Northstar

Agreed, though since they do compete in a similar price range smk does have a bit of a point. Still, I'm not sure if people looking at a G8 want something as small as a 335i. I think a better comparison would be a $40k+ Challenger or Camaro vs. a 335i coupe or similar.

The G3 is the most overpriced pile of automotive lard in history. The G8 GXP, on the other hand, looks sweet.

A picture says a thousand words, I need not comment, it speaks for itself:

This is a tough call, because there have been so many... you could name one from each brand, or more. Cadillac SRX, Chevy Malibu (last gen, and this gen isn't selling that great so far either), CSVs, all sorts of Pontiacs (Aztek, Grand Prix, G6 to some extent), 9-7x, the list goes on and on... I guess the biggest flop might be the SRX. Cadillac had a lot of momentum going at that point and looked poised to make a run to the top, but the failure of the SRX was the first set back and seemed to kill momentum.

The legislators want to see some sort of "plan" from the automakers with how they're going to spend the money, but the only thing that's going to happen is that money is going to keep them afloat until their costs go down so that they can make money again. What more do they want other than what GM already has planned? GM should just go bankrupt so it can get rid of all its costs, then ask the government for a $25 billion "restart" loan... $25 billion should be enough money to make 20-25 world-class products. GM would be amazing if it had best-in-class Malibu, Cruze, Silverado, Traverse, Equinox, Aveo, Corvette, Camaro, CTS, STS, Alpha Cadillac, SRX, XLR, 7-Series competitor, etc. That's only 14, they'd still have money for 6+ more models. This is why GM probably is best off getting down to 3-4 brands. That's a lot of products and it doesn't even include all of Cadillac and Chevy. There still needs to be money left over for Pontiac, Buick, GMC, and Saturn, which is why Pontiac is becoming expensive Chevy cars and GMC are more expensive Chevy trucks. Even Buick isn't becoming anything besides fancy Chevy's (but they are unique, at least), and Saturn is just Opel... really GM is only investing money in 2 1/2 or 3 brands.

At least the job he is looking for is going to make more than a dollar a day while working in a sweatshop making T-shirts... People in China get paid ~$100 month to work 50 hour weeks in about the crappiest conditions... that's why you can go to the store and buy a T-shirt for a few dollars.

The interior is very disappointing. It's going to look like it's 5 years old already without that huge NAV screen in there (most won't have that).

The front looks cool, but the design as a whole doesn't really work, IMO. The side and rear don't go very well with the front of the car.

I think it's rather ugly, and while the interior looks nice, it also looks like it could be in any number of cars. Not very interesting.

The G3 is now not only the most pointless vehicle on the market, it's also the most overpriced.

I am at the point where I don't think $25 billion is going to be enough... that's less than a year of cash burn. GM probably needs more time than that. Why not just get rid of the union and all the associated costs now, and start fresh ASAP? Might as well declare bankruptcy, start with new management, and get some sort of loan from the government to start out. How about $50 billion? At $1 billion/car, that should give you enough money for 50 great vehicles.

Chevy and Cadillac are the easy choices because not one vehicle from the two brands really compete with each other, or at least they are not supposed to. You could argue that the Escalade is similar enough to the Tahoe, and that the XLR and Corvette are somewhat similar, but the price difference is definitely there. Unless you want to move Buick upmarket to Cadillac's level, which I don't feel will work, your lineup might as well just be Chevy and Saturn or Chevy and Buick. What Saturn is aiming for is not that far off from where Buick is now.

Right now, I'm pretty convinced GM is probably going to go bankrupt, and the government is going to force the current management out in order for them to "save" GM and give them a loan to start over, or at least something like this is what I feel will happen. Anyways, when the "new" GM comes around, I envision a lineup of Chevy, Cadillac, and one other brand. What should that brand be? I'd like to see what everything thinks, just for the hell of it.

I think they should just let the companies declare bankruptcy so that they can rid themselves of the union and their terrible costs associated with it, and then the government should loan them X amount of money to help fund new products that can compete in the market place.

I agree about the GTO, and they are relative steals right now. There's an '04 on eBay right now, no reserve and only 30 minutes left, with 33k miles for $12800. If you wanted a newer one, an 06 with less than 20k miles can be had for $18-20k.

Saw a yellow Gallardo convertible yesterday.

I agree Rick needs to go. Bring in someone from the outside to change the culture at GM and bring a new attitude to the company. Rick has had plenty of time to get things moving in the right direction and has continuously failed at doing so.

What a stupid article. He says nothing we didn't already know and apparently thinks someone who has no experience in the auto industry can reinvent a company like GM in a year. Speaking of innovation, maybe he should check out the Volt. Before, customers weren't asking for innovation, they were asking for SUVs, and GM gave them that. I'm sure he would have suggested GM try something different back in '01 when it sold Tahoes and Suburbans by the boatloads Granted, GM never really got the car part of the business down, which should have been taken care of, but I don't think it would matter right now. Sure, GM was losing sales because of poor offerings on the car side, but every automaker is doing poorly right now and it just so happens it affects GM the most since they have the most fixed costs.

Hopefully the Alpha Camaro is close in size to the 3-Series BMW coupe. 108.7 inch wheelbase and 181.1 overall length. Even if the current Camaro (same wheelbase) were to cut down the overhangs to the BMW's level, it would be a bit tidier. ~184.7" seems like a much better package to me, and would save weight.

Where did you find that the Challenger is 191" long? Dodge.com lists the Challenger as 197.7" inches long. That's almost 8" longer than the GTO (189.8") EDIT: just saw your second post above. GTO is 72.5" wide compared to 75.7" for the Challenger. Again, the GTO is plenty roomy inside and the Challenger's excess width seems excessive, though the Camaro is also wide at 75.5" (190.4" long). For comparison, the BMW 7-Series (outgoing model) is 198.0 inches long and 74.9" wide. Challenger is wide and just slightly shorter... I think that's too big considering the 7-Series is a big car.

I think 10 inches could definitely make or break a deal. About 190 inches is as big as a car as I would want, I think. The GTO is pretty much as big as I would want right now, and I certainly wouldn't want something as big as the Challenger. The Challenger is less than 3 inches shorter than the 95 Eight-Eight LSS I drive on campus, and that car is huge!

I drove through some car lots this weekend, and whilst driving through the Cadillac lot I noticed something that's rather alarming to me... there were probably 6 CTSs in my dealer's lot (smallish dealer), and not one of them had fog lights. Instead, all of them had the cheesy black plastic inserts. And, we're not talking about the "cheap" sub-$40k CTSs either, all of them were over $40k, and only one was less that $44k. GM is touting a $44k car to take on the world's best sports sedans that has no fog lights. Way to scream "CHEAP" GM! Even your best products have major flaws such as this. While the car doesn't look bad the combination of no fog lights and dinky wheels make the base CTS look rather cheap for their price. For reference, CTS with fogs and nice wheels: CTS w/o fogs, dinky wheels:

GM should declare bankruptcy right now, because it's bound to happen. Might as well start to try to turn things around right now instead of waiting. It's quite possible that the union will be gone or at least won't give GM such an unfair advantage... I think GM needs probably $50 billion from the government to really turn things around after declaring bankruptcy. That will give them enough money to run for a while and at the same time develop some very competitive vehicles.

I like most stuff other than gin. Bar shots are usually pretty good... beer is ok, but I do get tired of it after a while. My favorite mixed drink is a shot of vodka and a shot of amaretto mixed with coke, tastes like a Dr. Pepper.

I'd go to tirerack.com and read the reviews from both tirerack and the consumer reviews.