My lift. Now that I have one, I don’t know how I worked on cars without one. Rolling around on your back is for the birds!

What do you think the brake booster operates on? A few newer cars do brake by wire, but few praise the feeling compared to a vacuum based brake booster.

Brakes are fine. 

Yes, but Episodes of the Twilight Zone are available to stream. 

They actually do. The base BMW vinyl seats can be pretty terrible compared to the upper spec leather sports seats (for example). A rental Spec Mercedes A class makes your average Hyundai look like a Bentley. Plus, what is the point of comparing a trim level that nobody actually buys?

People are getting way too hung up about whether a car brand has luxury features like bank-vault doors, seats made out of whale penis leather, or perfect panel gaps.

You know what also doesn’t have massaging seats? Paganis, Ferraris, McLarens. It’s as much about class of vehicle as manufacturer. I’m sure Rolls Royce has all sorts of massaging options.

Tesla at least has a unique product. There are other EVs of course, but nothing that looks and feels like a Tesla. That may be a bad thing, but at least its differentiation. You can’t go and get something exactly like a Tesla for cheaper. 

Not sure it makes sense to compare “base” prices because almost nobody gets a true base model Mercedes/BMW. No dealer keeps them on the lot in that form, and if you order them you often give up some pretty basic features that would be standard in many economy cars if you order the true base-base model. By contrast,…

It’s not that the legal system was designed to be opaque, it’s more a byproduct of how it was developed.

They exist. A former boss of mine sold an absolutely MINT one for $6k last year. It had been owned by his aunt who bought it as a retirement gift for herself then never drove it (around 10k on the odometer). 

Can you really call something a “muscle car” if it doesn’t have any muscle? 

I’m in my late 30s. Perhaps different parts of the country, but I see pre-war cars on surface roads from time to time. Never the freeway. I suppose I’ve seen hotrods on pre-war chassis, but that’s a different ballgame from a factory original Model A or something of that nature. 

That’s why I specified European ones. American ones had the power but couldn’t turn or stop, but a lot of European cars could handle and stop pretty well too. Doubly so in 2022 if they are running modern tires. I wouldn’t hesitate to take a 70s Porsche, Alfa, BMW, or Mercedes up to 80. There are also plenty of options…

The Tesla haterade draws clicks, so they won’t stop. 

One thing worth mentioning is that the law is increasingly an anachronism because there are fewer and fewer meaningful requirements in the U.S. that don’t exist in the rest of the world. Nobody is selling cars without airbags or catalytic converters anymore. European emissions aren’t much different from the U.S.

I’ve seen hypermilers, but I’ve never seen a pre-war car on an access controlled freeway in my entire life. 

Many 60s and 70s cars have plenty of juice to keep up on a modern freeway. The European ones can generally stop and handle at that speed pretty well too. I’d draw the line at 1940s or earlier.

If the worry is the environmental impact, stunts like the Bugatti don’t even factor. For every Bugatti going 250mph, there are 1,000+ BMWs going 130. In the aggregate, the BMWs are going to be far worse for the environment.

This seems like a car for a very specific sort of buyer. It’s the type of thing you buy when you have one of those glass garages that spills out into the living room. It’s more of a sculpture than a car.