New Off-Roader Comrade? Certainly comrade, that’ll be 3 million pairs of knickers
MOSCOW LATEST: Does the Taganrog Automobile Factory have a deal for you! Rows of freshly minted Hyundai Santa Fe sport utility vehicles are available right now. In exchange — well, do you have any circuit boards? Or sheet metal? Or sneakers?
Here is a sign of the financial times in Russia: Barter is back on the table.
Advertisements are beginning to appear in newspapers and online, like one that offered “2,500,000 rubles’ worth of premium underwear for any automobile,” and another promising “lumber in Krasnoyarsk for food or medicine.” A crane manufacturer in Yekaterinburg is paying its debtors with excavators.
Many would-be barterers are looking for a truly liquid commodity, something universal, like gasoline. Even underwear, it is said, is much more liquid than automobiles.
Suddenly car leasing becomes much more interesting as monthly payments get more exotic.
February 12, 2009 at 11:22 am | Car Leasing News, Hyundai | No comment
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Scrappage for UK?
Talk is that Peter Mandelson is pondering on a ‘scrappage scheme’ in order to stimulate the ailing UK car market.
Scrappage schemes have already been introduced successfully in Germany and France, where owners who trade-in cars of around nine-years-old or more receive a cash incentive of almost £2000 if they then buy a new environmentally friendly car.
The UK car industry is, not surprisingly, pushing for such a scheme to be introduced in the UK, and the Government has already asked car makers to supply costed proposals.
There are voices who suggest it could subsidise manufacturers based elsewhere in Europe and not the UK. Others see it as just a means of subsiding an industry that should be left to decline with money going into more green transport methods.
Mass car leasing would see many more efficient, new cars on the road which would emit less harmful substances – and be regularly replaced.
February 8, 2009 at 11:11 pm | Car Leasing Advice, Car Leasing News | No comment
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Golly Jeremy!
The King of the Car Shows is in a spot of bother. Ooh-er. Will he be sacked? Will he be suspended? Who can possibly take over and test all those family cars for us? How will we decide which Ferrrari to buy or lease?
But hold on here. Was Lord Clarkson a bit previous with his apology – surely the first he has ever made? Was he perhaps misunderstood? Could a half-decent junior spinner from Blair PR Inc. have handled things better? Let’s have a go.
The reference to our prime minister being Scottish is factual, so the only points of issue are the spoken words which have been taken to be ‘one-eyed’ and ‘idiot’. What if Jeremy actually said ‘wan-eyed’?
I put it to you that it would have sounded exactly the same. ‘Wan’ can mean rather tired, unhappy and pallid – perhaps lacking in forcefulness, competence or effectiveness. There are people around who would see this as a factual statement too.
That leaves us with ‘idiot’. There may be those who see this as offensive. But it seems the origin of the word ‘idiot’ lies in the Latin word ‘idiota’ which means something like layman or private person – most likely ‘ordinary person’ would do. Matter of opinion as to whether Gordon is ordinary, surely.
So, what we have is probably a complete misunderstanding. Clarkson was merely giving it as his opinion that our Scottish prime minister is just an ordinary person who is rather tired, pale and a bit ineffective.
Is this a bad thing to have said? Well, don’t forget, Gordon rules in a Parliament which has no outstanding alternatives and, as Alfred Hitchcock famously commented, “In the country of the bland the wan-eyed man is king”.
I rang Jeremy to outline this interpretation of his remarks. ‘Golly’ was all he said (and let’s be clear he didn’t say Gollywog and anyway you didn’t hear this from me, right?)
February 7, 2009 at 8:38 pm | Car Leasing News | No comment
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The words ‘blind spot’ come to mind
You can place your order for this £132K carplane/planecar now although it hasn’t flown yet and it isn’t scheduled to be available until ‘next year’.
The Terrafugia Transition is a two-seater plane that at the touch of a button converts into a road-legal car. It takes its maiden flight next month and is scheduled to hit the showrooms by next year. It takes just 15 seconds to switch between flying and driving and is powered by a 100bhp petrol motor. It’s not yet available for car leasing.
The company says, “The majority of our customers are retired or near-retired couples who want a fun vehicle to putter around the country in”. Presumably they don’t want to fly then?
Not for us to pooh, pooh futuristic ideas. No, all we’ll say is:
January 31, 2009 at 1:31 pm | Car Leasing News | No comment
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