It’s the last thing Elon Musk wants to hear and it’s likely not something General Motors will be too pleased about. Contained within the tax plan introduced by House Republicans Thursday is the elimination of a huge driver for electric vehicle sales — the $7,500 EV tax credit.

Automakers, and especially the two mentioned above, already stood to lose their credits in the near future (there’s a 200,000-vehicle-per-manufacturer cap), but the new tax bill would see the buyer incentive permanently removed, not renewed, as many had hoped. Such a move could slam the brakes on a still-fledgling segment in the U.S. Read More >

North America’s love affair with SUVs and crossovers arose so suddenly and with such passion that manufacturers were left scrambling to meet demand. Luxury brands certainly aren’t exempt from this but, unlike mainstream marquis, the sudden shift in product demand has thrown those marques a bit of a curveball.

Since prestige brands tend to possess substantially higher leasing rates than their more-affordable contemporaries, luxury automakers are getting stuck with off-lease sedans that nobody seems to want. While that’s terrible news for corporate accountants, it’s good news for anyone looking for a good deal on a used Lexus ES or Audi A4.  Read More >

For two years right at the inception of the Infiniti brand, the automaker’s lineup featured an M30 coupe and convertible. Sharing a body with the JDM Nissan Leopard, under the hood lay the VG30 engine from the delightful Nissan 300ZX.

This one’s clean enough to warrant a Picture Time, but not rare enough for Rare Rides duty. Check out this maroon rectangle.

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Some of you noticed that we had a little bit of a technical snafu yesterday, and a few of you commented on Steph’s post with references to your own IT issues.

I try to read as many comments as I can, but it’s not humanly possible for me to catch them all. The same is true for the rest of our editors. Our moderators do a great job and clue us in to issues, but we’re all busy and things get missed.

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Today we step back in time over 50 years to check out a little beige truck. Imported across the sea, it fell right into the hands of a caring buyer — one who cautiously stepped away from the American pickup truck norm. What we have here is the very beginning of a Japanese manufacturer’s truck offerings in North America; a 66-horsepower genesis moment.

It’s a Toyota Stout, from 1966.

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The 10th-generation Accord sedan has been thrust into a marketplace infatuated with crossovers and all-wheel-drive machines of every type and description. Lower, wider, and with more interior room than its predecessor, the Accord’s new clothes wear well, tapering to the rear with a fastback flair. You just know there’s at least one Honda sales person out there using the words “four-door coupe.”

Thing is, some folks are so brand loyal to the Honda marque that they’ll buy one simply because the word “Accord” is hammered onto the trunk lid. For the rest of us, let’s take a look at this year’s base model Accord and see if it measures up to our Ace of Base yardstick. Read More >

Then Peter opened his mouth, and said, Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons; But in every nation he that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him. Some of you will immediately recognize that as Acts 10:34-35. The rest of you are heathens who have no business in a civilized society. I’m just kidding, of course; in the future, do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.

The phrase “respecter of persons” won’t be immediately obvious to people without a classical education so allow me to elaborate. To pay respect to someone’s person was to give them the courtesy due their rank. It’s odd to think that once upon a time children were exhaustively drilled in proper titles and modes of address and whatnot, but that’s just the way it was. Woe betide the poor prole who referred to someone as “Your Grace” instead of “Your Highness” or something like that.

We’re now seeing a bit of that old stratified society return nowadays, in the endless permutations of luxury services and in Manhattanite children who tell their parents, “Next time we fly private like everyone else.” It will only get worse from here. And the more it becomes blatantly obvious that there are different classes of people in this world, the stronger the appeal will be of a politician, or a God, who is immune to the blandishments and caresses of rank but instead judges people for their righteous works.

The American freeway, of course, has a ranking system of its own, and that’s where today’s question comes in.

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Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you know Ram will drop a new half-ton pickup at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit in January. It’s a big gamble redesigning a cash cow, lest the truck faithful turn up their noses at the new styling.

In the past, manufacturers have hedged their bets by simultaneously producing both the new and old styles, such as when Ford offered both the F-150 and F-150 Heritage in 2004. Now, Ram appears poised to deploy the same strategy in 2018, according to bossman Sergio Marchionne.

