New 2014 Corvette Stingray = Chevron Car

Click to embiggen.

I finally figured out what's been bugging me about the new Corvette Stingray. The March issue of MotorTrend features a yellow Stingray on its cover, and it has been staring at me from the sink in our bathroom all week long. It looks cool from several angles. But in yellow, and straight on? Chevron Car, straight up.

Blast from the Past: See the USA in Your (Shitty) Chevrolet!

The car from hell. Image from AOL.

This post is a combination of my usual Sunday Blast from the Past feature, and a complaint to General Motors and its Chevrolet division. Now, I will concede that the modern-day fleet of Chevys is pretty cool: the new Malibu, Sonic, Spark, Volt, Corvette, Cruze and Camaro are awesome to look at. And I'm also aware that the Chevy Impala is due for a complete makeover. But it cannot be said loudly or often enough, the 2013 Chevrolet Impala sucks for air! Not only does the body style date back to the Bush era--2005 for the 2006 model year--but it has either been de-contented or has never been good, at least for the rental market.

Our recent trip to the Oregon coast was fantastic in nearly every way, except for the rental Impala, driven nearly 600 miles each way from San Francisco. The front driver seat was tolerable, barely. The front passenger seat had no back support, and the seat was insufficient for long drives. The backseat? intolerable. Horrible. We actually thought that it had been folded down, then reinserted improperly. It was like sitting on a foldout, convertible sofa from the 1970s. 200 miles into our adventure, we stopped at a Walmart for dining room chair cushions, just so that we could mitigate the torture! We used them for the rest of the jouney, and still weren't comfortable. Add to that a set of barely usable cup holders (wobbly coffee, anyone?) tiny visors, and a glovebox the size of a macho burrito, and you have a fairly shitty driving experience.

A Chevrolet I actually owned and liked!

Beyond all of that, for a full-sized car, the passenger cabin was woefully cramped. We had two six-footers with us, true. But we have more room--far more room--in the backseat of our Toyota Corolla-based Scion xB at home. And the cabin of the car was no bigger than the interior of my mid-sized Mitubishi Galant. The only place the Chevy excelled was in the trunk, which sleeps six. The car sucked. Hard. So, here then is my salute to all the shitty Chevys over the years (even though one of my favorites was my 1986 Chevy Cavailier RS). GM, you can do so much better.

Republicans Suck at Math, and Hate the Chevy Volt

Obama in a Volt, or, "Evil in a Failure!" Image from
Wonkette.

I remember when the movie Superman Returns came out, and from the beginning the reports were that the movie would have to make more than $200 million in order to make up its development costs. The movie did clear that hurdle, but was still widely considered to be a failure for not reaching Iron Man or Avengers-level money, in order to make money on top of its investment. Well, it was also derided because people didn't like it (I did, but I'm in the minority). But it was saddled with all of the money wasted on early drafts and hired-then-fired cast and crew from aborted earlier treatments.

The Chevy Volt is getting a bit of that seemingly unfair treatment at the moment. First, it had a lot of development costs. Second--for some reason--conservatives, led by Rush Limbaugh despise the car.* So, just like conservatives will believe just about anything that makes President Obama look bad, no matter how far-fetched, the calculations about just how much each Chevy Volt is losing is a bit of a stretch. When I heard Limbaugh bloviating about it today on the radio, I knew there had to be more to it. There always is. The bad math comes from assuming there will never be another Volt (or derivative), and dividing the development and production costs between each existing model. Which isn't very honest.

It would be at this point that I should point out that Rupert Murdoch lost millions of dollars on FOX "News" for years, and years, before it posted a profit. Sometimes you have to pump money into a project for a while before it bears fruit. Hopefully, General Motors produces less rotten fruit, though!

[Excerpt]

No, GM Is Not Losing $49K On Every Volt; Reuters Just Fails at Basic Business Math

If there’s one characteristic that distinguishes conservatives from liberals, it’s business acumen, right? Libruls may occasionally be able to sell some patchouli-scented hemp-based iPod cozies at the Lesbian Sisterhood crafts fair, but conservatives are the folks who REALLY understand how Bidness works! That’s pretty much the premise of every Republican campaign in the last 30 years, after all. So how is it that when a journalist made a pretty obvious error in a story, the supposedly business-savvy folks in the right-wing blogosphere went nuts passing on the story’s erroneous conclusions? . . .

