Generally speaking, I'm not partial to cars that remind me of death. But I respect Lexus for selling a model lineup that keeps faith with their "luxury car as mobile mausoleum" brand heritage. That said, the Japanese automaker's sensory deprivation shtick has taken a couple of major hits since the debut of the LS400, in the form of leathered-up, badge-engineered Toyotas. But the "new" GS300 is a far more worrying development: a bespoke model that turns its back on everything that made The Big L successful in the first place.

Visually, that's a good thing. The new GS300 represents a bold and beautiful break from Lexus' amorphous aesthetic. The four-door's front end seems a bit of an 8-Series crib, and the rear is as confused as an absinthe drinker, but the GS300's hunkered stance and nose-heavy proportions project a genuine sense of aggression. The rear pillars are especially wikkid, and the swageless sides add a statement of streamlined modernity. If ever a car promised to give the BMW 530i a decent run for the money– and quite a lot of money it is too– the GS300 is it.

So, Ford has a new guck. I only caught a few seconds of the ad touting The Blue Oval's "Grand Unifying Concept", but I'm reasonably sure Mr. Bill promised that, from now on, all Ford motor products will be known for… innovation. Should reality somehow mirror hype, Ford's eight brands will heretofore produce cutting edge vehicles that do way cool stuff that will make both consumers and the competition sit up and say "Whoa, Dude!" Maybe, but I reckon innovation is as likely to save FoMoCo as a GM buyout.

For one thing, most people view innovation (a.k.a. change) as only slightly more desirable than hepatocellular carcinoma. Automobilists don't want to drive the radical new machine bristling with innovative technology and design. They want the same car as the one they're driving, only a bit newer. How else could you explain the fact that GM continues to sell cars that are two product cycles behind the competition– to the same people who bought one before? Sure, automakers put a lot of gee-whizzery in mass market motors, but there are still a large number of motorists who'd rather celebrate their birthday at the Registry of Motor Vehicles than program a sat nav system.

You don't need to own a Brush Motor Company friction drive car to know that automotive history is littered with manufacturers who went out on a technological limb that snapped beneath them. Even successful carmakers regularly fall prey to feature sleep. When BMW's 7-Series introduced its pioneering iDrive [you nuts] mouse controller, the system flummoxed the faithful and alienated aspirants. When GM created an SUV with a power roof section above the cargo bay, the advance was met with spectacular apathy (save waterproof grandfather clock collectors). Bill Gates may be sniffing around the auto world, but he does so at his peril.

In fact, the more innovative the automobile, the less saleable it is. For every pistonhead who feels enriched by the latest engineering brainwave, for every Ferrari owner beta testing kludgy software and clever-but-dainty mechanicals, there are a million consumers who understand that the last thing you want in a 4000lbs. piece of metal hurling itself through a world of solid objects is unreliable– I mean "innovative" technology. Besides, you'd think that Ford has suffered enough product recalls without reinventing the wheel, and everything attached.

And then there's the cost. If Ford is serious in their newfound determination to boldly go where CAD-CAM computers make treads, they're going to have to plow a lot more of Mr. Bill's inheritance into research and development. To stay ahead of the technological curve in every automotive technology– from fuel cells to LED lighting– Ford would have to spend Portugal's gross national product on Xtreme engineering. Per year. Technologists will argue about the difference between in-yer-face innovation and behind-the-scenes boffinology, but splitting hairs isn't going to save anyone any money. No matter how you program it into you spreadsheet, high tech costs big bucks.

Innovation asunder, you've can't blame Mr. Bill for wanting to tell consumers why they should buy from the family firm. The 80's motto "Quality is Job One" certainly helped pull Ford back from the brink the last time 'round. Unfortunately, Lexus now owns that piece of real estate. More worryingly, Toyota's snagged reliability (with Hyundai in hot pursuit) AND innovation (by Prius engagement). Honda has bagged the quality engineering gig, GM lives (and dies) on the cheap, DCX does bling, Porsche is performance, Audi loves luxury, BMW is bitchin' and Mercedes still snobs-out. Ford is left wandering in brand image wasteland.

