sale of its Jaguar and Land Rover brands. The delay does not bode well for India's Tata Motors; it gives the Indian automaker's private equity rivals more time to secure financing for the deal. Meanwhile, Indiantelevision.com reports that Tata's way ahead of its competitors on its home turf– at least in terms of television advertising. From January to this August, Tata bought more TV time than Honda Hero Motors, by a margin of 19 to 17 percent. Mighty Mahindra & Mahindra, which dropped out of the bidding for Jag and Landie, spent their money elsewhere. Which may be just as well in a clutter-kills-your-message kinda way; Indian TV runs an average of 630 car or Jeep ads per day. 

The Jacksn Clarion Ledger reports that Mayor Frank Melton's plan to impound the vehicles of motorists with past-due city fines– designed to scarf-up some $10m in "missing" revenue– is running into strong political and practical headwinds. First, the Captain of the Hinds County Sheriff's Departmenthas publicly declared that he will do anything to enforce the law– but he won't do that. "We'll still be participating in a joint operation to serve misdemeanor warrants," Capt. Ken Magee said. "But as far as going to a person's home and towing their vehicle? No. We're not going to do that." Second, as University of Mississippi law professor Michael Hoffheimer points out, the campaign faces the law of severely diminished returns. "There are things cities can do to collect fines that are legal," he said. "But the problem is they are also expensive." And lastly, the Mayor's decision to target "high dollar" cars first will win him no friends amongst the cities movers and shakers– even if they are scofflaws.

Yesterday, we reported that Saudi Arabia's blanket ban on women drivers was rooted in clerical  fatwas– rather than secular or Islamic law. As if to prove the point, African Business reports that the predominantly conservative, 95 percent Muslim west African country of Senegal is training two thousand women taxi drivers. Project "Taxi Sister" is the result of a government fund to help would-be female entrepreneurs and car dealer Espace-Auto. To allay critics, the taxi drivers will only work from seven AM to seven PM, wear distinctive (and chaste) uniforms and receive martial arts training. Espace-Auto's MD claims the project it's not all about the art of the deal. "(Male-female) parity should not be just a slogan," Serigne Mboup said. "It must be applied in the economic sphere." Amen.  

Failing upwards is a very strange concept, one that I don't pretend to understand. For example, Mark Fields took the reins of  Ford's doomed-from-birth Premier Automotive Group (PAG) from founder Wolgang Reitzle in 1998. During Field's four-year tenure, PAG continued its inexorable decline. Fields didn't staunch Jaguar's wounds (i.e. kill the X-type) or introduce hit models (i.e. the Jaguar F-type) or do anything to pull PAG into profit (i.e. launch the Volvo XC90). And yet his service at PAG earned Fields the position of President of the Americas and a temporary slot as CEO-in-waiting. No doubt Fields is a handsome, energetic, personable, intelligent and hard-working Ford employee. But it seems that his ascension has more to do with these traits than what business people like to call "results." The fact that Fields is still in situ tells me that Ford's diseased corporate culture remains intact– which is far more worrying prospect than even its bone dry product pipeline. Can ex-Boeing CEO Alan Mulally retrain Ford's old guard in his new (old) ways? Maybe. But I'm reminded of a piece of advice I found in an Atlantic magazine article some 20 years ago. What's the trick to training a dog? Answer above.