"LUTZ SEZ" PONTIAC G8 SHOULD BECOME CHEVROLET CAPRICE (AND THEN "LUTZ SEZ" IT DOESN'T)

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Here's a rumor that ought to give nightmares to the Glass House Gang. Just when it looked like the mega-potent V8/RWD Holden Commodore, oddly known in the States as the Pontiac G8, would be retreating back to the "Land of Wonder, the Land Down Under," "Maximum Bob" Lutz may intervene to save it as a Chevrolet Caprice.

(That sound you just heard was a host of Ford lifers exclaiming "Crikey!")

Given that the Commodore is already sold as a Chevrolet Caprice in the Middle East and likely could be easily "badge engineered" into a bow-tie bruiser (Why bother to do anything more than just rip off the "Pontiac" badges and glue on some new Chevy ones?), Lutz's proposal is a "beyond obvious" move.

Whether "Obama/U.A.W. Motors" can pull off the switch before the Obama hikes in Corporate Average Fuel Economy hit is a question. Another question is whether an obviously good idea such as the "Holden Caprice" can survive the current political climate for what would likely be a short run.

Ford, of course, will be left without any U.S. certified V8 capable RWD sedan chassis after the slaughter of its Panthers sometime in the 2010-2011 time frame. Thus, as the Second Supercar Era ends in the hailstorm of "climate change"/"Cap-n-Tax"/"Global Governance" madness, FoMoCo will not be able to build one last "muscle car" sedan to tide us over through the coming malaise. (The overweight, under-performing, V8-less "Fat Buddha" 2010 Taurus and SHO (Slow, Heavy, Overpriced) certainly won't!

Tragic. Stupid. And just as predicted here, Ford has "Lutz more to worry about."


[UPDATE: After this post, Truth With Speedzzter reader "Alex" and Bangshift.com reported that Lutz had to flip-flop on the Caprice, saying that there was no "business case" for it.

As Speedzzter wrote over at "Bangshift,"

And a bunch of those FoMoCo execs who approved the Taurus SHO (Slow, Heavy, Overpriced) are now breathing again . . . .

(Of course they probably never really expected that "Government Motors" would offer something as audacious as the RWD V8 G8/Caprice.

and

No "business case" is Detroit-speak for the when the parasitic Robert McNamara bean-counter types (i.e. Fritz Henderson and his appliance motorist handlers on the Car Czar Central Committee) shoot down a what looks to everyone else like a "no brainer."

So much for another good idea.]

GRAND MARQUIS & RANGER: OVERPRICED?

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According to Forbes Magazine and an outfit known as Vincentric, Mercury Grand Marquis and Ford Ranger are overpriced.

Vincentric’s multi-variable analysis determined that the Manufacturer’s Suggested Retail Price (MSRP) for Grand Marquis is a whopping 21.4 percent above market value. This placed the Grand Marquis in the penultimate position of shame, only behind bankrupt Dodge’s Ram pickup.

Ford Ranger Supercab and regular cab 2wd were overpriced 11.1 Percent and 11.5 percent respectively.

A SAD WAY TO STARVE A PANTHER

Grand Marquis’ poor showing are wholly predictable. The car has not be restyled in over ten model years. Even Henry’s Model T had more exterior updates than that.

Mechanically, the Grand Marquis soldiers along with a wonderful full-frame RWD chassis that was redone for the 2003-2004 Marauder, but is hamstrung with a puny 281-cube SOHC having only two small valves per cylinder. It’s also limited by an out-of-date four-speed automatic. Since the sacking of the overpriced/underpowered (for a sports sedan) Marauder, Mercury has offered virtually no touring or performance options on the big Panther.

So here you have it: A relatively low-performance “grandma” car that looks almost identical to one sold ten years ago, and starved of any development or promotion for the better part of a decade is a shoe-in for low market values.

And it’s all on purpose.

The Glass House Gang is TRYING to kill the Panther through obvious neglect. Clearly, a lot of pricy executive egos are invested in forcing Panther customers into the Volvo-derived six-cylinder FWD “D3s” and their flabby derivatives. The “Fat Buddha” 2010 Taurus gets all the love while the long-serving RWD Panther doesn’t even get the scraps! And in this sick, self-fulfilling prophecy, FoMoCo will justify slaughtering the last “real” full-frame RWD car that probably will ever be offered for sale in America at the end of 2010 or 2011 because of declining sales.

The bean counters and Panther haters destroyed any chance the Marauder had of igniting the Impala SS sports sedan/muscle car formula. And the bean counters and Panther haters have shamefully milked the 1998/2003 Grand Marquis, withholding from it obvious off-the-shelf parts that would have made it more competitive and a better value.

Of course, the irony is that back when GM was killing RWD and V8 power in the 1980s, Ford, Lincoln and Mercury benefitted from keeping their Panthers alive (albeit mostly on limited investment life support).

The development budget since 2003 seems to be about $1.95 . . . .

Had Mercury made reasonable investments in the Grand Marquis (i.e. restyling on the customary Japanese four-year cycle, multivalve engines, cylinder deactivation and variable valve timing, six-speed transmissions, and the sorts of performance options suggested by (or withheld from) the Marauder, and perhaps even the return of two-door body styles or the still-born Marauder convertable) market values would not have nosedived like a new “1998 model.”

The story is similar for Ranger. Long neglected, new Rangers are fundamentally the same as older models. Without high-performance V8s or other image-builders (an electric hybrid or a modern turbo-diesel would have been an obvious choice a while back given the green interests and rhetoric of William Clay Ford, Jr.), the Ranger, like the Grand Marquis is a dated commodity vehicle.

The slow "Terri Schivo" starvation deaths of the Panthers and Ranger evidence a poor way of running an automobile company.

“LUTZ” MORE FOR FORD TO WORRY ABOUT

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Now that the government takeover and “for show” Section 363 sale of General Motors' "good stuff" is complete, the handwringing begins.

Idealistic pollyannas (sadly including “Truth With Speedzzter”) expect that political backlash will hold back “Government Motors” as many formerly loyal “buy American” customers punish the Democrats and the U.A.W. for destroying another pillar of the not-so-free market. These Ford-o-philes even dream of FoMoCo assuming the dominant position among the domestics in the U.S. light vehicle market.

On the other hand, Ford skeptics are crowing that Ford’s self-help restructuring and mortgaging for the “Way Forward” will get steamrolled by the bankruptcy-slimmed GM. They say that FoMoCo’s now at a material structural disadvantage to “Obama-U.A.W. Motors” because they didn’t join the deadbeats’ parade to bankruptcy. They also claim that GM has a better product mix coming on-line and will exploit their natural market share hegemony. They assert, however, that nothing is going to stand in the way of the “Asian Invasion” and that once the hyper-predatory Communist Chinese get their act together, it’s going to be “game over.”

