The Boston Globe on the Prius love:
Then there’s the hipness factor: ”I’ve had a lot of kids tell me that this is way cool,” she says, ”and at age 52, I have very few ways to be way cool.” When she first started driving the old Prius, it was, she says, ”a guy magnet.” For a certain type of guy, anyway. ”I would go out, and guys in Subaru Outbacks with Greenpeace stickers and L.L. Bean shirts would come over,” she says.
But the marketing department knew that only a special customer would pay $20,000 for a compact car. Specifically, someone with a master’s degree, a six-figure income, and a fondness for composting.
Oh well, I’m 0-for-3 on that one. :)
Salon notes how the automakers have backed themselves in to a corner:
With this agreement, the automakers unilaterally disarm from their long-standing position that they cannot make clean cars. In fact, they have sued to overturn the California Clean Car Law which is the basis for Canada’s action. The auto companies are now in the awkward position of telling a judge that they cannot make the same cars in California that they will make in Canada.