I always wanted to be Chris Knight. Because, well, I was the other guy in the movie. Well, maybe not quite as smart either. Actually, I had all the worldliness of Mitch Taylor, with the charm of Lazlo Hollyfield...
First off, Merry Christmas to everyone. May God bless all of you in your different adventures this year.
In a telling article Toyota as well as the director of the film came to the defense of GM. The fact of the matter is that not enough buyers cared enough for the program that it withered on the vine nearly eight years before it was really considered a real automotive exodus out of big oil. GM had made some missteps at that time, however, GM was also being ran by people that didn't know the car business. At all. GM was picked because it was an easy target. What really gets me is the fact that people will lambaste a company like this and cause ill will toward them and us, ultimately, as dealers, when it was an uninterested public to blame. When the larger mass of people want to buy something, they want to pay for something that fills their wants. That includes power, convenience, and some form of indulgence. An electric car doesn't fill many of those voids. Hence the ultimate death of the project. Electric cars are the future, but we need battery storage technology to improve, dramatically. I'm more interested in who will reinvent the electric car, not who killed it."The movie 'Who Killed the Electric Car?' was terribly one-sided," Ernest Bastien, Toyota Motor Sales vice president for vehicle operations, said intensely. "It was not balanced at all."
We were talking in Charlotte, N.C., a couple of weeks ago. I was there to drive Toyota's new 2007 Tundra pickup, and the change in topic was completely unexpected.
If it's not surprising enough to hear Toyota defending GM, try this on for size: The film's director pretty much agrees.
"We let Toyota off the hook for how they subverted the program" to sell electric cars because GM had a higher profile, director Chris Paine told me over the phone Sunday."
I am a big anime fan. I also hold my Christian faith dearly. This is a very odd combination due to many elements of popular anime. I won't watch anime that revolves heavily around demonology, or promotes alot of magic. I know, but before I am pegged as a zealot, I have a deep love of my faith, I see God as my father. I don't want to fight about it, ask me about it and I'll answer as many questions as I can. I won't thump you over the head with it.
I recently had to give up my 2006 GMC Sierra due to mileage. For those of you that don't know me, I drive demos, and thus have to trade cars often, every 5000 miles or so. About two weeks ago I took delivery of a 2007 Pontiac Torrent. It was a very stripped base model. The only options I had ordered on it were cruise control and a rear multifunction panel. All I can say is "WOW." If this is the direction of the new GM, we have a bright future indeed. I have grow acustom to driving vehicles that have a long list of optional equipment. Almost everything that used to be optional now comes standard. A decent CD stereo, power door lock, power windows, etc. Just about every niceity one could need is standard, except cruise and floor mats. The smooth V6 churns out plenty of power and does so quietly. The only noticible exhaust noise comes from the rear under harder acceleration, which Pontiac has always allowed. Part of their "Fuel for the Soul" aura. 3.5 litres of unbridled fury is not exactly how I would describe it, but it does run very well. The epa city estimates were very close, in the 18-ish range. I did not do any highway driving, because I was waiting for the Torrent I just started driving the weekend. It is a deep dark black version with the PCM preferred package, sunroof and 17 inch wheels. The preferred pakage afforrds you the luxury of remote start, deep tinted windows, a Pioneer audio system, cruise, and much more. Overall this package is very feature rich. The only complaint is that the taller tires have effected gas mileage, but very little. The ride is also a bit firmer. The sound sytem is actually much better than the outgoing model. Pontiac, as well as the rest of GM, are switching to a family of radios called "blacktie." They go with anything, get it? I really am glad though, because it is a very feature packed, intuitive, innovative radio. It also features a jack in the front that you can connect your portable music devices to. Instead of having to burn a bunch of CDs to listen to. The size, features, and price are right on target. I hope to be able to afford one of these for my wife soon. We both agree this is the perfect vehicle for a family on the move.
Todd came by this weekend to help me breath some life into my 300 MHz Blueberry iBook. So far the performance is mixed. I'm not a coder, and this is my first foray into the "alternate opertaing system lifestyle." That is if you don't count OS X. Of course OS X was more polished, but what surprised me was that it seemed quicker. I installed a copy of Xubuntu Linux, thinking that due to it's lighter system requirements, it would be faster. I was wrong. It is quite a nice system. I'd like to try it on a faster setup. I was thinking about my B&W G3, but it requires special software to tell OS X a G4 chip has been transplanted into it. Xubuntu may not be able to take advantage of the extra muscle that was squeezed out of that thing. So, I will probably not worry about installing it on this system just yet. Overall, Xubuntu was more plush than I thought it would be. But, I do have quite a bit to learn.