Time will tell which of these predictions prove correct.

However, Obama Motors’ hand-picked beancounter-in-chief, Fritz Henderson, has thrown another wrinkle into the mix: “Maximum Bob” Lutz.

Lutz, one of the last of the “Car Guys” to make any impact in Detroit, is foregoing retirement to wrestle GM’s tattered, government-stained image out of the ditch as the New GM’s communications chief.

Few Detroiters can talk “car” with more heart and soul than Lutz.

You can bet that “Maximum Bob” won’t be jabbering on about “Zen” anything. Instead, he’ll probably make even the most pedestrian electric-vacuum-cleaner microcar sound like the Second Coming.

While those of us GM skeptics deep-down want to believe that nothing can rescue GM’s hapless “Roger Smithian” image, we know that if anyone can do it, “Maximum Bob” can.

Sure, he’s a wild card that will often make the “true belivers” in the Green movement and the GM boardroom squirm at times. But when Bob is allowed to be Bob, nearly magic things have often happened. In fact, nearly anything in the GM product line that’s not wholly forgettable has Lutz’s imprimatur on it.

Now the Glass House Gang has “Lutz” to worry about.

IS THE 2010 FORD TAURUS A "FAT BUDDHA?”

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It now seems that SHO in the current Taurus vernacular stands for . . . .

Slow
Heavy
Overpriced

But does the base “Bull” (or more fittingly, the “steer” -- based on recent road tests) stand for something else? Something theological?

Usually automobiles do not have any religious qualities. They are non-sectarian machines. They have no consciousness or an eternal "soul." Accordingly, manufacturers tend to avoid religious themes.

But a recent press release from Ford Motor Company suggests that “centered” interior designer Lon Zaback apparently attributes Zen Buddhist aesthetics to the 2010 Taurus interior design!

For example, Zaback jabbered to FoMoCo’s in-house P.R. scribes that:

The rubber mats in the storage compartments have a pebble-in-pond water droplet pattern,” said Zaback. “It’s a Zen detail that imparts a sense of harmony and well-being. It really shows the distance we’ll go to impress a customer with our attention to the most minute detail.”

A similar Zen “wave” pattern also is repeated in the pads in the base of the center console.

This sort of new-age gibberish causes eyes to glaze over in much of the heartland.

Most certainly potential Taurus customers will appreciate “attention to detail” and the absence of cheap, smelly molded plastics. But few, if any, will anticipate . . . or appreciate . . . that the “patterns,” “harmony” and “well-being” were apparently inspired by misplaced devotion to some obtuse, morbidly obese, dead Chinese religionist!

On the other hand, perhaps it does explain the Taurus’ weight problem . . . .

And all that "harmony and well-being" balogona will give Taurus drivers something to think about when they're getting their clocks cleaned by the Hemis, V8s and Eurotrash sports sedans in the next lane . . .

This is not FoMoCo’s first foray into the “Zen” morass.

Truth With Speedzzter readers will recall that “Zen” nonsense was part of the plan for revitalizing Mercury (See "Zen and the Art of Killing Mercury" in the "Best of Speedzzter" sidebar) And unsubstantiated flirtations with Buddhism have long dogged Chairman William Clay Ford, Jr. A 2004 USA Today article contained this interesting passage:

Ask Ford Motor CEO Bill Ford if he CEgO [sic] surfs, and he shakes his head. "It's too depressing," he says.

What Ford would find are frequent mentions of him being a Buddhist. He pinpoints it to a 2000 article in The New York Times magazine with the headline: The Buddha of Detroit. It was a straightforward profile, but the lead paragraph seized on Ford's interest in Eastern mysticism, acupuncture, homeopathy, Zen -- and Vipassana Buddhism.

Ford says he wouldn't "categorize" himself as a Buddhist. "Not exclusively a Buddhist by any means, although I have read quite a bit." Still, it's grist for the Internet mill. A recent search for "Bill Ford" and Buddhist on the search engine Dogpile.com returned 72 hits.

(Perhaps if “Lil’ Billy” read more about automobiles and less worthless bilge from false and deceptive Eastern religions, his tenure at Ford wouldn’t have been such a mess).

Undoubtedly somebody at Ford has market researched all of the silly “Zen talk” and decided that it is not a liability. Perhaps they believe that it makes FoMoCo more “Oriental” in an age when Pacific Rim predators are raiding the American market. Of course FoMoCo market research also brought us the Edsel, so perhaps faith in it is misplaced.

And this sort of thing may not sit too well with some of Ford’s more conservative and sensitive Judeo-Christian Taurus customers. Some of these customers still have a bad taste left over from FoMoCo’s pandering to the radical homosexual rights lobby and the resulting boycott. Moreover, it was bad enough that Ford named the original front-wheel-drive “steer” after an astrological symbol. But now some may blow all of the allusions to new age and Buddhist religions out of proportion to attack the image of the car.

A memorable line from the film “Animal House” is "Fat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life, son.” To paraphrase it for the 2010 Taurus – Fat, slow and Zen Buddhist is no way to design (or market) a sedan, son.

TAURUS SHO IS A PIG IN EDMUNDS TESTING

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Truth With Speedzzter previously opined that Ford Motor Company hadn't learned the correct lessons from the Mercury Marauder debacle.

And a recent Edmunds comparison test bears that out.

The EcoBoost Taurus is an expensive, fat pig that labored to card a weak 14.2-second quarter-mile timeslip. Notwithstanding all-wheel drive and a brace of liliputian turbos, the SHO failed to break the 100 m.p.h. barrier in the quarter mile. That makes the SHO "easy pickin's" for a long list of cheaper sport sedans.

The 2010 Ford Taurus has undoubtedly picked up right where the last 1999 Ford Taurus SHO left off. The problem is, this is not the year 2000. . . . In the end, the 2010 Ford Taurus SHO feels like an excellent all-new Taurus with a muscular engine, period. It's not quite up to the sport sedan badge. [T]he 2009 Infiniti G37 (and the crowd in which it is typically found) has nothing to worry about from the Taurus SHO. That is, unless someone starts changing the G37's list of standard equipment to include two NFL players.

Brakes are apparently an area where Mulally's boys seem have a problem. Edmunds panned the SHO's stoppers. Similarly, Car and Driver (which is no friend to the Glass House Gang, notwithstanding the underdog victory it declared for the underpowered 2010 Mustang GT in last months issue) dogged the brakes of the regular non-SHO 2010 Taurus.

The 2010 Taurus and Taurus SHO are shaping up to be less than expected. Ford's penny-pinching, false economy, and poor benchmarking may have doomed them to also-ran status.

It's an inauspicious start for the EcoBoost era.

MCCURDY AND THE OEMS TO BEG FOR MORE "CA$H FOR CLUNKER$" HANDOUTS

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Ronald Reagan once said "The closest thing to eternal life on earth is a government program." And if Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers superlobbyist Dave McCurdy and the radical greens get their way, "Cash for Clunkers" will be the next immortal government giveaway.