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Great handling, two seats, sporty styling, and coupe lines. No, we’re not talking about a Corvette Z06, because it’s another Malaise Day here at Rare Rides — and our topic of discussion is a shockingly orange Ford EXP.

I always thought those letters stood for EXtra Powerful, but maybe I was wrong. Let’s find out.

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This should lead to more than a few odd pairings. Mopar, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles’ performance and aftermarket parts division, will now offer a Dodge SRT Hellcat engine — the company’s 707 horsepower, supercharged 6.2-liter V8 — minus the car.

Dubbed the “Hellcrate,” the warranty-backed engine and associated kit was unveiled Monday ahead of this week’s SEMA show in Las Vegas. This means Mopar fans looking to own a 707-hp beast have other options than just visiting an FCA dealer and signing on the dotted line for a new vehicle. Read More >

While it’s impossible to imagine you haven’t already noticed, Japanese automakers are entering a new era of style. Disparate from each other and unabashedly novel, vehicles are beginning to crop up at trade shows and on the road that we couldn’t have seen coming a few years earlier.

Right now, the most obvious examples are from Toyota and Honda. But even Mazda, Subaru, and Mitsubishi have recently made a concerted effort to step up their styling game. The reason, according to manufacturers, is new competition.

It wasn’t all that long ago that Japan could offer a fairly dull automobile and bank on its superior quality and value to get prospective buyers to take it home. Things are different now. The quality gap is beginning to close and other manufacturers are getting better at providing most of the things that used to denote something as distinctively Japanese.  Read More >

Even though it represents a small slice of the model’s overall volume, Toyota owes a lot to the hybrid version of its top-selling RAV4 compact crossover. Without it, the RAV4 wouldn’t actually be the United States’ top-selling compact crossover.

Through the end of September, Toyota sold 36,352 hybrid variants, pushing the RAV4 nameplate ahead of the Nissan Rogue/Rogue Sport family. Sales of the hybrid model are up 10 percent this year. Realizing it has a good thing on its hands, Toyota seems eager to get more RAV4 Hybrids into the hands of green-car shoppers looking for more room to go with their fuel economy.

The automaker is now planning a new entry-level trim for the 2018 RAV4 Hybrid. Read More >

One thing about visiting wrecking yards in the Upper Midwest is that I know I’ll see interesting late-model General Motors cars.

I couldn’t find the elusive junkyard Saturn Ion Redline during my trip to Wisconsin in August, but I did find its Chevrolet cousin: a Chevrolet Cobalt SS, spotted in a Green Bay self-service yard. Read More >

For five years now, Mazda has hinted, then promised, then reassured us that a rotary-powered sports car will return to the company’s lineup, ready to fill a spot left vacant by the departing RX-8 in 2012.

We’re still waiting and, Mazda now informs us, we’ll be waiting quite a bit longer. While the cylinderless gasoline engine holds promise as a range-extender in electrified vehicles (something powertrain chief Mitsuo Hitomi feels is a definite future use for the powerplant), that’s not something Wankel fans want to hear. They want to spin that engine up to eleventy billion rpm and drop the clutch.

It’ll happen, says Mazda’s senior managing executive officer, Kiyoshi Fujiwara, but something’s cropped up that pushed the rotary’s return to the back burner. That thing is the company’s gasoline compression ignition engine, the Skyactiv-X. Read More >

I’ve already made the case against Aston Martin using Tom Brady as a brand ambassador. However, after months of marinating in a pool of semi-rational anger, I came to the realization that not everyone would view it as a step down from James Bond.

Brady was chosen specifically to appeal to the United States because Aston wants to bolster sales in North America. His eerily straight teeth and All American Good Looks™ were a marketing selection, albeit an incredibly boring one.

While I prattle on endlessly about how unsettling I find the man, what I find particularly bothersome is that we’re supposed to presume Brady is an automotive enthusiast and ambassador of good taste. However, I’ve never seen him doing guest spots on motoring shows and his penchant for the finer things appears to be nothing more than a byproduct of his being successful. So, when Aston announced the $360,000 car he spent five months helping design was finished, my eyes rolled so far back into my head that it induced a nose bleed and I subsequently passed out.  Read More >