As someone who's good with the guck, I offer the following suggestion: safety. While performance and style grab the headlines and make marketeers feel macho as Hell, the average motorist is motivated by more prosaic concerns: their social, physical and financial security. Any car that protects their personal status quo is in with a chance. Under that remit, the term 'safety' encompasses design, handling, braking, traction control, ergonomics, repairs, finance, etc. So yes, an Aston could be a 'safe supercar'. Lincolns and Jaguars could feature all that expensive hi-tech safety stuff, like heads-up displays and cruise control radar. Mazda could embody nimble safety. Land Rover would be the off-roader that gets you there… and back. (Volvo's a done deal and Mercury can go fish.) Whether you're blasting in an Aston or fooling around in a Ford, the Blue Oval's got your back.

Sound familiar? GM flirted with a company-wide safety campaign earlier this year. Of course, The General's ADD reasserted itself and the safety guck disappeared. So the way is clear for Ford to refine and sell its entire product range under the overarching brand umbrella of safety– from the cars themselves through to the ownership experience. Mr. Bill could even make it hip. Safe! OK, it may not be the sexiest answer to Ford's imagectomy, but it is the safest.

While GM models continue to debut and disappear like Manolo Blahniks, the Chevrolet Corvette stays the course, slowly evolving towards excellence. To mark the retirement of Chief Engineer Dave Hill, Car Czar Bob Lutz posted a short honorific on GM's fastlane blog: "Dave was often disruptive, stubborn, unwilling to take direction, unwilling to take advice, unwilling to accept constraints or limits — in other words, the perfect man for the job." In other other words, Hill was a successful guardian of the Corvette flame DESPITE GM, not because of it.

Lutz' unintentional condemnation of his employer's corporate culture won't surprise anyone who's had dealings with The General. I've received dozens of emails from GM workers and suppliers. They describe an organization so complex it makes the legal system in Kafka's The Trial seem like basic addition. One story convinced me that the phrase "institutional paralysis" was coined by a seat bracket designer. Another persuaded me that "matrix management" and "total chaos" are synonymous. And another reminded me of A Confederacy of Dunces, and left me wondering why more GM managers haven't followed author John Kennedy Toole's example.

In all the discussion about GM's perilous financials, it's often forgotten that the company itself is a disaster. Think of it this way: no one at GM wakes up in the morning and says, right, let's go make some vehicles that are two product cycles behind the competition at a price that will bankrupt The General within the next year. [Mr. Hill would have probably sacrificed his left testicle to equip the 'Vette with Audi-esque soft touch plastics.] But something happens between morning muesli and Miller time that kills GM workers' creativity and stifles the company's competitiveness. That something is bureaucracy.

It's not about size. It's about focus. Toyota is living, breathing, money-making proof that a multinational automaker can produce millions of vehicles without tripping all over itself. To do so, to create an organizational structure lean enough to consistently produce genre-dominating cars, a carmaker must maintain laser-like focus. It must first decide EXACTLY what it wants to do, and then it must do it better than anyone else. As a corollary, the manufacturer must accept that it can't– shouldn't– do everything. It's about choosing your battles wisely, fighting them tenaciously and then protecting your territory with steadfast ferocity.

Domestically, GM has eight brands: Hummer, Buick, Pontiac, Cadillac, Saturn, Chevrolet, Saab and GMC. Which one of them has focus? Which one of them sells a coherent lineup, where every single model does [the same] one thing better than anyone else? Are all Chevy's economy cars? Do all Buicks lead their competition in interior quietness? Are all Pontiacs sexy? What do all Saabs, Saturns or GMC trucks do that no other vehicle in their class can match? Sure, all of GM's domestic brands sell cars that don't fall apart, get reasonable mileage, are reasonably comfortable and don't cost a fortune compared to the competition. But what's their unique selling point? Why bother buying one?

It's General Motors by name, general motors by nature. Once you go down that road, it's no wonder that the Chinese walls separating the brands disappear, and dozens of models across the eight brands emerge on their respective forecourts courtesy of the bloodless process known as badge engineering. Since all the cars within each of GM's eight brands must do everything pretty well, but none are asked to excel in any one area (save Hummer, but give it time), it makes perfect sense to save money by sharing management, designers, workers, models, parts, marketing, etc. Is it any wonder that GM's company culture rewards measured uniformity rather than breakthrough creativity?

