While You Were Sleeping: July 15, 2014

You have to love the auto world. It’s a world where a Cimarroned-up version of the RAV4 is a sure-fire winner and an affordable FT86 competitor is a waste of time. The Russians get cheap Datsuns and we get expensive Volts. Meanwhile, the one-percenter train rolls on, now with additional boost for the V-12.

It Stands For “Next X-Wife”: Two solid reviews of the Lexus NX: one from Ben Stewart at R&T and one from AlexOnAutos.

He Also Believes Michael Buble Is A Competitor Of Sorts To Frank Sinatra: Poor Nissan! They just can’t seem to find the money to build the IDx rear-wheel-drive sports car. Pierre Loing, the vice-president in charge of making excuses for stuff, told Wards Auto that doing 50,000 units of such a car wouldn’t be “worth it”. Mr. Loing then (probably) produced a large mushroom from an inner coat pocket and ate it whole before exclaiming that he “believes Nissan’s Juke CUV is a competitor of sorts to the BRZ and FR-S, as it has similar performance characteristics, as well as a DI turbocharged 4-cyl.”

As Opposed To One Of The Least Modern Ones: Nissan tells us that “Bringing affordable quality motoring within the reach of up-and-coming Russian customers, the four-door, five-seat car is being built at the Togliatti plant in Russia, a partnership between the Renault-Nissan Alliance and AVTOVAZ. A special ceremony took place today to mark the first Datsun on-DO coming off the production line. The Datsun on-DO is being produced on one of the most modern lines in the AVTOVAZ facility. Plant personnel are using production techniques that have been developed and refined during the evolution of the Renault-Nissan Alliance, established 15 years ago.” Dumb-asses! The Renault Alliance was “established” in 1983 and it’s been “rusting” ever since.

Good Thing They Didn’t Bring The Eldorado Back, Because That Would Have Been A Total Failure: Automotive News reports that discounts on the ELR are swinging through the $14,000 mark on their way to an expected maximum that can be mathematically described as “whatever the Volt costs, minus what we have to pay customers to be seen in a Cadillac.” When asked to comment, Cadillac’s new head of marketing, Johann de Something, said, “The ELR is, and always has been, the Cadillac of Volts.”

And Ten Years From Now It Will Be On eBay For Thirty Grand: The S65AMG Coupe can lean into corners and it has a twin-turbo V12 and it’s massively quick and who really cares because I don’t think a single TTAC reader will buy one. The kind of people who buy these things don’t read any car magazines besides the duPont Registry. Wait, I take that back, there’s one current CL65 owner who reads TTAC. A tip of the fedora to our own doctorv8. Other than that, let’s face it: most of you are too cheap to buy the port-installed trunk liner in your Subaru Impreza, even though the guys at the port really need the work.