Hybrid cars catching up?

Auto Makers Start To Back Away From Big SUVs ??

Bush Proposal May Cut Tax on S.U.V.'s for Business
NYT By DANNY HAKIM
The White House economic plan would increase by 50 percent or more the
deductions that small-business owners can take on the biggest sport
utility vehicles.

Deatils of the Lieberman/McCain draft proposal on climate change are here.

Warren Brown sees no evil in the latest Lincoln Aviator !

.."Judging from the latest sales figures, U.S. buyers want SUVs and other light trucks as much as, if not more than, they want cars. Light trucks hold 50 percent of the U.S. new-vehicle market, and the cars that sell along with them increasingly are taking on some attributes of those trucks. Witness the growth of all-wheel-drive sedans.

Huffington and her friends might call that terrorism. I call it capitalism, and I'm a dyed-in-the-wool capitalist, which is why I enjoyed tooling around in the Aviator. From its sumptuous, heated leather seats to its winged instrument panel, this SUV has everything, which is precisely the point of its being."

After the Evangelical Environmental Network, it's columnist Arianna Huffington, film producer Lawrence Bender, environmental activist Laurie David, and movie and TV agent Ari Emanuel who have formed a group called Americans for Fuel Efficient Cars (AFEC) asking "What is you SUV doing to the world?" The ads are a parody of the anti-drug spots released by the US government last year. See related press coverage here.

More on the "war" against the SUV's: This time it's called the "Axle of Evil".

Following up on the modest success of the Prius, Toyota plans to sell a hybrid version of a small S.U.V., the RX 330 from its Lexus brand, by the end of 2004. Fuel economy is one of the concerns that is driving this launch. But, the Chrysler Chief Executive thinks that may be that role could be taken up by the Diesels. What really is the potential for the diesels?

However, GM's plans to launch several hybrids starting late this year really shows the arrival of Hybrids in the US markets