Hey, I just realized... the guy's original thingie was asking people's thoughts on VW TDI's. I don't think he was setting out some bait to start a "my dog's smarter than your dog" war. We each have our favorite "pet". Mine is a black Jetta TDI (52.2 MPG last tank/B100- no forign oil needed). I thinks they's great.
Another thing- even horses emit greenhouse gasses. So do you. Yeah, I know your GHGs are less detrimental to the enviroment (unless your "enviroment" is upwind of my enviroment) than ANY car's, but at least the guy's not asking if there's anything he can do to keep his 1972 Buick 225 from smoking so much, and maybe get the MPG's into the double digits. Right?
At least he's interested. Save the planet, save some money... win/win.

*cough*CAroadtax*cough* ;)

just for a reference, I paid $2400 for a '97 passat tdi in poor condition with 220,000 miles. Personally I don't really like the engineering of the chassis and the car itself, or many other VW models but I'm glad I bought it and would definitely buy another.
I do the work myself and for $300 in parts (and the help of some great people on tdiclub) I got it to run reliably. I have $2700 into it with a fresh timing belt, filters, water pump, and many other little wearable replacement items.

Now with the AC on and driving aggressively my last tank was 40mpg but I have had it up to 43mpg. It's got issues, my Check engine light is on and occasionally goes into limp mode but it has been very reliable for 10,000miles so far.

omgwtfbyobbq *cough*californiaalreadygetsenoughofmydangedmoney* cough*
Taxation without representation- and if you think Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstien represent MY interest, yer just nuts. I'm a college-educated heterosexual married white Christian male who owns guns and works- hard- for a living. I am veryveryvery low on the list of voters that matter to them. So, if either of them wants to sit down and go over an itemized list of what I owe and what I've paid, I'll be glad to lay it out.

lol jeez you guys :)

Well stinkindiesel, if it makes you feel any better, homosexual devil worshiping single brown males who have never attended college are veryveryvery low on the list of voters who matter. In fact, unless you're a bidness, or the shee... ahem, consumers the bidness fl... er, has. You probably won't mean much to them. :D

Suuure you are, now just hand me the gun...

HEY!!! I mean, hey, I'm ok, not even close to snapping.
Speaking of voters who matter to our Cali senators, my wife is on ALL their mail and email lists. She's Puerto Rican (in California, that's the same as Mexican- "Hispanic" or "Latino" are have geographic context; in NY it means Puerto Rican, in FL it means Cuban, and in CA it means Mexican) and at one point she identified herself on some form as a Hispanic female small-business owner. Thankyouverymuch.
And brown un-college educated men (hetero- or homo-) get May 1st and May 5th off. Or at least they take those days off. I worked.
I'm laughing with a tear in my eye.
Oh, and which gun did you mean? Pick a color.

Heh, stop being so naive guero. In CA we get people from Mexico and beyond. In Riverside the family living in front of me was from Ecuador iirc. And the **** they can give each other, man... Anyway, if I was working a crappy job, I'd take off a couple extra days too.

I'm not naiive, guerro, I'm facetious. I know not all brown people in Aztlan are Mexican, etc., it's just that in if you've got a name like "Ramirez" and live in NYC, there are those dullards that will assume you're Puerto Rican. If you've got that name in Florida, they'll think you're Cuban, blahblahblah and so on. My esposa is P.R. and DON'T call her Mezcan. My stepmother is Peruvian (that's in southern Mezco... duh) but she'll read you the riot act if you assume she's Mezcan.
And shame on you for thinking eveyone who took off those days had cruddy jobs;). Heck, the ones with cruddy jobs take off the whole week!:eek:
The family across from me is Cuban, the folks next door are Brazilian. The people on the other side two doors down are Philippino. A door to door salesman saw my shaved dome and assumed I would commiserate and said "Sure are a lot of Mexicans around here".
I explained, that as a Christian, there are no colors or races; we are all God's creation and to judge a brother by the outward manifestation of his genetic information is the truest, deepest and ugliest form of ignorance. God himself recognizes a man not by what is presented outwardly, but what he carries in his heart and what he does with it.
He did not make the sale. Judging books...