According to the Automotive News, McCurdy and the dole-loving OEMS want to throw billons more borrowed bailout money after bad on welfare payments to new car buyers. The CARS Act's abject waste of $1,000,000,000.00 will only destroy 250,000 potential collector and spare parts vehicles. That's apparently not enough taxpayer-funded vandalism to suit the AAM's bailout-loving membership.

McCurdy chirped "I think it'll go very quickly, and Congress may have to revisit it in the fall . . . 250,000 vehicles isn't enough. We think there'll be additional phases of this . . . It'll probably evolve."

"Evolution" will undoubtedly mean putting even more V8s and at-risk milestone historic vehicles in the crosshairs of welfare/corporate greed and misguided, big-spending environmental policies.

As "Truth With Speedzzter" predicted, the initial CARS Act compromise was merely to get the "camel's nose into the tent."

Meanwhile, the Specialty Equipment Market Association's SEMA Action Network (SAN) is attempting to put its best spin on a lobbying disaster. The latest issues of "Driving Force" contains the following explanation of the AAM/greeniac/liberal Democrat/RINO rout:

SAN then focused its efforts on lessening the impact of the program on the hobbyist community.“SEMA and the SAN are disappointed that Congress ignored evidence that vehicle scrappage programs will not achieve claimed environmental benefits,” said Steve McDonald, SEMA’s Vice President of Government Affairs. “However, we are pleased that lawmakers agreed not to include the older cars and parts that help drive the passions of many in the automotive hobbyist community.”

Under the program, consumers who agree to scrap a trade-in car that gets 18 miles per gallon or less (15 mpg or less for heavy pick-ups and vans) will receive a voucher to buy a qualifying new car. The voucher will range from $3,500 to $4,500 based on the new car’s fuel efficiency. The program primarily targets SUVs and pickups since most passenger cars manufactured during the last 25 years get more than the 18 mpg combined city/highway requirement.

[As the EDMUNDS list posted below shows, however, this is simply not true. Virtually every V8 and RWD vehicle built after 1984 with a trade-in value of $4,500 or less is at risk]

The car buyer will receive a $3,500 voucher if they buy a new passenger car that was rated at 4 mpg higher than the older vehicle, or a new pickup truck/SUV that was at least 2 mpg higher than the old truck. They will receive a $4,500 voucher if the passenger car was at least 10 mpg higher and the truck/SUV was at least 5 mpg higher.

Lawmakers want the program to last one year but have only set aside $1 billion to fund car purchases made from July 1-Nov. 1, 2009. They will seek another $3 billion later this summer to fund the program into 2010.

“It took countless meetings with lawmakers and their staff in order to secure the 25-year exemption and recycling provisions,” said SEMA Director of Regulatory Affairs Stuart Gosswein. “While it proved impossible to kill the scrappage program, lawmakers were keenly aware of the SAN’s opposition to the program and wanted to remove any unintended consequences to the hobbyist community. Your voices were heard.”

Most certainly the next round of "Cash for Clunkers" welfare will go after a wider cross-section of historic and special interest vehicles. And paid shills like the AAM's Dave McCurdy will be leading the money-hungry Visigoths.

The apparently toothless SEMA lobby has its work cut out for it.

FALCON & “SQUARE BIRD” FATHER ROBERT MCNAMARA DEAD AT 93

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The Washington Post and the Drudge Report are reporting that former Ford Motor Company “Whiz Kid” and President Robert McNamara is dead.

While most of the news reports will undoubtedly focus on McNamara’s controversial tenure as U.S. Secretary of Defense during portions of the Vietnam era or his subsequent leadership at the World Bank, his pre-Kennedy era tenure in the upper echelons of FoMoCo should not be ignored.

McNamara has often been described as an opposite to Lee Iacocca. While Iacocca was sometimes a master at flash, repackaging, superficial trendiness, and self-promotion, McNamara reportedly favored a more conservative “appliance motoring” "bean-counter" approach.

Thus, McNamara was a key figure in the development of Ford’s first modern compact car: The Falcon. Although the Falcon was initially a massive hit – and a well-needed one in the wake of the Edsel debacle – its prosaic styling, bland specifications, and tepid initial performance were clear counter-points to its platform cousin, the Iacocca-championed 1964 ½ Mustang. In fact, under the skin, the first production Mustangs were little more than gussied-up McNamara Falcons (albeit with optional V8s, bucket seats, and other “youth market” frivolities).

The [Falcon]rolled out in the autumn of 1959 . . . . It was sensible in every way, basic [Six]-cylinder transportation priced at just $1,912. It was the car McNamara left for automotive historians to judge him by, and it reflected his sense of value and utility and austerity. . . . He remained forever proud of the Falcon. He bought one soon after moving to Washington and once drove up to an elegant dinner at Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson’s Washington home in his beloved compact. LBJ burst out laughing.

Ford’s car guys hated the Falcon too. “McNamara made a car that looked like him. He had had those granny glasses and he made a granny car,” said Harold Sperlich, of Ford and later Chrysler. “He didn’t seem like a car-company president, if you will,” said Mac Gordon, an automobile journalist, who interviewed McNamara many times at Ford. “Ed Cole, his famous counterpart at Chevrolet, was a real car guy. You’d go into his office and see pictures of race cars and air bags, car stuff. Not in McNamara’s office.” Secrest says: “You would not have found him in an interview talking about being underneath a car as a kid, trying to make himself sound like a great car lover. It didn’t mean anything to him.”

Yet the Falcon wasn’t small enough or elemental enough for McNamara. He was a strong supporter of the V4-powered, FWD “Cardinal” project. Although the Cardinal followed in the tire tracks of Sir Alec Issigonis’ revolutionary 1959 BMC Mini and was somewhat predictive of the direction the auto industry would be forced to take fifteen to twenty years later, Iacocca promptly killed it, even though McNamara had reportedly devised a virtual "no loss" plan to domesticate it as a VW Beetle fighter.

McNamara’s practical “appliance motorist” streak directly lead to Corvette’s five decades of mostly unchallenged hegemony at the crest of the American sports car marketplace. McNamara failed to understand the need to fight Corvette in the “halo” true sports car class. Thus, although the first generation Thunderbird outsold Corvette and at times outperformed it in speed trials, McNamara bought the idea of a heavy, bloated four-seat boulevard tourer for the T-Bird’s second generation.

