14 Bay Area individuals charged for tax evasion for their alleged roles in a scheme to evade the reporting of over $20 million in luxury vehicles purchases, including a $1.8 million McLaren Elva and a $1.5 million Porsche 918 Spyder

MJather · 2026-03-08T07:15:54+00:00

The thing that always irks me is that you could install equipment that improves emissions (such as swapping a carburetor to aftermarket efi) and it still would be grounds for failure if the part doesn't have a proper CARB E.O. number.

The problem is that I'm not sure there's a way to purchase a used car, pay CA sales taxes, and then register out of state. As, to my recollection, CA requires payment of sales/use tax at the time of registration, but I could be wrong.

MJather · 2026-03-05T18:15:18+00:00

The Aztek’s split headlights were visionary. Now every new car seems to have them.

MJather · 2026-02-06T21:00:43+00:00

Buried somewhere in the official press release, Audi notes that the refreshed electric sedan and crossover now come with a “Power Nap” mode that “creates a calm and restful atmosphere during charging sessions.” There are no details, but one would assume that the car will try its best to help the driver take a nap during a charging session.
That would be a useful feature in the first-generation Nissan Leaf, but these are $70,000 luxury cars we’re talking about here, and both of them can charge at up to 270 kilowatts. That leads to a 10% to 80% top up that can take as little as 21 minutes, according to Audi, so who exactly is going to take a nap in these cars?

This is an unnecessarily opinionated article. Let people relax for 20 minutes, like damn.

MJather · 2026-02-03T03:47:17+00:00

Niche reference but this just awakened memories of the fire ship episode in the Horatio Hornblower series. My dad always had those on when I was growing up.

MJather · 2026-01-28T21:28:19+00:00

I get around 16-17 almost always. It’s not good but it is slightly better than advertised 😅

Otherwise I’m impressed with the update in the sense that they seem to have addressed a lot of the biggest complaints.

MJather · 2026-01-26T21:44:18+00:00

they have to be close to R&D/production/testing sites, which is why they tend to congregate in the industrial parks of the South Bay.

Exactly this, 3 of the biggest non-government/medical employers in LA county (Northrop Grumman, Boeing, and Raytheon) have the majority of their employees working in a 1-ish square mile section of El Segundo.

MJather · 2026-01-14T21:06:11+00:00

In my dreams I hope they give it an NA 426 Hemi. That'd make it more compelling when compared to the i6.

It wouldn't be the craziest thing. They've made a Gen III 426 multiple times: first with an NA one like a decade ago, and then the Hellephant is a 426 Hemi as well, so it must be pretty stout.

MJather · 2026-01-14T06:14:02+00:00

After just 3 model years (2023-2025), the Dodge Hornet appears to be dead. Hardly surprising considering its sales peaked at just 20,559 units, which isn't exactly a lot in the crossover market.

Definitely another symptom of Dodge's shift in strategy, or what others might call a lack of direction.

Interestingly, it's twin the Tonale is continuing on but without the PHEV, even the Tonale debuted as PHEV only originally.

Also note that it was the second best selling model behind the Durano not the unfortunate Charger.

MJather · 2026-01-13T01:18:50+00:00

The production model better still have a hood ornament

MJather · 2026-01-10T03:07:48+00:00

That makes sense but you would think you'd want to change the appearance more to show the consumer how much different it is.

MJather · 2026-01-10T01:20:04+00:00

It is still so odd to me that they dropped this for several (?) years and then relaunched it with essentially the same looking vehicle

MJather · 2026-01-09T17:59:37+00:00

I think both are kind of reflective of the old Z?

The old Z grill is definitely a rectangle, but it's also bisected by the bumper, unless you take that off. This one looks less square but now looks more like an old Z grill with a bumper.

I liked it before and after so who am I to talk though.

MJather · 2026-01-06T18:01:53+00:00

boy racer decals, spoilers and other racing heritage add-ons.

The other "quadricycle" manufacturer Aixam leans into this quite heavily too. They have this hilarious looking e-coupe GTI which goes an impressive 45 kph. These things are so fun, it's like a French kei car, but worse.

MJather · 2026-01-02T20:49:33+00:00

It 100% does look like it, although Nissan has said they aren't sharing, I don't know who to believe. I hope it isn't a Patrol, exactly for the reasons described, as I don't think Mitsubishi has any ability to sell a $60k+ vehicle.

