From the department of “Yep, they said it” comes this item in today’s edition of Automotive News:

Mike Accavitti, the former head of Dodge who became American Honda’s vice president of marketing in August, describes the current luxury market as “too much machine and not enough humanity.”

Replace the phrase “the current luxury market” with “the automobile.” Does anything change?

So, you’d think, if capitalists really did take their customers’ interests at least partly seriously, that the first generation of “alt fuel” cars would be the least efficient ones.

Ah, but as Henry Ford II once infamously quipped, mini cars mean mini profits.

Hence, Chevrolet is preparing a Volt mini-van.

The next Prius, meanwhile? A station wagon:

According to Automotive News, the Prius wagon uses the standard Prius hybrid engine but “weighs about 220 pounds more” than the sedan, and “increases the [vehicle's] drag coefficient” by 16 percent.