Read more at: Wonkette


* Obviously, conservatives dislike anything Obama has done, even if he was enacting conservative ideas. Everything. And even thought the Volt--as the story above mentions--was started in 2007, they link its perceived failure with Obama. But doesn't it bother anyone that Limbaugh is leading the parade of hatred not just against our President, but against an American institution like GM?

FOX "News" Conservative Guest Debunks Chevy Volt Demonizing

I don't know, it looks nifty to me. Image from HybridCars.com

For reasons I cannot fathom, conservatives love to bash the Chevy Volt hybrid car. Though Chevrolet is an American company, and the Volt is an innovative vehicle, Rush Limbaugh, FOX "News" and thus all of right-wing world despise the car. So, how funny is it that a conservative guest on GOP-TV debunked all the crap they've been flinging at the Volt?

[Excerpt]


Fox News Debunks Right-Wing Lies About Chevy Volt: It’s ‘An Anti-Terrorist Weapon’ And ‘The Safest Car On The Road’

It’s one of the most remarkable interviews ever seen on Fox News. Yesterday, a conservative guest debunked all the destructive myths their pundits having been perpetuating, decrying their “fetish for demonizing the Volt.”

Conservatives, led by Fox News, have been pushing a variety of lies about the Chevy Volt. They’ve falsely asserted that it is unsafe and a creation of the Obama administration, using absurd terms to discourage sales like, “exploding Obamamobiles. . .”

Read more at: Think Progress

Blast from the Past: The Cars I've Owned!

I've previously run (and rerun) a blog post on the cars I've owned. But I never tried to find commercials for them all. I think it's about time I did!

1. My first car was a 1973(ish) Toyota Corolla. This ad misses the mark by about six years. But I'm still not sure if it was a '73, '74 or '75.
2. My second car was a 1980 Datsun 210. The one in the ad is a year older-- and a hatchback--where mine had a trunk. But close!



3. My third car, a present for graduation, was a 1978 Dodge Colt Station Wagon. Try to find a commercial for THAT! And believe it or not I did, but missed it by a year. Mine did NOT have faux wood grain sides, however.
4. This was the first car I bought for myself, the 1980 Toyota Celica. And while the commercial is EXCATLY the right year and car. . .they used a 1979 model for the ad! You can tell, because the '80 had rectangular headlights and a different grille.



5. After paying off my first car, I got restless and bought an '86 Chevrolet Cavalier at auction (for $2490!), only two years old. Mine was the red, sporty model.
6. My sixth car was an ill-advised purchase, also at auction. The '87 Nissan Pulsar was cute, but it leaked and had all sorts of problems.



7. When my Pulsar threw a timing chain, and turned into sculpture, I bought a 1989 Mazda 626 Turbo hatchback. Loved that car! In Japan, it was apparently called the Capella, as shown in this ad.
8. After the Mazda was near death, I bought a 1998 Jeep Wrangler, which had been a vehicle I'd wanted all my life. Since I held onto it for nine years, you can be sure I loved it. But all good things must come to an end. . .



9. And we come to my current car, which is oddly enough, currently at the body shop after a minor collision. The 2009 Mitsubishi Galant--which is only superficially different from the 2010, 2011 and 2012 Galant--may not win any awards, but I love it. And I don't expect to add a tenth car for a while.

So, that's it for now. Happy Monday!

Glee Chevy Commercial: See the USA in Your Chevrolet

This is pretty great.  And Chevy actually has the product these days to make it pay off. I'd drive any of 'em.

Motor Trend Editor Slams Rush Limbaugh

Image from Think Progress

And I couldn't be happier. I'm a Motor Trend subscriber, I think the new Chevys are pretty cool lookin', and I think Rush Limbaugh is a complete tool. Not even a useful tool. He's like a metric socket set when you're trying to work on your Corvette.

