2011 BMW 535i: Everything you want, except fun
January 29, 2010
The one thing you can be sure of when you walk out of a BMW news conference is that you'll have plenty of information. Your head aches from it. Your ears ring with it. Your jaws are sore from swallowing it whole like a snake.
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Ecstasy-to-drive Lotus Evora leaves one question: Take a check?
January 22, 2010
Every time I write about a high-performance sports car, I'm guaranteed to get letters from readers to this effect: "How can you possibly glorify the Badminton Dual-Cowl 87B? No one needs a car that goes 200 mph, costs $300,000 and gets five miles per gallon. With all that's going on in the world [climate change, war in the Middle East, balance of trade etc.]. For shame. For shame!"
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2010 Audi R8 5.2 FSI: An 'Avatar'-style creature of magnificent grace and power
January 15, 2010
James Cameron's film "Avatar" dreams a world where humans can telepathically plug into beautiful blue creatures of extraordinary power and speed, with glittery feline eyes and rock-hard butts.
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2011 Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG Gullwing: The mind-blowing 1950s version was cooler, but . . .
November 13, 2009
It goes about a zillion miles an hour, looks tougher than jailhouse steak and has explosive bolts in the doors, but before getting to the new Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG Gullwing, if I may, a nod to the old (1955-1957) Gullwing.
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Mercedes' 2010 E550 Coupe wins the E-class beauty contest
September 25, 2009
Is the 2010 Mercedes E550 Coupe pretty?
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Audi, BMW sell the sizzle of diesel, not the soot
September 1, 2009
Imagine trying to market a product that most Americans regard as old and obsolete, that is remembered -- if at all -- as low-class and low-tech, noisy and noisome, and whose most notable advocates are truck drivers with prominent trouser cleavage.
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Porsche wraps a 4-door hulk in racy corset
June 26, 2009
The new Porsche Panamera is the best-handling big sedan in the world, which I grant is a little like being the smartest kid on the Arizona State football team or the most chaste governor of South Carolina. No matter how hard you try -- and Porsche's engineers have busted their adorable lederhosen here -- a 4,344-pound, 16.3-foot four-door cannot beguile physics like a sports car, and it certainly cannot be made to handle anything like a 911.
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Chrysler will feel unfulfilled in its Italian romance
May 1, 2009
After an abusive affair with Germany's Daimler ending in 2007 and a dysfunctional relationship with former owner Cerberus Capital Management that ended with the company in bankruptcy Thursday, can Chrysler learn to love again?
