regfootball

i really am fine with GM delaying the next consumer Zeta until 2012 or whatever until the supposed future refinements are taken care of. that being, a little less weight, continuing to upgrade the engines and trannies, I would even like to see some interior refinement and North Americanization (i.e. silly window switches on the console instead of the doors, poor cupholder integration, cheap center stack with useless display up top, etc.). AWD would also be on my wish list as I would also think many of the dealers would scream out loud for it as an option. in the meantime, those that REALLY badly want a caprice will find a way to get one. and there is likely going to be a few used g8's to pick from as well.

why are people making such a big deal about this? its because all the fans loving the scandal in this, want to see a famous person become fallible. thing is half the married folk have probably cheated and a fair portion of the married folk get it on the side as well. do you eat the same thing for dinner seven days a week? Even if you eat the best beef tenderloin, you're still human and its all too tempting to have some shrimp or a pork sandwich as well. No one should be casting any stones at this, because its an issue we've all either dealt with or is tempting us every damn day. it falls under the category of human weakness and temptation. we decided it was a good idea to have monogamous relationships to preserve our family units and the well being of our offspring. Yet our biological urges tell us otherwise. What I hope is that Tiger and his wife can take the time to decide if that now this has happened, to see what's left to preserve. To be honest, I really hope they stick it out and that he cools it with the babe hunting while his kids are growing up. If he get divorced all that will happen is it will free him up to go out and skank on more women, it just will cost him BIG BUCKS. Maybe will all the money Elin might get from him, she can buy some GM stock.

nice galant greenhouse. galant, the car dodge should have rebadged as a stratus.

like a remelted rwd version of early decade bonneville.......the greenhouse is improved but i am not a fan of the blunt grille, long hood, or long deck. i suspect the flabby haunches will remain too. saw a nice 300m the other day. why can't chrysler make a good looking car like that again?

plymouth horizon tc3?

the LaCrosse is for the older set and the Lexus bangers. the Regal is for those who might intend a German car. Makes sense since its a German car. that is my anology with this Buick compact. It should compete vs. the VW Golf / Jetta line. which is WHY it needs ALL the body styles. Regal needs it too.

an 09.5 G6 with a 6 speed auto would be a good buy with those incentives. you'd probably get a 2500 dealer discount along with the 4500 off, you'd probably be in the 16-17 range. in my case another 2500 GM card. maybe i should see if there are any with the 6 speed, usb/bluetooth and a sunroof. that would be a nice commuter car.

i forgot the Lexus, its easy to forget. However, as a luxury device, the Lexus is indeed top tier. It just has no emotion. I think the reason Porsche did the Panamera was to elevate the status of an aspirational one from Luxury + sport to Sport + luxury. To be honest, I don't think you will see folks getting chauffered in the Panamera. THose folks will be driving it. Caddy needs to have a good enough entry here to be included with those cars you mentioned and have it seem legit. They already pulled off comparison with the G8 to the BMW and the corvette plays that role all the time. SO GM CAN DO IT!....my biggest fear is that they ALWAYS SKIMP IN INTERIOR QUALITY and this is the prime selling point of the S Class. If you think of the CTS interior its not even half way to where it should be in an S Class, and the CTS interior is a definite step in the right direction. THe LaCrosse interior however still has big issues on plastics and leather quality, fit and finish and panel gaps and assembly. Also textures and gloss all over. GM STILL MAKES SHINY GLOSSY SLOPPY INTERIORS!

cadillac needs to duplicate the chassis of the S class. the S class is the target for everything except price. the 7 series is bloated and ugly. the A8 is a misfit. the jaguar is nice but the interior is strange. other makes are wannabees. what did princess diana die in? an S class. the only other thing caddy could aspire to be a version of is rolls or bentley. the S class is THE target. and really when it comes down to it, the thing that makes the S class what it is is impeccable interior luxury. has anyone ever sat in one recently? the eerie quiet. the amazing material and finish quality. the room and space. the SOUND of the door when it closes. and then imagine how it drives. the genesis is a korean sort of knockoff attempt at duplicating some of that and they have a ways to go. The CTS is a nice job at aspirational luxury. BUt its not hard core luxury like the S Class. Perhaps the maserati is another one could consider a real luxury ride. cadillac needs to keep the price down though to move in volume and still draw its customary older buyers. Any caddy S class competitor should carry a DOHC v8 option with 6-8 speed tranny and AWD option (or sheet just make it standard) as well. Perhaps it should even have a v12 option although a twin turbo v8 would work just as well.

these bistro mugs really rock! 3 bucks! get em while you can! i only got 2, should have got like 6 of em.

the more and more i see of the sedan and the more pics i see of the hatch, i'll be really upset if we don't get the hatch. the sedan looks tidy enough, but it simply doesn't look very upscale. it looks like a fancier elantra. the hatch has an interesting rear that is nicer than the golf and has a style all its own. i don't want the sedan, i want the hatch. there is no excuse to not make this a full line offering and bring the hatches too. sedan, hatches, wagon. i can even get an elantra wagon. so this should not be difficult.