McNamara’s 1958 “Square Bird” marked the end of any serious retail challenge for the two-seat sports car market. Although Carroll Shelby’s rare and hyperexpensive Cobras would sometimes rule the racetrack and Ford would occasionally dabble in mostly irrelevant, low-production mid-engined two-seaters (Pantera, Ford GT), McNamara’s myopic abandonment of the two-seat high performance niche has consigned Ford to “second class” status on the streets for decades. Hundreds of thousands of Ford owners have switched to Chevrolet over the decades simply because Ford offered no legitimate V8 sports car as a capstone to the Ford line-up. Ford’s failure to contest the “Corvette” market has also held back development of several generations of Ford V8s. Much of Chevrolet’s grassroots motorsports dominance since 1955 has flowed from the wellspring of Corvette development.

McNamara poisoned the developmental well for Ford by taking the Thunderbird out of the game only a few short model years from inception.

McNamara’s heavyweight “Square Bird” did, however, predict the later explosion of interest in the personal luxury market. In fact, the four-seat Thunderbird virtually created this segment (probably much to the consternation of the utilitarian McNamara). But the death of Ford’s production challenge to Corvette marked a certain “flabbiness” that persists to this day. A real “car guy” would never have ceded the nationalistic high ground of sports cars to Zora Arkus-Duntov and Corvette.

Robert McNamara was no “car guy.”

Moreover, McNamara’s FoMoCo was content not to compete in the World-Class luxury car segment (Bill Ford’s Continental Division had already been shuttered when McNamara was the first outsider to assume Ford’s presidency). McNamara’s oversight opened the door to European and Japanese luxury dominance after the 1970s. The leaner “bullet” Thunderbird-based Continentals were conceived on McNamara’s watch and became an icon of McNamara’s next employer – the Kennedy Administration. But McNamara’s Lincolns were actually a mass-produced retrenchment from attempting to lead in the upper echelons of the world luxury market or even to beat Cadillac at home. Consequently, generations of Ford customers have been forced to abandon FoMoCo products once mass-produced luxury and near luxury vehicles were no longer satisfactory.

The mindset rooted in the McNamara-era has deprived Ford of important “halo” products for decades, and compensation for it may have directly led to the ill-fated Premium Auto Group disasters of the past decade.

Most of McNamara’s later tenure was consumed with the emerging death of the “Beat GM” vision. Coping with divisional consolidation, recession, the ridiculous AMA “racing ban,” import invaders, and the Edsel mess were the currency of the McNamara era. McNamara and his fellow “Whiz Kids” may have helped Henry Ford II transform his grandfather’s dying “clunker” of a company into a modern, grey flannel suit corporation, but McNamara and his statistical management cronies mostly failed to regain the market leadership that Old Henry had blown decades before. And much of the bureaucracy designed by the Whiz Kids became an albatross in McNamara’s “out years.”

Thus the verdict on McNamara at Ford might be analogous with some of the commentary on his flawed and controversial role in the Vietnam conflict. While he may have been an emotionless “technocrat” both at Ford and in the Government, he was, as David Halberstam wrote in "The Best and the Brightest" "a prisoner of his own background . . . unable, . . . to adapt his values and his terms to . . . realities.”

In Halberstam's judgment, McNamara "did not serve himself or his country well. He was, there is no kinder or gentler word for it, a fool." Some would argue that, the success of the Falcon notwithstanding, his long-term legacy at Ford was little better.

THE CA$H FOR CLUNKER$ "DEATH ROW LIST"

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Edmunds has produced a "Death Row" list of vehicles endangered by the welfare/bailout plan known as "Cash for Clunkers."

The list is packed with future collectibles, including several SVT Fords and scores of V8-powered RWD vehicles.

Even if the vehicles scrapped are too dilapidated to be currently collectible, many irreplaceable parts will be forever lost.

The list omits pre-1989 vehicles, because Edmunds determined that "almost all vehicles that are model year 1989 or earlier have a trade in value of less than $4,500..."

Shamefully, Ford Motor Company is making it "easy" for welfare seekers to vandalize our automotive heritage and destroy thousands of potential collector/parts vehicles. http://www.letfordrecycleyourride.com/ is FoMoCo's shameless shilling for laundered bailout cash (borrowed from the Chinese or printed up for the FED).

Ford has clearly taken a greedy, activist stand against collectors and grassroots motorsports in its support for the moronic CARS Act. Vintage Ford lovers should refrain from purchasing any new Ford, Mercury, or Lincoln products so long as FoMoCo is campaigning for its share of welfare money from the "Ca$h for Clunker$" boondoggle.

MAJORITY OF AMERICANS OPPOSE "CA$H FOR CLUNKER$" WELFARE PLAN

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Although a hoard of appliance motoring automotive vandals in the Congress and President Obama have championed the welfare-giveaway-bailout boondoggle popularly known as "Cash for Clunkers," a solid majority of Americans still oppose the plan.

Rassmussen reports that 54 percent of Americans disapprove of the new entitlement aimed at cleansing the streets of some seldom-driven vintage V8s through borrowing or printing money and handing it over to the automakers and their dealers in the form of welfare vouchers for purchasers of fuel efficient cars (mostly imports).

PROOF POSTIVE THAT DAVE MCCURDY IS AN IDIOT

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Cash for clunkers will benefit everyone from the consumer looking for the extra incentive to purchase a new car, to the communities who will receive additional tax revenue from the sales of new vehicles," said Dave McCurdy, CEO and president of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, which lobbied heavily for the bill.

R-I-G-H-T Dave.

It sure won't benefit the thousands of small businesses that who will have fewer customers because initially 250,000 V8s and V12s from the 1980s and 1990s (and probably 1,000,000+ V8s and V12s when the Democrats and RINOs appropriate some more money for this mess in fiscal year 2010) will be destroyed.

It sure won't benefit used car dealers and auto auctions, who will lose some of their opportunities for so-called "clunkers" vehicles to sell.

It sure won't benefit the thousands of hot rodders, kit car builders, restorers, and grassroots racers who will have to pay higher prices for the parts they need.

It sure won't benefit present and future generations of vintage vehicle collectors and restorers who will be deprived of hundreds of thousands of potential collector and donor vehicles.

It sure won't benefit the owners of true clunkers (i.e. rusted out FWD imports) who get no welfare vouchers to give to the pandering dealers and OEMs who are getting bailed out by ObamaCa$h for Clunker$.

It won't benefit the beginning drivers and the low-income families who cannot buy a new car but will be deprived of hundreds of thousands of still-functional used vehicles that will be wasted in the jaws of the crusher/shredder.

And it sure won't benefit the future generations who will have to pay interest to the Chinese and others for the money borrowed and wasted on this anti-free market welfare scheme.

Stupid quotes such as the one above are proof positive that Dave McCurdy is an idiot.

SENATE EFFORT TO CRUSH WELFARE "CA$H FOR CLUNKER$" FAILS

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Reuters and the Drudge Report are reporting that Senator Judd Gregg's valiant attempt to strip out of the pending $106 billion war funding bill a $1,000,000,000.00 version of the bailout-welfare boondoggle known as "Cash for Clunkers" has failed 60-36.