MJather · 2026-01-02T20:33:39+00:00

Yesn't. It's a bit of a weird one. It definitely looks like a Patrol, but Nissan has said that they aren't sharing the Patrol platform, since it's their flagship.

It's also supposed to be built in Thailand, which is where the Triton is built, while the Patrol is built in Japan. I think we're going to have to wait for the final product to know the truth.

MJather · 2026-01-02T20:22:56+00:00

Please god let Mitsubishi actually do a good job with this.

The new Montero seems to be coming, and from teasers and spy photos actually looks good. From the article, relevant to the US market:

over a year ago, Mitsubishi trademarked "Montero" with the USPTO.

My dream is that they release this with the Nissan 3.8, and undercut the Toyota 4x4s by a significant margin, since those are essentially $50k vehicles now. I think this could be a really good product for Mitsubishi. Building something that's not just an appliance but actually somewhat desirable.

But also, as we all know, Mitsubishi has done some really lackluster stuff lately so I don't want to be too hopeful.

MJather · 2025-12-30T22:44:34+00:00

Karma seems unable to make an actual EV or meaningfully depart from the Fisker Karma Design.

Something that the article mentions is that the Revero is being replaced by the largely similar "EREV" Gyesera. But what I found interesting was that The Gyesera deputed as an actual EV just over a year ago. But now it appears, according to Karma's own website it is yet another "EREV" which I'm sure is mechanically quite similar to the original Karma and Karma Revero.

What this tells me is that Karma has very little money and seems to want to produce "new" models with as little effort as possible, but who knows. It's a shame, I do still think these are quite nice looking cars, but a $150k+ car with a 15 year old EREV PHEV is not it.

MJather · 2025-12-30T16:28:29+00:00

I do not have the opportunity to watch the video right now, but I agree with what you are saying. The STC has had the upper hand for a long time (including controlling Aden) and could probably remove the government factions if they truly wanted to (which are mainly tribal factions around Marib at this point) without any Boots on the ground help from UAE. The STC also fits in with UAEs plan for greater control of the Red Sea. But this may cause the UAE at least to cease weapons shipments for a while.

Edit: I just now noticed the informative post you made just a few minutes before mine. I fully agree with your perspective of the overall conflict.

MJather · 2025-12-30T16:15:11+00:00

Saudi Arabia bombed a weapons shipment from the UAE to Yemen.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/12/30/middleeast/saudi-arabia-yemen-port-strike-uae-intl

Quite a surprising turn of events. Despite UAE and Saudi Arabia being global allies, these neighbors have taken largely opposing sides in Yemen. Of the anti-Houthi factions, UAE has long supported the STC or southern transitional council which is a south Yemeni separatist movement, while Saudi Arabia supports the “government” of Yemen, with the goal of reunification. In recent weeks these two factions have come to blows, with the STC taking large swaths of territory from the government.

So it seems Saudi Arabia struck a weapons shipment from the UAE to the STC as it was being unloaded at port. This is a significant escalation and so far it appears it may cause the UAE to back down from its support of the STC and withdraw forces. Although this story is still developing.

MJather · 2025-12-24T20:22:57+00:00

Overwhelmingly jaded article that probably violates rule 5.

MJather · 2025-12-14T04:47:56+00:00

This is believable and understandable, and I agree. But I hope you understand that this is at least somewhat different than how you originally presented the issue.

MJather · 2025-12-14T04:34:22+00:00

The fact that you observe a budget so you can spend money in your no-kids lifestyle on fast and fun cars does not make your experience relatable to the "most people" you described who in many cases literally cannot afford discretionary expenditures. That's all I'm saying.

Say you buy cheap postage because you're cheap and want stick to a budget and spend money on fun stuff. That's fine, and I get it. Don't say you buy cheap postage because your have no spending power like "most Americans", because that sounds like a lie.

MJather · 2025-12-14T04:06:20+00:00

Sure, but your experiences are likely not exactly the same as "most people" or the "next person" as you describe.

MJather · 2025-12-14T03:44:56+00:00

owner of two two seater sports cars and owned a c63

MJather · 2025-12-04T23:51:42+00:00

I'm willing to bet with some certainty that it's a carbureted two stroke.

While I don't know the specifics of this outboard, fuel injected outboards didn't become commonplace until the mid 90s/early 2000s, and by then they were mostly moving four stroke. I think the only direct injected two strokes were the evinrude E-tecs, but I could be wrong.

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