if you look at the images on the 2010 opel astra group on FB....there is even a nice hypothesis of the astra wagon. if buick is shooting at vw like they are with the regal, then the buick compact line should echo the golf/jetta....hb, wagons, etc, sedans.....including a full range of engines and trannies...including manuals.....

yet you read long term tests on the new Jag in the buff books and they say it has more than its share of problems.

parts have been getting dumped on. Where I live, we got like 3". The wind and cold is a beeoch, but 2/3 of my driveway was bare. The insane thing is, they called off school today. Right now I am at mcdonalds letting the kids burn off steam so she won't drive me crazy. I think the school staff wanted a day off.

i had continental extreme contacts on my 99 SHO for awile and they were good for snow actually, but i am not sure how much different those were from the touring contacts. the touring contacts are a popular tire.

sounds like the tires you have on it, are actually decent tires, but the weight distribution might be making it tougher. FWIW in this discussion, my neighbor across the street, reps for Dodge. When i asked him about getting a magnum he said be sure to get an AWD one. He said even with the electronics and such the Magnums were absolute skates in bad weather, lots of trouble with any incline other than perfectly level. You can't flame war this guy, he is probably a bigger cut nut and better driver than 99% of the people on this site...the SSR in his garage is just his 'extra ride'. I know he has considered trying to find a Viper to own.

if you study the reasons why snow tires work, a lot of it is the siping, and all the extra outside edges on the tire biting away. also the ability to shed away microscoping amounts of moisture, snow, and water...some of which ice or snow turning into water from the heat of the tire. the tire needs to shed that moisture just like it does normally in the rain. edges that are not present on a typical high perf all season or summer tire, that provide the extra bite. the snow tires rubber compound doesn't turn stiff a super low temps either, so the rubber is flexible and remains grippy. the original blizzaks i recall advertised all the microscopic pores in the tread that allowed it to have so much more biting edge. if i were filthy rich i would get snow tires for my AWD vehicles for winter. I was out in the storm tonight in the taurus x bustin it up, but i am guessing it would have been a sherman tank virtually unstoppable with some HAKKAPELITAS

hell the first 6-10 vehicles i drove were all rwd. vegas, vettes, pickups, buicks, etc. the only one aside from the vegas that were enjoyable in winter was the 77 century coupe (regal with a different grille). the reason it was good for winter....it had the 231 v6 in it, no weight on the front and no horsepower to get into trouble with. the 77 electra coupe on the other hand was a complete disaster in snow and bad weather. very nose heavy car.

bingo. exactly. a little more conventional, most of the benefits of the smart. smart, spark, any coincidence the names are similar sounding?

i get your drift, but it does have more luggage space than a solstice.........

this wouldn't hold up to the rigors of the plow? its got all wheel drive! in any case, it's probably more sturdy than a tundra.

its a case of some folks simply not liking him and his POV although I see he often makes incredibly valid points. Its just that some folks don't want to think another side of an issue exists. Some of the posting to rebut the notion that the next corvette could have something besides a v8 and something besides pushrod I felt was extreme and not proper in the way it tried to beat people's opinions down. so i make the assumption that all that does is give those who don't even want to think of the alternative ammo to just go minusing a bunch of people. truth is if you went down to GM and talked to the engineers there they would no doubt be considering every alternative possible. Did anyone ever think Harley would actually build a MODERN powertrain for their motorcycles? Wow, a porsche designed overhead cam liquid cooled screamer on a HARLEY and the tank ain't even atop the motor. Yet there is no possibility GM can ever put anything in a corvette besides a huge v8. The reaction to the possibility was rather caustic in places and that sort of thing I am not sure if a points system doesn't in fact just promote more of the toxicity rather than going into greater detail on discussing all facets of the topic.

right, that sort of thing goes on in other places, and all it is is sport for those who derive entertainment from rating people on the internet, if you don't get out of the house much and can't score with your friends and such, its too easy to just sit and take your frustrations out by rating people on the net. you know, it shouldn't be rating a poster, either. it simply should be, do you like that particular post or not? Agree or disagree? Well, that's what 'reply with quote is for'. We're not in the business or sport of rating people. Someone says something, its either something you agree or disagree with, or its something you can expand upon, or learn from. In some cases its another point of view that makes you go, 'why yes, that could be the case as well'. But to give people a points system for simply not liking someone, is all it amounts too. While I understand the desire to have some sort of self moderation, a point system is not going to get it very far I don't feel. Instead of Johnny negative thinking its making a world impact by docking points on someone because they either don't like them personally, or thinks differently about something doesn't accomplish anything but to foster division. If you don't agree on someTHING, deal with that notion that opposing viewpoints do exist and yours may or may not ultimately be wrong, and if the other person bothers you that much that perhaps instead of clicking points to get back at them maybe you would rather engage in a critical debate about the issue or whatever and resolve it in adult fashion. I really had no plans to use or recognize this feature at all myself....although if I do end up using it it will generally to complement someone for something.

