haypops

I would like to argue against this and some much more devastatingly unfair posts. If an individual were to consume one slice of bread more than required each day, by the time he/she were 45 they would be 360 pounds overweight. Not just weigh 360 pounds, but actually be 360 pounds more than their normal weight. How hard is it not to guess wrong by one piece of bread. Well a piece of bread is 75 calories and a typical diet is perhaps 1500 calories. That is an error of just 5%. Are you less than 5% inaccurate in your school studies, your cruising speed on the highway, your parallel parking requirements? Probably not. I know of people who participate in 12 step programs for both alcoholism and obesity. They will tell you that alcohol abstention is much easier than body weight to control. Sociological studies have shown that obese black women suffer much more discrimination because of their weight than there race. Unless you have a Ph.D. in biochemistry like I do, cut the fatties a little slack. To bring this back on topic; I suspect that Lutz was issuing a preemptive strike against the gas mileage credits will have little trouble getting this changed to GM's and the environment's betterment.

The car is quite attractive, I think. The 6 cylinder engine is pleasant but the 4 isn't competative. Worst of all is the CVT transmission. Chrylser and Nissan seem confident, everyone else not so. Seems like a gamble to me unless you get the manual/6 cylinder version.

Look at it this way: worse case scenario you are driving your new SMART car and you get frightened by traffic and piss your pants vs. you take the bus and sit in someone else's urine. Its your choice.

nice test drive, Healey likes the handling, the size, and the interior!

Perhaps Hummer? How many Hummer dealers are there. Really all they have that sells is a Colorado based SUV. I would think GM wants to build that brand too.

Is the theta being used for the antera/new vue/daewoo chevies etc. a new theta or the same theta that has been used for equinox/VUE/Torrent? If is new, then the optimizations necessary/desirable for the truklet could have been already designed in by GM enginners in Korea. I hope they can use the atlas engine family.

Any opinions/experience on the Atlas 4? On paper it seems terrific. It must be GM's least utilized engine.

Interesting. In the early 90's I came back to GM after years away largely because of the exceptional gas milage i got in 8.1 l powered motor home.

It is interesting that the 8.1 l. is still available on medium duty trucks and is being supplied to "partners" such as workhorse.

don't disrespect the ION

Because he wanted to replace this: with this:

That would be Packard. That would be moot That arguement would be theologicaly innacuarate and culturally insensative.

Maybe it has to fill up Spring Hill's production capacity?

The Chrysler group led the segment last year with 36.7 percent of the market, followed by Honda at 15.7 percent and GM at 14.9 percent. Last year GM sold 166,016 minivans. I think that it is fair to assume that GM would recieve a disproportionate amount of Ford's lost van sales volume.

Oh you sweet talker, you! I always enjoyed a horozontialy orientated steering wheel so as to have a place to rest my forearms and pretend that I was driving a real bus.

Well said. I noticed that you used quotation marks for incorporated in this country. I hope this is to include companies doing business here but incorporated in Bahamas and other loop-hole localities.

As in most things in life there is not a single simple answer. If Detroit can take a nibble here, and a nibble there out of their problems, things will turn around slowly. Senator Boxer has proposed an accelerated replacement of the US government's fleet with Big 3 only vehicles as one nibble at the problem.

Interesting read Mr.krinkle. Thanks

There are several different kinds of conservatives. You refer to the "wall street conservatives". There are also religious conservatives, individual freedon conservatives=libeterians?, national security conservatives, etc. The best I can come up with is label suck, just look for good governance. The jaded view is that the Vice Presidents mult million dollar reitement is based on the profits of another industry. Perhaps they don't know what to do? Peace.

full article here Lots that I don't agree with, but at least he tries. The leaders of General Motors, Ford and Chrysler recently had their long awaited summit with U.S. President George W. Bush last week. Sensitive to public sentiment, auto leaders argued they were not looking for special treatment. Instead, they sought adjustments in public policy that would benefit both the country and their operating environment. A close look at their problems and actions indicates automakers are not willing to address tough issues and Washington cannot save them. <more>

