regfootball

there are a lot of men married to women that control what cars are bought in the families......not in my house (i pick all the cars here) but I have two friends who got Pilots last year, not by their choice, and the list of whipped men is a lot longer. And even then, the guys still aren't getting it any more I guess. But at least they get nagged less I think. How else did the Camcords get so popular?

there are a lot of men married to women that control what cars are bought in the families......not in my house (i pick all the cars here) but I have two friends who got Pilots last year, not by their choice, and the list of whipped men is a lot longer. And even then, the guys still aren't getting it any more I guess. But at least they get nagged less I think. How else did the Camcords get so popular?

that was the angle but you don't have to stick to it if you don't want to. thanks for the reminder on the CRV, Rondo and Camry as ugly stick cars. How did I forget those? I'll add the galant and new Lancer to the good list.

10 Best Lexus IS (tops the list....the one Toyota I might buy) Mazda 3 Mazda RX-8 (even if it's feminine) Nissan Maxima Infiniti M35/45 Infiniti G35 sedan Infiniti FX35/45 Acura TSX (everything after this point is reaching) MDX Mazda CX-9 11-bonus pick Acura TL 10 worst Yaris hatch Xb current Highlander the Turdra Ridgeline Civic Prius Avalon Fit Azera/Sonata combo platter Veracruz Sequioa Elantra lists may change daily

generic to dull. why bother.

does the altima get smaller in 3-4 years then?

like it or not, CA still pushes the idiotic agendas that result in things like no diesels coming to America. it would be more productive for the auto industry as a whole of any orientation if CA would exercise lifestyle restraint to curb emissions and power usage instead of creating more and more but forcing all the other states to subsidize the development of that stuff. You want your car to put out half as much CO2? Move halfways closer to work. Sure, that does go for the fruitcake population in some areas/states in the northeast, too. Thanks to all that bunch we have overly complex emissions systems that drive up all our fuel and car prices big time. Emissions regulations should only be determined by the feds, then all carmakers would have a much better chance at making a buck. Who cares if it's 33% of the population, which its likely not. I don't think someone in the middle of Kansas should have to pay for Mercedes developing a bizarro exhaust system just to be able to sell a few diesels around here. In fact, the standards for emissions and crash testing should be global standards. It would help all the global car companies save time and money re-engineering and testing solutions specific to each country. Then if someplace like Cali decides they want to be special, we can just simply say, sorry, you don't meet OUR standard. Keep it federal. If it meets federal standards then it should be saleable in every state.

blame the California government for starting the whole 'we gotta be special' deal on special regulations (emissions). Perhaps if the folks in that state would simply practice lifestyle changes (i.e. too many people living there and driving 100 mile round trip to work) perhaps self important regulations like their bozo emissions standards would not be needed. Emissions should be regulated at the federal level if we are going to make regulatory standards we will hold all carmakers to. I find it curious that someone would find the entire outsourcing of all our manufacturing (clothes, electronics, and now apparently cars too) to be an entirely good thing to not even have a second thought about. While some would brush it off and simply say, "we don't want those jobs here anyways", the flip side of that is "why can't we keep some jobs like that here" and grow the economy in addition to all the other fluff jobs (i.e. marketing, sales, banking, finance, 'management', etc.)". An argument can be made either way for anything. It would seem to make sense that there is some point where building crap half way around the globe and expensing the wasteful energy and resources to put it on the boat and ship back is pointless and unproductive, as much as it is raping the land and an excess waste of time of which some folks could be doing other things more worthwhile. Or, to rip on people for having things made over in China with power plants charged by electricity from heavily polluting plants they have over there. the greenies ought to make a case against that. Why the hell do we need to erect millions of square feet of useless real estate to sell cars at? We've overvalued all that retail property that the dealer cartel father owns, because of its visibility and access, simply to have a visible spot to park a bunch of cars (which are sold by questionable operations that are protected by monopolistic franchise agreements.....the protectionism right here that no one seems to talk about but they are otherwise against protectionism anyways when it doesn't apply to them). We live in a day and age where in reality, most folks would rather do away with large dealers and simply pick a car off the internet direct from the manufacturer. Ask the consumer and they probably would give a rats ass if 80% of the dealers shut down. Nothing that a couple simple test drive centers couldn't handle and a few service garages sprinkled all over town. These massive lots chewing up space to park overpriced cars (overpriced because the excessive overhead built into running excessive amounts and size of car dealerships) would be better served to everyone on this planet if were used for other purposes like housing and public facilities. Instead we have to look at these unattractive eyesore sprawling buildings that only add to the price of my car. Kinda similar to the idea that unions put undo overhead on the manufacturing process. All this overhead is on the sales side. I think it's about time we outsource all that function and streamline the system to get rid of all those excess middlemen, or send their work overseas. We don't need to have the finance manager here. We don't need to have the dealership manager live here. If they are the ones helping me select the car and making sure my needs are getting met, that's fine. But I surely don't need to pay for the excessive amounts of sales managers, and all the slop in the system that comes with having to have to bear the inventory charge of all these competing dealers and their inventory and labor and land costs and advertising costs when I could simply spec out the car on line and have it made to order and shipped directly to me on short lead time from the factory where it is parked a in simple efficient parking multistory structure. where is the lean production and the outsourcing and the cost reduction on the sales and marketing and management side? At some point we cannot justify their waste in the equation too. Send it overseas. Since we're cutting everyone's throat here, why don't just do that? Do you think people really give a rat's ass who the franchise owner is? Red McCombs, Denny hecker, John Elway, whoever, car buyers in no way want to put money into these guys' pockets. Let's get rid of these middle men. They deserve nothing from me when i could just as easily have the car shipped to me from GM itself. As much as I like it, why do we even need the receptionist or service cashier? You know, at every car dealer they hire the gal willing to sit at a desk, below eye level with her big breasts spilling out of the shirt she was told to wear or wears voluntarily because that was what qualified her for the job. Let's outsource it all. The people in China and India and Japan will figure out a way to take those once untouchable sales, marketing, and management jobs as well as technical jobs that are already going over there. It doesn't seem to ring to some until it hits home. Someday it will happen. Let it happen to those that are fine with the outsourcing and 'moving production elsewhere'. you don't want to care if it happens to others so it must be fine if it happens to yourself, your family, town, state, country too. free trade is great if it's also fair and equal trade.