the whole rep thing is cheesy and accomplishes nothing. if you have a disagreement with someone, you respect that they have a disagreement, a decision had to be made whether the disagreement is detrimental to the whole group function in any way. If its merely a difference of opinion that can be validated either way, then all you are doing is promoting group think and a popularity contest of the larger group. its one thing to have a disagreement with someone, debate it, and both learn something from it. its another to simply say you don't like it and throw a number at it and be closed minded about having multiple viewpoints. or shall i say DIVERSITY. it becomes nothing less than like those websites where you rate people based on their looks. hard to say your a website of biggest critics when you are going to slam people for being critics. and besides, this is not a discussion forum about video games and gaming with that whole immature set of folks. the only thing a rating systems does within this group is just a way to create more division and promote divisive attitudes.

my 95 tbird lx was nose heavy, like 58/42 or something. non drivable in winter. between the porky nose, rwd, and firestone $h! tires, you couldn't get anywhere. not helping matters was a first gen traction control system and abs that was unresponsive and actually made things worse. so I did the 120+ pounds over the rear axle with concrete blocks, occasionally when we traveled my wife would sit in the rear seats while i was in the front to get more weight bias on the rear. basically the rear end the suspension didn't like and wasn't designed for that much weight. the second winter i got 4 blizzaks on steel wheels from tire rack. it improved it, still wouldn't do inclines etc. but it did cut down on the fishtailing, it helped with traction from a dead stop, and it helped with braking. i hated getting the tires and wheels swapped each spring and fall. i hated having to put dead weight in my trunk to cut down my trunk space and fuel mileage. driving on ice or in snowstorms and blizzards, i hated the car. the rest of the time it was a nice car. the last couple years I owned that t-bird, was when i got my 89 SHO. with fresh all season tires, fwd, the manual trans, and a very tractable engine, the SHO was perhaps the best winter car I have owned. it was a goat in the snow, odd considering it did not have snow tires. in fact it was high performance Eagle GT all season. that was also my first front drive car. at that point i decided to give up on being a snob about the drive wheels and was fine with the front drive getting me around in winter, and in general. the SHO was faster and ran smoother than the tbird too. if the tbird had had a turbo 4 that was like 350 pounds lighter and much narrower stickier tires, it might have been ok in snow...it was such a large car, huge wheelbase and track. once you broke that rear end loose or even if it just started to get slightly out of control, you were done. one of the times that was the straw for the camels back was when i was trying to get out of the parking lot at work/incline drive/snow, stop and turn right sharp.....took about an hour and people pushing to get it up the incline first of all and then pray to GOd it didn't get going so fast you couldn't stop and go over into the ditch on the other side. plus to have any front traction to turn. You see about 15, 20 other cars leave the parking lot and decide, this ain't worth it. the blizzaks on all four corners kept me from having to sell the car and were quiet tires mostly too. they saved wear on my OEM's, which made it to 75k on the odo when i sold the car it still had some tread left...i had prob put 15k on the snows. changing and rotating the tires extends the life. you can justify a snow tire purchase if you keep the car a long time because it saves the tread wear on your originals. a female friend who bought a 3 series and ignored my warning to her to get an AWD one, she calls me one days and said her and her dad went to put snows on it after she had issues getting around especially with her driving skills. To me, you buy a rwd car where there is snow, just add the snow tires to the budget. some of the most venom you get from other drivers is when you are out driving in wet icy conditions or snowy conditions and you in line at a stoplight that turns green and the first car or car in front of you is rwd and they cannot even make it through the intersection and light goes red....you lose a whole traffic cycle because some guy has no traction and is drving a rwd vehicle. so there is like 10 cars behind that want to kill the person who couldn't make it through the intersection in their little cute spunky ford ranger with sandbags in the back and makes it about 8 feet in 2 minutes on a 5% incline or some craziness like that. I guess i would say snows are a worthwhile investment and will do the most to make winter driving better. I don't think more than 100 pounds on the rear end does much other than to really change the handling characteristics of your vehicle so much you won't be familiar with it. actually parking ramps with a sleep slope and need to stop quick but with an icy glaze on them from melting and refrozen water......incredibly dangerous with the rwd car. the corkscrew ramps or steep ramps where the weight distribution of your car becomes hazardous or changes quickly....i didn't like that. the taurus x is our first AWD vehicle and the first time i had it out in a snowstorm last year, it was amazing how easy i could maneuver the vehicle and gain traction at in town speeds. I hate the mpg hit but those 10 days you need it in the winter, its a great thing to have.