It’s interesting to note too that despite what we are told on the news about the hard party lines that voters stick to and across which there is a chasm, in the case of the Rust Belt areas, there were a ton of crossover voters from Obama to Trump, and in the case of the special election in the Pittsburgh region of PA,…

Free trade is a “classic liberal” concept, otherwise accepted as modern-day libertarianism (small govt, social liberalism). Traditional republicans from back in the days of Andrew Carnegie and the like were strong protectionists, and did so at the behest of those American industrialists who wanted to protect their…

“But speaking for the majority, a low mile perfect condition car is what they’d desire, or expect.”

Huh? Most people shopping for a car in this hypothetical $2300 range ($300 plus your proposed $2000 in repairs) are happy enough to get a car with some okay tread on the tires, a healthy engine and A/C that works.

This…

Kind of-sort of: the beauty of these Rangers is that for basically no money lost on depreciation you can scoop one up for $2000, drive it all spring and summer doing projects, then turn around and sell it for $2000 in the fall when you’re done. They’re stupid simple so not much breaks. Now, if they sold a new simple…

Yep working 4WD boosts value of Rangers up big time. That and sub-150k miles and no body rot makes it a steal at $4k IMO. That’s more of a $5k truck but then you wouldn’t have sold it quite so quick. It gets harder in the 2WD space just because the market is just so saturated with options. But there is also a healthy…

My favorite Jalopnik contributor! I’ve owned a pair of the previous body style Ranger in the last two years (buy one each spring for project use, sell in time for winter to not deal with their sketchy winter traction). Here’s a sort of before and after on my ‘97. Bought for $1700, sold for $2500 with a line of people…

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, there was an absolute “gold rush” of guys importing 7 year old (due for Shaaken inspection?) JDM cars into Russian Far Eastern ports (Vladivostok mostly), and then the cars making their way into the Siberian interior to be resold in bigger cities like Novosibirsk, Omsk,…

I’m inclined to agree with just about everything you said, but wouldn’t lay blame on the deindustrialization of American solely at the feet of unions and “excessive” benefits. I put a lot of it on the constant drive for multi-national corporations to return ever-increasing profits to please shareholders, which often le…

It is hostility, at you referring to fellow Americans that are working for a living as stupid mindless zombies. Ironically enough I used to program robots for a living, and married into a family from a Rust Belt Ohio town that has lost most of its decent union steel jobs and is suffering badly with the opioid crisis.…

“ line worker zombies are scared of”

Your contempt for working class people in this country practically oozes from your post. Let me guess, you’re a “compassionate” liberal, right? Or a boot-strapping neo-conservative? They’re beginning to sound like one and the same these days. 

Another Werth article, another preachy but weak diatribe.

“Are you part of a family of five, including multiple children who participate in sports” Good luck fitting everyone in the car on a family vacation, camping outting, weekend trip to the grandparents’, etc, etc. 

Question: do you have any kids?  Are you even…

Articles like this are what are driving away viewers and commenters on Jalopnik in droves. Good luck rebuilding it with the rainbow coalition. No matter your intentions, it’s preachy and boring.

Wow convincing counter-argument bud.

Here’s an example of a 4wd truck (2nd gen Tacoma) and a Forester out for some deep snow driving. The Forester ultimately bottoms out on its belly, as expected. I do find the choice of General Grabber AT2s on the Forester odd for the winter, not sure what the yota had, looked like some big oversized Mud Terrains.

That’s pretty awesome, not gonna lie. In the case of the New jersey-ite on the OBX beach, if he kept it in a lower gear and held the throttle down and kept up momentum I do wonder how far he’d get. It was really deep and dry/soft sand that day at Cape Point. The problem would be if you slow down/stop at any point,…

I want to see a Crosstrek driving through anywhere close to 2 feet of snow that’s not fresh powder. Hint: it’d get high-centered and then burn up the clutch/CVT/viscous coupling if the owner isn’t careful. Subarus are excellent foul weather cars with exceptional capability for the AWD/crossover class, but I think it…

Well deep enough to test the maximum ground clearance I’m presuming. If it’s powder, then obviously it’s not much of a problem for either vehicle. But if it’s denser snow, the Crosstrek will run out of a) clearance b) torque/gearing.

The current F150's minimum clearance is at the stupid aerodynamic valence under the…

You seriously think a Crosstrek will go through deep snow as well as a 4WD F150?

You think it’d be better for the environment if the guy with a modern daily driver hald-ton bought a whole other new car with all the energy and material inputs it would take to manufacture it? Stop and think for a second.

Well if that’s the case then I hope you live in a mud hut with no A/C or electricity, never fly in a plane, etc.