the maxima gained major cred in the early 90's by being the FWD, 4 door sports car. And there is a market for it. Well, was. Still is? depends on what Nissan and Infiniti do with the rest of their lineup. There's plenty of folks out there that do not want RWD. Personally, we don't need the Maxima to be rear wheel drive. Especially since so much of its 'legend' as a 4 dr sports car came from its FWD phase. The infiniti products take care of the RWD part adequately. There is no pent up demand for a meat and potatoes Japanese brand RWD car (or Korean one for that matter too). What is most important for Nissan is how the Maxima and Altima co-exist. This concerns me. If the maxima gets smaller, what happens to the Altima? Do they make it even cheaper than it already is? i.e. look how cheesy the sentra became.

and disregarding that there is a responsibility businesses have to contribute back to the communities and countries in which they do business and operate.

being profitable and holding your business practices to a higher standard can coexist. In properly run companies. this is nice

so at least we have established that business people have no obligation to do anything beyond manufacturing numbers on a spread sheet. We require nothing of them that they have a conscience or have any concern for the social fabric or ecnomic health of our country as any sort of priority. We require no stewardship of them in any way shape and form. sweet. I should have went to business school. we exist as humans for profit, and nothing else. building a country be damned. as far as xenophobia, Japan inc is pretty much the masters of that. Otherwise their markets would be open as gaping wide as ours is.

how would that GMC coupe look with a dogleg 'bmw' style rear pillar?

well, this situation is certainly a kerfuffle and really does highlight why this stuff is sometimes not black and white. Generally I am very against abortion not gonna spew why, but this might be one of those conditions that make you think hard about the net benefit. It really does go to show that we humans are certainly not all that qualified to determine who lives and who dies and it really exposes our fallibility when we try to do things like that. Thank goodness for random chance or divine intervention...take your pick.....things generally work out best in cases like this if we can avoid human involvement in the decision.

sometimes wives don't put out unless a camry is in the garage.

I really don't mind moderate support for some Japanese companies that are not out to lie and deceit their way to the market. These are companies that know their place and operate from more of a fair trade mindset. If the companies in mind add choice for the consumer and do so in the spirit of free and fair trade then I can be convinced it provides good. Examples, mazda, suzuki, mitsubishi. These companies want to share and participate and have defined niches. Mazda 'collaborates' with Ford. There is an even exchange and fairness there. Suzuki still maintains a mutually beneficial relationship with GM. Mitsubishi used to be linked with Chrysler until Daimler screwed them. Aside from NUMMI I have not seen any interest from Toyota in being a 'collaborator'. Honda is particular is far too homogenous as well, even if they supplied some engines for the Vue. It is hard to know Nissan's intentions since the French run them, and the French are not all together.

planes leave the US daily for Tokyo. If they want, let them get on board and fly over there. There are lots of folks clamoring to get into this country and be a part of it. If those yoda humpers don't want to be a part they can a-offer up solutions and get on it or b- GTF out.

and turn signal and wiper controls. reason enough, that is, to alone not buy the car. I was cursing every time I had to use the turn signal. Hey DCX, turn signal on the left, wipers on the right. Capiche? major disagreement with me here. the G8 was wowing folks at the auto show here. It's a yummy form. Tasteful and just agressive enough. Looks great to domestic fans, euro fans, and japan fans. The charger reeks of the clad pontiac meets who gives a rip about musclecars anymore age. The Magnum is passable because it doesn't resort to the cheesiness of warmed over musclecar styling cues.