"Truth With Speedzzter" will publish the list of the SIXTY welfare-pimp senators who voted against the interests of the automotive hobbies and grassroots motorsports as soon as this information is verified.

Initial, unverified information suggests that this was mostly a party-line vote with a few RINO defectors. If so, the Democratic party has clearly gone on record in opposition to free markets, automobile collecting, vintage vehicle preservation, grassroots motorsports, and the thousands of small businesses who serve these avocations.

UPDATE 1:

The $1,000,000,000.00 version of Rep. Betty Sutton's (D-OH) CARS Act (a/k/a the ANTI-VINTAGE V8s ACT) was snuck into a House Senate Conference version of the massive House Report 111-151 - MAKING SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS FOR THE FISCAL YEAR ENDING SEPTEMBER 30, 2009, AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES. Here's the text of the conference report:

TITLE XIII--CONSUMER ASSISTANCE TO RECYCLE AND SAVE ACT
The conference agreement includes a new title providing $1 billion for vouchers of $3,500 or $4,500 to be applied toward the purchase or lease of a new fuel efficient automobile or truck from July 1-November 1, 2009. To qualify for a voucher under this authority the vehicle turned in must be scrapped, and the purchased vehicle must achieve greater fuel efficiency than the vehicle to be turned in.

The enemies of free markets, grassroots motorsports, and the automotive hobbies who to let the Conference Report to go forward on a Motion to Waive All Applicable Points of Order Under Rule 44 on Conference Report on H.R. 2346, and stop Senator Gregg's attempt to remove the CARS ACT are:

YEAs ---60

Akaka (D-HI)
Baucus (D-MT)
Bayh (D-IN)
Begich (D-AK)
Bennet (D-CO)
Bingaman (D-NM)
Bond (R-MO) {RINO ALERT!]
Boxer (D-CA)
Brown (D-OH)
Burris (D-IL)
Cantwell (D-WA)
Cardin (D-MD)
Carper (D-DE)
Casey (D-PA)
Cochran (R-MS) [RINO ALERT!]
Collins (R-ME) [RINO ALERT!]
Conrad (D-ND)
Dodd (D-CT)
Dorgan (D-ND)
Durbin (D-IL)
Feingold (D-WI)
Feinstein (D-CA)
Gillibrand (D-NY)
Hagan (D-NC)
Harkin (D-IA)
Inouye (D-HI)
Johnson (D-SD)
Kaufman (D-DE)
Kerry (D-MA)
Klobuchar (D-MN)
Kohl (D-WI)
Landrieu (D-LA)
Lautenberg (D-NJ)
Leahy (D-VT)
Levin (D-MI)
Lieberman (ID-CT)
Lincoln (D-AR)
McCaskill (D-MO)
Menendez (D-NJ)
Merkley (D-OR)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Murray (D-WA)
Nelson (D-FL)
Pryor (D-AR)
Reed (D-RI)
Reid (D-NV)
Rockefeller (D-WV)
Sanders (I-VT)
Schumer (D-NY)
Shaheen (D-NH)
Specter (D-PA)
Stabenow (D-MI)
Tester (D-MT)
Udall (D-CO)
Udall (D-NM)
Voinovich (R-OH) [RINO ALERT!]
Warner (D-VA)
Webb (D-VA)
Whitehouse (D-RI) [RINO ALERT!]
Wyden (D-OR)

These SIXTY infamous Senators are welfare-bailout pimps of the highest order. They are enemies and vandals of our automotive heritage. They are in favor of spending A BILLION DOLLARS that we do not have to give a bailout to Toyota, Hyundai, Nissan and others, through welfare voucher for greedy and selfish owners of collectible and donor V8s from the 1980s and 1990s.

This is a sad day for vintage automobility in America.

And this little $1,000,000,000.00 vehicle scrappage program will be just the initial salvo in a lengthy war against vintage vehicles.

ELECTRO-FUSION IS THE "MOST PATENTED CAR" (BUT VW'S TWINCHARGER IS 2009's INTERNATIONAL ENGINE OF THE YEAR)

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A couple of interesting items from Autoblog Green . . . .

VW 1.4-liter Twincharger wins 2009 International Engine of the Year

And

Ford Fusion hybrid, the most patented car in history

So what if these two got together (like chocolate and peanut butter in a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup)?


Given FoMoCo's funding of Eaton's development of the modernized Roots blower in the 1980s, Ford's once and recent history with turbocharging, and the allure of hybrid-electric powertrains, its too bad that a twincharged (hopefully a displacement-on-demand DOHC V8) electric-hybrid isn't in Ford's lineup (Think hybrid electric Mustang)

WILL IT SOON BE "GOREMOBILES" VERSUS "OBAMAMOBILES?"

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Al Gore, who has parlayed his 2000 loss of the the U.S. presidential election and international liberal/socialist hysteria over anthropogenic "climate change," nee "global warming," into a vast fortune, is apparently entering the automobile business.

According to a report by AOL's "Daily Finance" website, picked up by the Drudge Report, funding for a new million-square foot auto plant in Monroe, Louisiana is set to come in part from a venture capital firm affliated with Gore: Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. "KPCB, which has formed an alliance with Gore's Generation Investment Management, specializes in green and cutting-edge tech investments."

So in a sense, the market for soulless, "uniform, happy, shiny, government-designed, sanitized, tamper-proof, disposable electro-micro car" transportation appliances is apparently becoming irresistable for liberal politicians.

Is a high-voltage Willie Wiredhand/Reddy Kilowatt war fought between greeniac "Goremoblies" and goverment-sponsored "Obamamobiles" in our future?

ARE THERE REALLY TOO MANY NEW AUTO DEALERSHIPS?

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The conventional wisdom, lapped up by the Obama Administration "Auto Czars" and most of the motoring/business press is that the Detroit 3 have too many dealerships.

But a Wall Street Journal "Deal Journal" article somewhat calls this assumption into question.

Veteran dealer Jack Fitzgerald claims:

There were 12,836 dealerships before the auto makers swung the axe. That is down from roughly 40,000 dealerships in 1950. In that time number of Detroit cars running on the road rose to 150 million from 50 million. That means there are 75% fewer domestic dealers out there even as the number of cars in operation tripled . . . .

And automotive historians are often quick to point out that weak dealer networks cost many "independant" manufacturers sales in the 1940s-1960s and helped doom their survival chances.

"40,000 dealerships in 1950. . . .75% fewer domestic dealers out there even as the number of cars in operation tripled,"

Perhaps it's really lack of domestic competition that's allowed the remaining Detroit 3 dealers to become such scam artists and so unresponsive to customer desires.

Cutting dealers to compete with the Japanese invaders makes as much sense as Sears/KMart cutting the number of stores to take on Walmart.