JD power sales satisfaction survey

If too political, then I apologize and ask the moderator to remove. Ernie ----------------------------------------------------- The Wall Street Journal November 15, 2006 Wednesday Pg. A18 American Workers Have a Chance To Be Heard By Jim Webb The most important -- and unfortunately the least debated -- issue in politics today is our society's steady drift toward a class-based system, the likes of which we have not seen since the 19th century. America's top tier has grown infinitely richer and more removed over the past 25 years. It is not unfair to say that they are literally living in a different country. Few among them send their children to public schools; fewer still send their loved ones to fight our wars. They own most of our stocks, making the stock market an unreliable indicator of the economic health of working people. The top 1% now takes in an astounding 16% of national income, up from 8% in 1980. The tax codes protect them, just as they protect corporate America, through a vast system of loopholes. Incestuous corporate boards regularly approve compensation packages for chief executives and others that are out of logic's range. As this newspaper has reported, the average CEO of a sizeable corporation makes more than $10 million a year, while the minimum wage for workers amounts to about $10,000 a year, and has not been raised in nearly a decade. When I graduated from college in the 1960s, the average CEO made 20 times what the average worker made. Today, that CEO makes 400 times as much. In the age of globalization and outsourcing, and with a vast underground labor pool from illegal immigration, the average American worker is seeing a different life and a troubling future. Trickle-down economics didn't happen. Despite the vaunted all-time highs of the stock market, wages and salaries are at all-time lows as a percentage of the national wealth. At the same time, medical costs have risen 73% in the last six years alone. Half of that increase comes from wage-earners' pockets rather than from insurance, and 47 million Americans have no medical insurance at all. Manufacturing jobs are disappearing. Many earned pension programs have collapsed in the wake of corporate "reorganization." And workers' ability to negotiate their futures has been eviscerated by the twin threats of modern corporate America: If they complain too loudly, their jobs might either be outsourced overseas or given to illegal immigrants. This ever-widening divide is too often ignored or downplayed by its beneficiaries. A sense of entitlement has set in among elites, bordering on hubris. When I raised this issue with corporate leaders during the recent political campaign, I was met repeatedly with denials, and, from some, an overt lack of concern for those who are falling behind. A troubling arrogance is in the air among the nation's most fortunate. Some shrug off large-scale economic and social dislocations as the inevitable byproducts of the "rough road of capitalism." Others claim that it's the fault of the worker or the public education system, that the average American is simply not up to the international challenge, that our education system fails us, or that our workers have become spoiled by old notions of corporate paternalism. Still others have gone so far as to argue that these divisions are the natural results of a competitive society. Furthermore, an unspoken insinuation seems to be inundating our national debate: Certain immigrant groups have the "right genetics" and thus are natural entrants to the "overclass," while others, as well as those who come from stock that has been here for 200 years and have not made it to the top, simply don't possess the necessary attributes. Most Americans reject such notions. But the true challenge is for everyone to understand that the current economic divisions in society are harmful to our future. It should be the first order of business for the new Congress to begin addressing these divisions, and to work to bring true fairness back to economic life. Workers already understand this, as they see stagnant wages and disappearing jobs. America's elites need to understand this reality in terms of their own self-interest. A recent survey in the Economist warned that globalization was affecting the U.S. differently than other "First World" nations, and that white-collar jobs were in as much danger as the blue-collar positions which have thus far been ravaged by outsourcing and illegal immigration. That survey then warned that "unless a solution is found to sluggish real wages and rising inequality, there is a serious risk of a protectionist backlash" in America that would take us away from what they view to be the "biggest economic stimulus in world history." More troubling is this: If it remains unchecked, this bifurcation of opportunities and advantages along class lines has the potential to bring a period of political unrest. Up to now, most American workers have simply been worried about their job prospects. Once they understand that there are (and were) clear alternatives to the policies that have dislocated careers and altered futures, they will demand more accountability from the leaders who have failed to protect their interests. The "Wal-Marting" of cheap consumer products brought in from places like China, and the easy money from low-interest home mortgage refinancing, have softened the blows in recent years. But the balance point is tipping in both cases, away from the consumer and away from our national interest. The politics of the Karl Rove era were designed to distract and divide the very people who would ordinarily be rebelling against the deterioration of their way of life. Working Americans have been repeatedly seduced at the polls by emotional issues such as the predictable mantra of "God, guns, gays, abortion and the flag" while their way of life shifted ineluctably beneath their feet. But this election cycle showed an electorate that intends to hold government leaders accountable for allowing every American a fair opportunity to succeed. With this new Congress, and heading into an important presidential election in 2008, American workers have a chance to be heard in ways that have eluded them for more than a decade. Nothing is more important for the health of our society than to grant them the validity of their concerns. And our government leaders have no greater duty than to confront the growing unfairness in this age of globalization.

There isn't a 3.2L HF v6 in NA, is there? Wasn't that the old 54 degree v6 from the caterra with no vvt or whatever its called. In general I do agree with your comment. Aside from the Atlas and Honda 3.5L engines, there is OHV 6 cylinder engines of 3400, 3500, and 3900 some with and some without vvt.