Dragon

That thing got a HEMI? umm...no

f'n cool was planning on flying through London on my way to Spain this summer (With a stop in Assen, Holland for the MotoGP race). Might have to make an extended stop in England for a little infiltartion

first, let me say that I am not now, nor ever been, a proponent of the war in Iraq. But I would like to point out that your Congress did approve military action in Iraq by your president in the Joint Resolution To authorize the use of United States Armed Forces against Iraq (Public law 107-243, 116 Stat. 1497-1502) and like it or not, Hussein did not live up to the resolutions imposed upon him by the Security Council

the idea in principal are good, ie. increasing fuel efficiency, but the timeline's and targets really need a lot more though. of course, when/if something like this gets implemented (even a higher gas tax), the next president will be the one dealing with all the ramifications

crippling strikes then, or crippling costs now and probably long into the future

don't forget the conversion rate too hmmm...Magna Magnum?

why is that bad? didn't she do a good job running Magna before? Plus it would get her outta politics...well, at least as an MP

i'm sure Belinda would be all over supporting environmental legislation regarding toughening emissions laws if daddy bought Chrysler EDIT: REFERENCE: For our american friends, the daughter of Magna's owner, Belinda Stronach, is a member of our parliament

they're based in aurora, not Sauga. as I said in other threads, I'd be for it for mostly patriotic reasons. But seeing as they have experience building Chryslers & Jeeps in Austria, and they've made a lot of parts for them (most of my projects at my last job for Magna subsidiaries were for Chrysler programs), it could be a good fit. That being said, they might be shooting themselves in the foot when it comes to their parts business with other companies, though other parts manufacturers would thrive. I guess in theory they could bring all their parts manufacturing in house to a)cut out the middle man to lower costs and b)make up for business lost when other automakers stop makin their parts through Magna.

why would GM do that? they already know who did it

because when China decides to dump the stuff on our shores, the guys making decisions will take their recently cashed in stock options and golden parachutes and retire to some nice island far away, leaving us to be fubar'd

mmm, any chance we'd see this over here?

so to get rid of their struggling American brand, they'd get in bed with another struggling American brand? who incidentally, would be struggling even more once they take over the first struggling American brand. I need to go lie down. my head hurts

and guess who's being tabbed to run Chrysler if Magna buys them...Wolfgang Bernhard.

they got the money, they have the expertise in the parts and hell, they already make Chrysler's and Jeeps over in Austria. On a purely patriotic level, i'd love to see a Canadian automaker. I wonder how/if this would effect their parts business though. I dont' see GM, Ford or anybody else wanting to let their competitor make their parts. But on the flip side, as those contracts run out, they could just replace them with their own internal parts.

the $h!fire-esque nose was the first thing i noticed too. The back window looks like it was taken from a vette.

all depends how the shipping agreement is written. I'm sure GM's lawyers have it setup in a way such that there is minimal interaction required between the car and shipping employees. Probably including keep them out of the trunk and under the hood

Short-term perhaps. Long term, I could see them pulling a Toyota and going from $h! to #1 in the world

it was a merger of equals in name only to soothe worries of chrysler investors. in reality it was a takeover of Chrysler by Daimler

putting them on new GM chassis and using new GM engines wouldnt' really be running it as its own company like Daimler did is it? too let Chrysler truly continue on its why like they did with Daimler, losing a billion a year before they could get turned around (which would take a few years), PLUS the initial 5 billion purchase price, PLUS however many billions in development costs to get them up to a quality and price point where they could turn a profit, would have them end up billions and billions in debt before they turn a profit. Even when they do start turning a profit, it won't be that much, and will take years just to get out of the hole they've dug themselves into. So really, if that happened, it would probably be close to a decade before GM started to see any return on investment, and thats being generous. A turnaround that would get GM an ROI in a lot shorter time is possible, but to do so, the Chrysler Group we'd see then would look nothing like the Chrysler group as it stands now.

what profit?

if it was so easy to turn Chrysler around, Hyundai or Nissan would be fighting for them. Fact is, its a lot harder than it seems. It took years upon years to get the ship in the right direction, and we're still years away from seeing the ship stabilized.

No doubt it has a loyal following, but the current one is a bit long in the fang and I can't imagine spending money finishing up development on the next gen would be high on GM's priority list given they are still trying to dig out of their own hole and the fact they already have one ass kicking sportscar already

LS's maybe superior, but the one big thing HEMI has over them is brand recognition. Most non-ca people recognize the HEMI name, but I'd bet not the LS name. And I think GM could really use that to their advantage

SLR McLaren “722 Edition”