(Sam Walton figured out that a proliferation of stores in underserved smaller markets, highly-involved local managers, and advanced inventory control would ultimately beat the consolidated urban superstore model of Sears, Montgomery Ward, J.C. Penney, K-Mart, Target and the other "unbeatable" titans of 1960s retailing)

Increasing the number of smaller dealers, improving "build to order" response times, vastly improved inventory management (is there any reason in the internet age that buyers should not be able to search a manufacturer's entire national inventory by color, options, price, and location in thirty seconds?), and more regional dealer group/co-op advertising would improve competitiveness.

The current franchising system has created a monopoly of megastores that is mostly controlled by a handful of huge chains, like Sonic, Group One and Penske. The archaic practice of carrying 200-500 units in stock under a floorplan financing arrangement and having a huge multi-million dollar service department also bloats the overhead of auto retailing and hurts competition. Protected territories also hurts competition.

Back in the 40,000 dealership days, it really didn't require more than a half-dozen people in a low-overhead filling-station-sized store to run a viable, small volume retail outlet. And there were plenty of alternative sources for the same brand if you didn't like a particular dealer's practices. Integration of the dealers into their local communities also improved consumer relations and built relationships that lead to repeat business.

However, the OEMs have long disfavored small dealers, forced expensive, unreasonable and unnecessary investments in facilities that could only be covered by building megastores, and encouraged anti-competitive sales territory protection.

Now, the problem is becoming that if potential customers don't like how the impersonal, local megastore treats them, they often have few convenient options other than shopping other brands (usually sold in thinly-veiled companion stores operated by one of the megachains).

Multi-manufacturer megastores also lead to reduced brand promotion effort and spiff-based sales poaching. A smaller dealer committed to one manufacturer will be more motivated to promote the brand.

Thus, a better system would break up the monopolies, cut out layers of management, and proliferate the number of dealers and retail locations across America. Much of middle America is being left without any convenient dealerships.

When Detroit copies the Japanese urban megadealer model, it is inevitable that they will lose rural and "heartland" sales because of loss of convenience and increased cross-shopping at multi-brand megastores.

At the dawn of the auto age, Henry Ford dominated the market in part through a huge national dealer base. Although modern vehicles aren't simple commodities like the Model T, advanced technology could make a dealer re-proliferation model work again.

2011 MUSTANG V6 -- DOES IT BEAT CAMARO?

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Bangshift and The Mustang News are reporting that the base mill for the 2011 Mustang (the last 'Stang before the draconian Obama Administration CAFE increases really start to dampen what's left of the party) is going to be a 273-horsepower DOHC 3.7 liter V6.

Is it enough to beat Camaro's 304-horsepower DOHC GDI V6?

A quick back of the envelope calculation suggests that both the 2011 Mustang 6 and the Camaro 6 should slot in at around 12.8 pounds per pony.

That's hardly a knockout punch, but the Mustang's lighter weight might give it the edge. Moreover, without seeing the torque curves and gearing, it's hard to project which 2011 "secretary special" will be the quickest and fastest.

At least Ford Motor Company's doing something, even if it doesn't really look like a "best in class" move at this juncture.

PROOF POSITIVE CLARENCE DITLOW IS EITHER A SOPHIST OR AN IDIOT

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Ralph Nader disciple Clarence Ditlow has long been a controversial figure in the automotive world. As head honcho of the hyper-regulatory activist group Center for Auto Safety (CAS), Ditlow has frequently turned his Naderesque fire on the Detroit 3. The CAS list of causes célèbre often reads like a contingency-fee trial lawyer pirates' wish list. (Plaintiffs trial lawyer shakedown artists often champion scores of regulations to bootstrap questionable negligence and products liability claims)

Now Ditlow wants General Motors and Chrysler to just "roll over" to the extreme, radical demands of the pirate lawyers and other liberals who want to regulate every aspect of motoring and vehicle production under the guise of "safety."

Given the government's ownership, the lobbyists are in essence working for the government," said Clarence Ditlow, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety, a consumer group. "The government ought to be able to tell them, 'Do what we say because we are you.'"

This evidences either empty sophistry or a profound lack of understanding as to how government actually works. Even if "Government Motors" and "Fix It Again Tony Chrysler" were cabinet-level government agencies (and not just captives to the Obama-UAW-sponsored bailout madness) they would be urging the other components of government to formulate policies meeting their mutual interests (anyone who has ever spent any time around government at any level realizes this fact of intra-governmental "lobbying.").

Is it reasonable to for policy makers to make decisions without the input of those who will be affected? Clarence Ditlow apparently thinks so.

The fact that GM and Chrysler will still be required to have registered lobbyists adds a level of transparency to something that would inevitably occur.

As one lobbyist wrote:

Before we start casting stones, however, consider for a minute that the vast majority of these lobbyists are working on issues that you might actually care about! For example, are you a member of AARP? Do you contribute to the Sierra Club? Do you own a car and have an AAA membership? All of these organizations use funds from their members to hire "lobbyists" in Washington, DC. In fact, you, yes you, might actually be acting as a lobbyist in your daily life. Have you ever called up a city agency to express the need for a stop sign in your neighborhood? Have you signed on to a petition or letter from a professional organization that was then sent to elected officials at the state or federal level? That's lobbying, my friend, pure and simple

.

Perhaps in Ditlow's world, banning GM and Chrysler from any lobbying would lead to more hasty, anti-free market, bad deals, such as the Obama Administration's sudden hike in the Corporate Average Fuel Economy requirements (Which Jim DeMint attibutes to the Detroit 3 being reduced to "pawns," even without Ditlow's dream of a lobbying ban).

Or perhaps Ditlow and CAS just want the liberal Naderites and the GreeNazis to have completely unfettered control over the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Moreover, he likely does not want anyone at GM or Chrysler lobbying Congress to reign in the abuses of the Obama Administration. Perhaps CAS believes that getting rid of input from the experts at GM and Chrysler will make the road to government-approved Obamamobiles smoother.

Regardless, Ditlow's demand for no lobbying is classic overreaching.

But the real problem isn't lobbyists, but rather the NEED for lobbyists. Ford Motor Company CEO Alan Mulally candidly observes that "We've become so stymied with regulation" . . . . "We have to say enough is enough and get back to freeing people up."

Daniel J. Mitchell also put it succinctly back in 2004:

The real problem is that government is too big and has too much power -- and this attracts lobbyists for the same reason that rotten meat attracts flies.

In other words, lobbyists exist because many people cannot resist the temptation to try to redistribute resources in their direction -- while others seek representation because they don’t want to be the chumps footing the bill. . . . And don’t forget federal regulations. Rules and red tape cost the economy about $850 billion annually [in 2004]. Does anyone really think it odd that this costly regulatory maze encourages lobbying?