I can understand that is it's the easy path for business leaders in the US to outsource jobs and make the remaining jobs here temp jobs. From a tunnel vision perspective it's a no brainer for someone charged with a running a business to do that. From a leadership, stewardship, and visionary perspective, I would hope one would aspire for more...that is to try to figure out a way to improve our own citizen's well being rather than take the easy path and disregard what everyone's existence here means to the US. The easy path is not always proved to be the best path over time. Sometimes you gotta try a little harder. Well, maybe that's what our politicans ought to be doing, is removing the barriers to doing business profitably in this country. Ah, they are too busy getting bought off at every corner to care. until then, our domestic producers are saddled with a business environment in which they are severely disadvantaged, at least with regards to third worlders and homogenous, controlled societies with vendettas like Japan. Part because of their own fault, and part because not. And if they go away, no one seems to care, no one that MATTERS. At least until it doesn't affect them. When we sell off enough of the US or are indebted so much so that others own us, no one will care either I guess. Enjoy getting your paychecks in yen. I'd never accuse a pure businessman of doing anything beyond bare minimum required for extracting easy profit. They just don't 'train' businessmen to do much besides that in school, if they went to school. It's rare to find businessmen who expand their roles / duties to include something with a greater reach / societal good. Especially if it doesn't involve some sort of personal paycheck or stock option or bonus.

It's obvious that working for your company would suck. Employment at will or not, which, no $h! sherlock, means every day is a new employment contract and you prove yourself every day. but not commiting to an employee (i.e. stringing them along, temp style) basically says, 'you are nothing but a piece of meat, I in no way value you in any sort of way whatsoever'. You know the phrase, 'you get what you pay for'? Well, if your employment arrangements are not reasonable and don't signify some sort of reciprocal commitment to the worker, you're the one that's gonna get fked in the end. high turnover, low productivity, defective products and labor, immigration issues, whatever. Someway, somehow, you'll be left to fail in the end. Then what is the price? Numbers are not the only criteria and sorry to say it, but profits are not 100% the criteria for running a successful business. Integrity, reciprocal giving and getting and relationships is the only recipe for a long lasting successful business. It wouldn't surprise me one bit to learn that your company probably has no sort of charitable giving policy that is worth a hill of beans. And not just some cheesy made up policy that only exists to show off in PR brochures. how bout something that exists as a genuine effort to give back the communities you rape low priced temp labor from? Wait till management and marketing jobs are all in India or China or Japan, too. Keep sending $$$ overseas and eventually not too far down the road, all the management and decision makers of our fates are over there as well. When the shoe is on the other foot and somebody from Japan or India is the one hiring you as a temp, won't that be a hoot.

I'm so glad to see we have folks in this country who seem to endorse moving our nation to a bunch of part time temp workers with no health insurance or benefits and endorsing high turnover and treating human resources as a replaceable 'tool'. That sort of attitude usually only comes from the elitists who feel irreplaceable themselves. Eventually we all reap what we sow. Wait till management and marketing jobs are all in India too. And that is not a pro-union comment or anything against efficiency. It has more to do with getting people to believe that if you invest in people and build their futures, the future of your country and community is built as well.......and that's not done stringing folks along, giving them some hope of being full hires, or decent wages, and instead using them to just pull the rug out from under them. Attemtping to tear people down in interest of profits only is a guarantee to destroy our fabric. The acronym for 'toyota production system', TPS, deosn't also have to mean 'treating people $h!ty'.

i saw it on GMI. LOVE IT. love the logo. love the grille. SEX.

well, since toyota hires temps and gets rid of them at 2.99 years so as not to have to give them bene's, it's only natural they have to keep hiring a lot of new temps every 2.99 years (which they will not have to pay bene's to). There's your opportunities.

doesn't matter, as long as they get to buy that Lexus they want.

the real hardcore toyodaphiles are very snooty about even American made Toyotas, the perception is still strong that American made japanese cars do not match the quality of real Japanese ones. That is why all the Lexus are made in Japan. The people that buy them are still snooty enough to demand their cars be made in JAPAN. Some XENOPHOBIA coming from that end. We always get ripped here about Xenophobia of the Japanese companies but its equal xenophobia from the customers that specify they want the real japanese stuff. Not the sloppy Camlees made in Kentucky. The trucks Toyota makes here probably for cafe reasons or something.