Of course, inside any large organization, there will always be employees striving to realize their personal vision of product excellence– despite the internal forces ranging against them. Dave Hill was one of GM's "mavericks'; I'm sure he could tell plenty of stories of missed opportunities, needless compromise and administrative lethargy. In any case, Hill's success is an anomoly: the exception that proves the rule. Just think of all the nameless managers who were prevented from creating something great because they had to satisfy GM's overarching desire to do something good…

We've said it before. We'll say it again: GM must die. You can't fix this company. Even if GM's unions agreed to join their Chinese colleagues and work for $1.50 per hour, even if several of GM's 14 (count 'em 14) crossovers are a runaway success, the company is deeply, fundamentally, culturally flawed. Shuttering Buick, Saturn and Saab would help, but nothing can save a car company that's a jack of all trades and master of none.

You know what I love about the new Hyundai Sonata? Nothing. You know what I hate about it? Nothing. In other words, it's a hit. Out there in the real world– away from the elitist, over-educated automotive palate of a professional car reviewer– any vehicle that asks nothing whatsoever of its owner is guaranteed a place in the average American motorists' affections. If the automobile in question is cheap, reliable, comfortable and inoffensive, millions of people will buy it, love it and, eventually, buy another one. The new Hyundai Sonata is all that, and more. Not much more, but some…

Aesthetically, you've got to credit Hyundai for their tireless pursuit of total inoffensiveness. Rather than stick with any one of the company's four previous schnozzes, the Sonata's designers opted for yet another round of plastic surgery. This one's a winner; it's vaguely Japanese, completely unobjectionable and utterly forgettable. The Sonata's front end is proof positive that it's easier to copy a copy (i.e. the Honda Accord) than it is to knock-off an original. The same principle holds true for the rest of the Sonata's sheet metal; it's a riff on the Ford 500's riff on the Audi A6. For people who can't afford the real deal, or even recognize it when they see it, the Sonata is a perfectly judged pastiche.

Details of The General's highly-touted secret accord with the United Auto Workers (UAW) have finally filtered out. Even a cursory glance at the fine print– which promises to get finer in the days to come– reveals that the "landmark" deal is not the company-saving "historic giveback" the mainstream media, UAW and company officials would have us believe. In truth, it's not even too little too late. It's nothing at all.

The UAW's new agreement with GM stipulates that 118k active union members forgo a $1 per hour pay increase scheduled for '06. That works out to about $2000 per worker, per year. So, by not paying its workers an extra buck an hour, GM saves $236m. Only "saves" isn't the right word. It's more like "redirects". The $236m that won't appear on GM workers' payslips will now go straight to… healthcare. In other words, GM "saves" the money by spending it on healthcare rather than wages, and its workers go right on enjoying the free and full benefits they've enjoyed since tires were ply.

Even if we operate on the assumption that this money counts as an economy because The General won't have to dig into its pockets for ANOTHER $236m, it's still not the stuff of which corporate turnarounds are made. The amount represents just over 4% of The General's current annual health care bill. As costs in the health care sector are rising by well over 4% per year, it's actually a loss. Anyway, where's the rest of that supposed billion dollar UAW give back?

GM has 500,000 retired employees receiving free health care for both themselves and, where applicable, their family. The new GM – UAW agreement asks them to start carrying some of the financial burden through increased co-pays, slightly larger deductibles and exclusions for "lifestyle drugs" like Viagra (I kid you not). This extra expense works out to be roughly $370 per year for an individual retiree, to $752 for a family. (Workers who receive less than $8k per year from their GM pension still get a free ride.) And there's your remaining $750m in health care savings. Or not.

If you were laboring under the impression that the UAW would give up benefits for the good of General Motors– in the sense that even a blood-sucking parasite knows to drop off the host before it dies– think again. As part of this arrangement, GM will create a special fund for retirees to help them pay for their additional health care costs. The amount going in is… wait for it… a billion dollars. And that's just the first year. In the second year of this scheme, GM will pay in… another billion dollars. And guess who gets the interest on the $2b?