To paraphrase Professor Wigmore, the adversarial system is the greatest engine ever invented for the discovery of truth. Yet, if taken at face value, Clarence Ditlow apparently wants no debate and no opposition from those whom his comrades are seeking to regulate.

This view is either highly naive or completely disingenuous. Even fellow Naderite Joan Claybrook can't agree with Ditlow: "I do believe in the First Amendment and speaking your mind . . . If they don't have lobbyists expressing their point of view, who does it?"

LAST MINUTE HOPE TO KILL CA$H FOR CLUNKER$?

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Is there a slim hope in the U.S. Senate to stop the vintage V8-crushing, borrowed-money-funded "monster truck" known as "Cash for Clunkers?"

Maybe!

Republican Senator Judd Gregg of New Hampshire said he hopes to raise a procedural motion on the Senate floor to strip the provision from a bill that continues funding for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

"As the nation's debt continues to climb to unsustainable levels, it is troubling that Congress is looking for even more fiscally reckless ways to subsidize the auto industry," Gregg said in a statement.

AMEN, Senator Gregg!

Another bailout laundered through a welfare program that attacks the free market and our automotive history is simply a horrible idea, regardless of the benefits claimed by the greeniacs and corporate welfare pimps, such as Ford Vice President for Government Affairs Pete Lawson,William Clay Ford, Jr, FoMoCo Vice President for Government and Community Relations Ziad Ojakli, and auto industry superlobbyist Dave McCurdy.

Call and write your Senators today and ask them to support Senator Gregg's move to strip the wasteful ObamaCa$h for Clunker$ boondoggle out of the war funding bill.

OBAMA'S CAFE HIKE AND CA$H FOR CLUNKER$ DOOMS SUVS

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To most enthusiast motorists, sport utility vehicles are either a nuisance or a necessary evil. Typically, SUVs are rolling chicanes or road blocks for sporting pony car drivers. They've often been the transportation "appliance" of choice by many marginal motorists who value size and perceived safety over handling, acceleration,and fuel economy.

A few SUV drivers are serious off-roading enthusiasts.

Other enthusiasts tolerate SUVs for their practicality. Since Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards killed the large station wagon, SUVs have been the most popular replacement for drivers who need to haul large quantities of people and things without the mind-numbing boredom of a minivan. And SUVs have been placed into service towing boats, race cars, and recreational trailers, which are tasks the current crop of FWD vehicles are not equipped to perform.

Many hot rodders and grassroots motorsportsmen have viewed aging SUVs as donor vehicles for V8-based RWD projects.

But now SUVs are under a winnowing attack. Used SUVs at the bottom of the market stand to be decimated by the welfare/bailout plan known as "Cash for Clunkers." And President Obama's massive acceleration of hikes in the Corporate Average Fuel Economy Standards will likely choke off new supplies of affordable and mid-market SUVs.

Industry observers warn it will be difficult to keep crossovers such as Equinox — never mind traditional SUVs — in the line-up as the result of the Obama administration’s recent move to raise the Corporate Average Fuel Economy standard to 35.5 mpg by 2016.

Further downsizing may be essential, which could drive full-size SUVs like the Ford Expedition, Mercedes GL and Cadillac Escalade off the road entirely. Already, a number of manufacturers have begun paring back SUV projects.

Future SUV sales will compete with high-performance car sales under the new CAFE rules. This stands to drive up the sticker price of each.

And while expensive hybrid, turbo-diesel and exotic lightweight materials technology will keep some of the high-end SUVs on the road (in downsized form, no doubt), many in the middle class will be effectively "priced out" of the SUV market.

Certainly as some of these fuel-saving technologies are applied, they may "trickle down" to V8 RWD performance cars through the aftermarket, if not through the OEMs. But whether the volume of OEM production will be sufficient to reduce the costs of the "trickle down" technologies remains to be seen.

As it is now, only GM's rare and expensive hybrid Tahoe-class SUVs contain any electric hybrid technology that appears adaptable to traditional RWD muscle cars and street rods.

Ford's more conservative approach to SUVs has produced little technology for "trickle down" to muscle car retrofits. Ford's parsimony and short-sightedness stands to put Ford-loyal performance car builders at a huge disadvantage if future fuel price/taxation costs trigger electric hybridization of muscle cars and street rods, or the torque-boosting "electric nitrous" concept catches fire.

Unfortunately, the current sales depression and bankruptcies of GM and Chrysler mean that the pipeline of quality late-model used SUVs will be less-than-full as supplies of new SUVs escalate in price.

In short, artificial market restrictions championed by President Obama and his radical green special interest constituency will dramatically increase the "buy in" cost for SUVs and constrict their supplies in the future. This stands also to restrict developments in the performance aftermarket, as well as putting a crimp in our freedom of mobility.

Now that's "change" we'll all have to pay for.

"Some future!"

CNBC'S PHIL LEBEAU MISSES IT ON "CA$H FOR CLUNKER$"

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CNBC's Phil Lebeau claims that "Cash for Clunkers" is a "clunker."

He laments in his "Behind the Wheel" blog that:

This "Cash for Clunkers" bill is evolving into one of those pieces of legislation that politicians will crow about as a sign of progress, but the impact could be limited.

His criticism is that the bill doesn't target enough old cars and trucks for government purchase and destruction.

With all due respect, Mr. Lebeau has completely missed it again.

Cash for Clunkers is a "clunker" but for vastly different reasons. It is another repudiation of free markets, It will greatly damage grassroots motorsports, "hot rodding" and the car collecting hobbies. It will lead to signficant losses from our automotive heritage. It is another bailout disguised as welfare. See,
http://speedzzter.blogspot.com/search/label/%22Cash%20for%20Clunkers%22

Under the House-passed version of the CARS Act, virtually any vehicle with a V8 engine built after 1984 and before 2000 is potentially at risk of being crushed if its been in the hands of the same greedy, welfare-loving owner for a year and has insurance. Most certainly, the few V8-powered vehicles built after 2000 probably have enough “trade in” value left to exceed the $3,500-$4,500 government bid.


As Truth With Speedzzter has previously pointed out, many of the vehicles at risk are seldom-driven special interest vehicles at the bottom of the depreciation cycle. Under normal, market-based attrition rates these would be of interest to collectors and enthusiasts as candidates for entry-level special interest use, future restoration, modification, or as powertrain donors for grassroots motorsports and "street rodding" activities.

Moreover, Truth With Speedzzter has correctly observed that:

Cash for Clunkers amounts to a declaration of war against American collector vehicles and grassroots motorsports, funded by money borrowed from the Communist Chinese and others. It will harm hundreds of thousands of small businesses that depend on affordable used vehicles.