[Excerpt]

Motor Trend Editor On Limbaugh’s Chevy Volt Attacks: ‘Just Remember: Driving And Oxycontin Don’t Mix’



Last week, the influential auto magazine Motor Trend announced that it had named the breakthrough plug-in hybrid Chevrolet Volt as its 2011 car of the year. Conservatives immediately picked up on the story and attacked Motor Trend. The magazine “awarded the Obama-approved, government-subsidized Chevrolet Volt its annual ‘Car of the Year’ appellation,” the Weekly Standard whined. . .
 
Read more at: Think Progress

General Motors Bounces Back, Bounces Wall Street as Well

I've never understood the conservative aversion to the automotive bailout by the government. Letting GM fail would have probably turned our Great Recession into the Great Depression II. Instead, GM went from hemorrhaging money to getting back in the black. On top of that, over a million people got to keep their jobs, and the United States still has a automobile industry.  So, it seems to have worked out for just about everybody, and barring something as yet unseen, America will get its money back and have a whole new fleet of suddenly very attractive Chevrolets, GMCs, Buicks and Cadillacs.

Seriously, a few years ago, there wasn't a car in the whole GM fleet (which used to include the deceased Pontiac and Saturn) that got me remotely excited. Now, there isn't a Chevy that doesn't look great. Even the teeny-tiny new Aveo looks kinda cute.  I'm less excited about their other lines, but plenty of people seem to like them. Years ago, the Carter administration bailed out Chrysler, and put them on a whole new path. It looks like it's happening again.  So why are conservatives such sourpusses about it?

[Excerpt]

GM gains in return to New York Stock Exchange



General Motors Co., which went bankrupt last year after almost a century on the New York Stock Exchange, advanced in its return Thursday to public trading after an initial public offering that raised more than $20 billion. . .


Read more at: SFGate

Fun With PhotoShop: 2011 Retro Cars

Okay, I really should call this Fun With Photo-Paint, since I use the CorelDRAW suite on my PC (at least until my Mac laptop arrives and broadens my horizons). I also should call it half-assed edition, since I started this little project with enthusiasm only to realize that my idea might be a little beyond my skill set (for now!).

2009 Mitsubishi Galant with Lancer Evolution nose

Last week, I did a mock-up of my 2009 Mitsubishi Galant, with a (much more sporty) Mitsubishi Lancer nose grafted onto it.  It reminded me, that back in the day of the big SUVs, I'd always wanted to mock-up an old Ford Pinto with all of the styling cues of the Ford Explorer, Expedition, Excursion and Escape.  It would of course be called the Ford Exploder.  Since that germ of an idea, SUVs aren't nearly as ubiquitous, and Ford's styling isn't quite as iconic as it used to be.  The brand new Ford Explorer sort of apes the Ford Flex, rather than setting its own style.  Anyway, aftter the Exploder idea, I also thought it would be funny to see some of the lesser lights of the 1970s be reborn in the fashion of the Ford Mustang, the Chrysler PT Cruiser and the Volkswagen New Beetle.

2011 Ford Pinto

Here are two of those ideas, though like I said, I didn't spend a huge amount of time on them once I realized this was going to be tough to pull off well.  But it's still sort of fun!  When my Mac arrives, I'm going to need the PhotoShop practice, so I may tackle the Dodge Omni. So many car lines have died out though, some great ones--say the AMC Pacer or Gremlin--would be a little trickier to execute.

2011 Chevrolet Chevette

One weird thing I noticed about these two cars is that their hoods are gigantically long compared to today's smaller cars.  This gives the Chevy Chevette a droopy-mouthed appearance when you graft a 2011 Aveo nose onto it.  On the Pinto, I used a 2010 Ford Explorer, harkening back to my Ford Exploder idea. It worked, I think, though I ran out of gas before I got to extending the red rocker panels to the bumper.  The funny thing is, however "grafted on" these 'shop jobs look, the real front end of that Pinto is a collision of lines and planes that itself looks like a bad PhotoShop job!

(Click pictures to embiggen!)

American Cars I'd Totally Buy

Dodge Challenger. Ford Mustang. Chevy Camero. Jeep Wrangler. All American icons, all cars I'd own in a heartbeat. Who says I'm an America hating libtard? Because I'm all about buying American. Seriously.