Add it all up and GM saves nothing on healthcare for the next two years. Nada. If you consider the fact that GM also agreed to assume $12b worth of pension liabilities tied to UAW workers left high and dry by Delphi's bankruptcy– PLUS a $1b sweetener– they've actually lost money on the deal. Or, if you prefer, GM and the UAW have successfully negotiated an increase in The General's labor costs.

Not to put too fine a point on it, who cares? Whenever GM's critics lambaste the company for its gi-normous "legacy costs", management always points their finger at health care; that's what's weighing us down! Well, it ain't necessarily so. Just ask CallmeSteve Miller. Delphi's President is asking his UAW members to take a 70% pay cut. That's not what I'd call pissing around. Pissing around is arguing for months about 1/6th of your health care bill, and then paying it anyway. GM and the UAW have done nothing more than paper over the tectonic cracks that threaten to swallow both of them, whole.

Meanwhile, the family silver sale continues. Majority interest in The General's GMAC Golden Goose is still on the block, with both corporate raiders KKR and uber-shark Kirk Kerkorian browsing the catalogue. Hot on the heels of the Fuji Heavy Industries sell-off, GM has announced that they're selling a majority interest in their Australian truck business to Isuzu. South Africa is next. Perhaps GM is building a war chest for the upcoming UAW strike of parts maker Delphi, which will shut down GM's production lines. In any case, Rabid Rick Wagoner recently went on record to say bankruptcy isn't an option. He's right: it's a certainty. Now's the time to short GM stock.

Greed is good, but gluttony is better. Greed means you have an insatiable desire for more. Gluttony means you're busy catering to your insatiability. Although many observers still consider the Porsche 911 a Gordon Gecko greedmobile, it's actually a glutton. For curves. No matter what kind of corner you throw at it– from a highway sweeper to a twisting country lane to a freshly laid race track– the C4 wants, needs, must have more. Reverse camber, broken surface, bad weather– it doesn't matter. As soon as it's exited one corner, the C4 is ready for the next. And the next. No question: the way this thing handles is a sin.

The C4 is the next-up next-gen 911: a wide-hipped iteration of the new Carrera's Coke-bottle-as-suppository design theme. As such, it's also a minimalist vision of the forthcoming be-winged and bi-gilled Turbo. Although the C4 offers Porsche-spotters a few cosmetic tweaks to the basic model's retro-modern mix, it is, at its core, another Armani-clad psycho-killer. Considering the C4's inherent potential for luring its pilot into legal entanglements, the stealth wealth aesthetic is probably a blessing in disguise.

You gotta love Audi. Despite its rivals' explosive growth, The Boys from Ingolstadt have resisted the lure of sudden intended niche acceleration. While questions about reliability and resale value have shadowed the brand's progress like a pack of predatory wolves, Audi keeps on plugging away with a limited line of luxury limos, waiting for their turn to fill US owners' heated garages. As always, the A4 is both the point man and the mainstay of Audi's long march. Does the latest evolution finally signal the beginning of the end of the beginning?

From a sheet metal standpoint, the A4 is perfectly positioned to enjoy a rare window of unopposed conservatism. BMW's once-staid products have been turning Japanese (I really think so), Mercedes has renounced their discreet design heritage, Jaguar has overexploited theirs, Cadillac continues to live on the edge and the Asian brands are stuck in Pasticheland (save Infiniti). Aside from its inappropriately voracious snout– perfectly designed to make US license plates look ugly and stupid– the A4 is the ideal choice for drivers who believe discretion is the better part of showing off. It's old money on wheels.

Our main man Daniel Howes of the Detroit News recently asked 'what the Hell happened to mass customization"? Mass customization means building a product to a customer's exact specifications, then delivering it before they get pissed off. As the choice of three trim levels seems to satisfy most sheep– I mean people, I don't thing the Big Three's lack of a Dell-style manufacturing system is a major problem. But the wider point is well taken. When will the auto industry wake up and realize that it's the 21st century?