The car-hating appliance motorists, radical greens, and the anti-collector vehicle elements in the U.A.W. and the Detroit 3 have outmanuvered grassroots automotive interests, automotive collectors, salvage dealers, and the aftermarket. These anti-free market forces want to tap the federal treasury to subsidize their meddling in the used vehicle and used auto parts markets. Such meddling will drive up prices, balloon the federal deficit, and will have minimal effects on the environment. The gutless lapdogs of the anti-collector/anti-free market special interests in Congress and the Obama Administration are all too willing to destroy a large part of our automotive heritage.

And our children and grandchildren will get a double bill for it. First, they will be deprived of hundreds of thousands of collectible vintage vehicles and parts vehicles. What vehicles and parts that survive the onslaught will be much more scarce and expensive. Second, our children and grandchildren will get stuck with the bill for the billions in bailout cash laundered through the "ObamaCa$h For Clunker$" program to the big automobile manufacturers.

Had we had a "Cash for Clunkers" program in the 1970s or early 1980s, a whole generation of Camaros, GTOs, Mustangs, Chargers, Firebirds, and other milestone models from the 1950s and 1960s would have been lost. The restoration and parts businesses that grew up around these vintage vehicles in the late 1980s and early 1990s would likely have never become viable. Hundreds of thousands of collector vehicles that have been restored and are now the "stars" of Barrett-Jackson and other "musclecar" events would never have been preserved for future generations.

Had we had a "Cash For Clunkers" program during or after World War II, many more of the "true classics" from the first decades of motoring would have been senslessly destroyed. As it was, WWII scrap drives claimed far too many of these beautiful, restorable classics when they were just commonly viewed as old "clunkers."

Had we had a "Cash for Clunkers" program in the 1950s or 1960s, most of the vehicles that are the basis for today's street rods would have been flattened. This would have placed enormous additional demand "pressure" on the surviving originals (too many of which would have been "cut up" by later generations to make hot rods) and thus would have significantly harmed the potential collectors of original 1930s popular cars.

Whole chapters of our American automotive heritiage would have been placed at risk had prior generations adopted the "Cash for Clunkers" approach.

Much like the misguided, anti-preservationist, government-funded "Urban Renewal" policies of the 1960s decimated much of America's irreplaceable archetectural heritage, Cash for Clunkers will decimate a meaningful chapter of our automotive history.

Cash for clunkers is a "clunker" for sure.

MAX MOSLEY AND BRIAN FRANCE: TWO PEAS IN A ROTTEN POD?

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Max Mosley and Brian France seem to want to destroy what’s left of the top two series in motorsports.

Although Formula One (F1) is an also-ran in the United States of America, it remains the biggest motorsports stage in the rest of the world. Max Mosley, boss of the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA), is locked into a multi-billion dollar game of “chicken” with Scuderia Ferrari and F1's other participating automakers, who are organized as the Formula One Teams Association (FOTA). According to the FIA, the dispute “goes to the fundamentals of Formula One.”

It is about technical freedom. It is recognition by the FIA and several teams that you can have technical freedom - the freedom to innovate - or you can have freedom to spend without limit. But you cannot sustain both.

According to FOTA, “the FIA's proposals are bad for the future of Formula One, the jobs of those employed within the motor-racing industry and especially the millions of loyal fans who are dismayed and confused at the internal bickering within our sport.”
The FIA wants a budget cap of “around $60 million” per team, starting in the 2010 season. Ferrari, who spends an estimated half-billion Euros per year on F1, and the other big budget teams in FOTA reject the across-the-board budget cap approach, but apparently want specific regulations to reduce costs in targeted areas.

Of course, “technical freedom” is a canard. Is “freedom” really all that free if there’s a budget cap? Of course not!

Given the total domination of Mercedes-powered Brawn GP in general and Jensen Button in particular so far in the 2009 season, the FIA-FOTA fight is probably the most competitive and interesting aspect now in Formula One. However, if the sad history of American open wheel racing can be taken as a guide, an owners-versus-sanctioning body bloodletting invariably ends up damaging the sport.

Formula One would not be Formula One without Ferrari, BMW, Mercedes, Renault (of course the Evil Empire (Toyota), like Honda, would hardly be missed). Fan interest in the series is inexorably linked to the participation of these marque manufacturers. The value and legitimacy of Formula One as the technological and competitive pinnacle of World motor racing tied to the continued participation of these teams.

Yet unless disaster is somehow averted in posh, clubby continental backrooms or in the World Motor Sport Council, Max Mosley seemingly has put F1 on a course wherein some or all of the FOTA teams (who are now only provisionally entered in the 2010 championship) could be absent in the near future.

Back in the parochial new world of “the Colonies,” Brian France is overreacting to the bankruptcies of General Motors and Chrysler by suggesting that the formerly all-American sport of “stock car racing” could be diluted even further with more “sticker-engineered,” non-production, NASCAR-spec, FunnyCars-of-Tomorrow entered by other foreign manufactures.

France has already alienated untold numbers of long-time, traditional “stock car” fans with all the greedy, open-arms pandering toward the Evil Empire (Toyota), the establishment of common template/common-specification, non-production “NASCARs” and the wholesale destruction of many other storied “stock car” traditions.

Now Bozo Brian wants to compound those errors by turning NASCAR into a battle between fake “NASCARs” badged as Hyundais, Hondas and Toyotas. Perhaps even Koenigsegg, the new owners of GM’s Saab Division, or Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery Co., the buyers of GM’s Hummer Division, would even be welcomed into “Our NASCAR (tm)” family!

Apparently these later generations of the dictatorial France family are not satisfied with their decades of retarding technological development in American motoring and motorsports. They are not satisfied with handing the keys to this formerly American heartland, grassroots sport to a handful of corporate superteams, the Evil Empire’s invaders and their gutless, self-centered, anti-American collaborators (i.e. Joe Gibbs, Micheal Waltrip). Now the Frances want to completely “internationalize” their fading, archaic brand of non-production, carbureted, pushrod V8, silhouette FunnyCar racing. They want to dilute the series by allowing even more foreign automakers who have never, ever offered a RWD V8 muscle car for sale to the general public "total access" to the NASCAR spec-racer “Sticker-Car” formula.

More deep pocketed, anti-American invaders funding huge factory superteams fielding look-a-like fake “stock cars” that the fans cannot relate to in any way is the last thing that NASCAR needs. Yet the third generation France family, who hold an effective monopoly on major-league sedan racing in America, could apparently care less about what the majority of long-suffering fans want (e.g. a return to racing of identifiable, production-based American-built cars from American-based manufacturers by American owner-drivers and smaller teams on a variety of tracks).

Max Mosley and Brian France are both playing a dangerous game. Both are pushing unpopular “change” that is certain to further alienate critical stakeholders. Both are unwisely tampering with the fundamentals of their respective series. Both have seemingly lost sight of why millions of fans invested their time and their recreation dollars into Formula One and NASCAR in the first place. They seem to be two peas in a pod rotten by corrosive hubris, arrogance, and wholesale detachment from their ultimate “customers.”