Subaru is Smart . . . Sort of

Subaru is “re-evaluating” its “overall direction toward electrified vehicles,” says CEO Atsushi Osaki.

Probably on account of the direction other manufacturers – especially Ford, Dodge, Mercedes-Benz and VW – are headed in, on account of their imprudent “commitment” to battery powered devices. The latter term isn’t derisive, by the way. It is descriptive. In the same way that describing a man wearing dress who insists he is a “she” as mentally ill is descriptive. This may hurt feelings but it doesn’t obviate facts. These things are devices powered by batteries. The term nicely conveys the homogenous character of the things. All of them essentially the same things, differing only in color and shape. Like blenders, microwave ovens and smartphones.

Anyhow, Subaru execs have taken note, apparently, of the stupendous losses – they are in the billions – incurred by Ford. The disastrous, possible irrecoverable sales losses afflicting Mercedes and VW, both of which may go bankrupt as a result of their “commitment.” Dodge is near-death on account of the suicidal decision by now-former Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares to cancel the Dodge Charger and Challenger and replace them both with a device called “Charger” that is as popular with Dodge buyers as Dylan Mulvaney is with Bud Light drinkers.

“We are re-evaluating our plans,” Osaki says. One can envision the captain of the Titanic saying the same – only in this case, Osaki is saying it before the collision with the iceberg. He mentions the “rapidly changing environment,” which encompasses the Trumpian tariffs but also the rapidly declining interest in battery powered devices, for essentially the same fundamental reason there is waning interest in the drugs being pushed by the pharmaceutical cartels. And – for the record – “pushed” is exactly the right word because it is the correct word. The word is often used to malign people who sell the drugs arbitrarily decreed to be illegal by the government but it is difficult to find a single instance of anyone who bought illegal drugs having been coerced in any way to buy them. 

Just a point of order.

Battery-powered devices are a lot like the legalized drugs that are pushed by the pharmaceutical cartels – in that they are pushed on us by the very same government that pushes legalized drugs on people. It’s an interesting congruence.

Subaru seems to prefer selling vehicles, which presupposes people want to buy them. That is why Subaru has been – what’s the right word? – hesitant to “commit” to battery-powered devices. The one device it currently has in its lineup – the Solterra – is in fact a rebadged Toyota bZ4x device. Subaru is smart. Let Toyota waste its R&D resources on making devices. It is far cheaper to let Toyota bear the brunt of the costs of designing a device, in other words.

There is another device apparently in the works – to be called (hilariously) Trailseeker, which is hilarious because seeking trails is arguably the last thing you’d want to try doing with a device because there is no place to charge up a device on a trail. If you own a device, you are tethered to a radius within the range of wherever there’s a place to plug the thing in. Such places are where there’s infrastructure. Especially as regards the also-hilariously styled “fast” chargers, where you’re forced to wait a long time for a charge. It is of a piece with the “convenience fee” you are charged by the DMV for using a credit card to pay the “court costs” levied on you by the court that forced you to appear before it to convict you – and “fined” you – for having caused no harm to anyone but having been found guilty of affronting the authority of the government in some way, as by “speeding.”

Back to devices. Automotive News says the “pace of Subaru’s rollout (of new devices) and the amount of money it plows into the technology is under review as the company braces for sliding sales and withholds earnings guidance.”

Subaru’s Senior Managing Executive Officer Tomoaki Emori said “It is becoming more difficult to decide how to incorporate electrification into our production mix.” That’s polite Japanese executive-speak for how do we extricate ourselves from this mess?

Emori also said: “While the shift to electrification and EVs is slowing down, EVs are the main scheme for dealing with global warming.” Italics added.

Oy meet vey.

This is either poltroonery or stupidity – and both conditions seem to afflict practically every decision-maker at every car company, Subaru included. Until this genuflecting before assertions of “global warming” (and “climate change,” the new term for the same thing) is stopped this pushing of devices will not stop. And Subaru’s “re-evaluating” will end up being nothing but a short-term abatement.

Same goes, by the way, for the abatement of the regs that are imposing compliance with all of this. President Trump has yet to forthrightly reject the underlying justification for them – i.e., this nonsense that the “climate” is “changing” because we’re most of us still driving vehicles with engines rather than devices powered by batteries. Like pretty much every Republican, he just wants to dial back the “transition” a little bit. He wants to “get back” to the regs that were imposed in 2020 – which got us to where we are right now.

The only way to get us out is to get rid of them entirely.

And the only way to do that is to stop agreeing with the claim that the “climate” is changing.”

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