The continued existence of The North American International Auto Show is the best example of carmakers' inability to accept and accommodate the enormous technological changes that have swept society. Let's face it: it's a dead show walking. Why would anyone other than industry-types on expense accounts fight the crowds, eat horrendous food and PAY to look at a parked car when they can see the same machine driving on their desktop? Besides, by the time Detroit's Cobo Center opens its doors to the frozen throngs, more than 75% of the new cars on display have already debuted in electronic/photographic form.

As well they should. With over 60 new models appearing each year, unveiling dozens of new cars in a single three-day window makes no sense whatsoever. It's like Ben & Jerry's, Hagen Daz, and Baskin & Robbins all announcing their new flavors on the fourth of July weekend. In the multi-media millennium, an actual physical auto show is an expensive, inefficient anachronism. Enthusiasts are sated; civilians are jaded.

The car industry's inability to utilize the web effectively as a sales tool is another example of their lack of contemporary thinking. All the carmakers' websites present a staggering array of product and let the customer have at it. Surfers can research a potential purchase, but the information is devoid of context, warmth or individualization. There's no interactive element recognizing the customer's particular needs and guiding them through the options. No wonder the majority of surfer-buyers peel off to edmunds.com for a better idea of a car's suitability and actual price.

Electronic after-sales contact is just as old fashioned– in the sense that there isn't any. Study after study shows that car buyers want MORE dealer contact, not less. Yet there's no email follow-up to see if drivers know how to operate their car's toys, or to advise them when retrofitted options become available. There's no customer-specific information timed to coincide with usage patterns: winter driving tips, summer vacation planning assistance, trade-in time depreciation updates, etc. There's only… silence.

Computers can keep track of a huge number of buying preferences and behaviors. There's an ever-increasing number of ways to interact with customers: telephone, websites, email, direct mail, text messaging, CD-ROMs and more. But carmakers can't seem to put all these elements together to increase customer satisfaction and loyalty. They act as if the new media is the old media, and put on lingerie competitions at sporting events.

Service departments have also neglected the possibilities inherent in the new technology. With the advent of GPS and on-board telemetries, it's amazing that the dealers' most profitable division still waits for their customers' cars to break down, or for their patrons to remember when it's time for service. Even discounting remote interrogation, surely there's an algorithm that can predict what will go wrong with a customer's car before it occurs, taking into account the customer's probable (or actual) driving habits and nationwide, model-specific service patterns.

And finally, the cars themselves show an inexplicable reluctance to evolve towards modern sensibilities. Computer interfaces like BMW's iDrive and Audi's MMI controllers seem to reflect a cutting edge hi-tech ethos. In fact, these awkward devices betray a stunning ignorance of simple ergonomics, requiring unacceptable physical, visual and mental diversion from the mission critical task of driving. What happened to the kind of thinking that led to the gentle red light glowing over a BMW's dash or GM's heads-up display? We don't need more technology, we need BETTER technology.

The obvious way to conclude this rant is to talk about supertanker turning circles, dinosaur brains and the possibility of smaller, faster car companies taking over from the large, unwieldy ones. But I won't go there. Instead, I refer you to America's gigantic after-market tuning industry. These guys build to suit, party with their customers and innovate on a daily basis. If Danny wants to know where to find mass customization, he could do worse than to watch Pimp My Ride.

I have never driven a Porsche so slowly in my life. Of course, it was broken. Please note: it wasn't the company's fault. When the nice man from Porsche handed me the key to the Cayenne S, the box fresh SUV looked more than ready to show the world that the Sultans of Stuttgart can build a damn fast, fine-handling truck.

At first, the aesthetically challenged Cayenne S motored down the Spanish pavement with reasonable aplomb. That said, the coil spring suspension reminded me of a tightly sprung trampoline. But hey, not even the Germans can tie down an SUV to the point where it can blast around corners, without falling over or ploughing straight ahead, while providing Jaguar ride quality. The best thing that can be said about the Cayenne S' on-road comfort is that the BMW X5 4.6 Sport is a lot worse.