"Is there any other significant issue in American political life, besides Israel, where (a) citizens split almost evenly in their views, yet (b) the leaders of both parties adopt identical lockstep positions which leave half of the citizenry with no real voice? More notably still, is there any other position, besides Israel, where (a) a party's voters overwhelmingly embrace one position (Israel should not have attacked Gaza) but (b) that party's leadership unanimously embraces the exact opposite position (Israel was absolutely right to attack Gaza and the U.S. must support Israel unequivocally)? Does that happen with any other issue?"

uh, yeah; the war in Iraq? oh i forgot, that's due to the secret Jewish mind control techniques/international Jewish cabal which controls the nations of the earth/Israel lobby. must be; it couldn't possibly be that we who thought the Iraqi incursion was tantamount to mass murder were too complacent to do anything but whine and moan on blogs and write the occasional letter to the editor, for fear of risking anything, much as our democratic party "leaders" knuckled under to the clear determination of the pro-war leaders and their followers to make life miserable for anybody who stood up tall and strong in opposition; why, that would mean we sold out the Iraqis to a bunch of criminals and crazies leading a lynch mob for our own comfort, and how could we ever hold our heads up again as moral authorities? no way, must have been those dang Israelis and their lobby controlling the government that we vote for which does things in our name.

if only the israeli peace movement would have the guts to whine and moan on blogs and write occasional letters to the editor, as we do, then certainly the israeli government would be forced to stop their nasty deeds. in the absence of this, why they're all guilty.

in drag to look a real SUV, which is based on truck components.

seriously, though, minivans make a lot more sense. so you have a lot of crap to carry sometimes; so does the UPS delivery or the electrician and i don't see them driving up in an Explorer.

"You were saying Israel was "founded" just like any other country is founded. No, it was given: a unique event in history. And Israel's behavior since then has been nothing but awful. If any country on the planet does NOT have the right to exist, it is Israel, hands down."

of course; if they had just moved in and massacred the previous inhabitants and taken over the whole damn place, they would be legitimate! like the US, or Australia, or Canada, or new zealand! but they have the original sin of being granted a piece of land by the UN in an attempt to mediate conflicting claims, while the other folks with a claim got the other chunk of the land; and they bought the majority of their land from the previous landowners so that only a minority of the previous inhabitants were chased off or killed or felt they had to be chased off or they would be killed; and worst of all, they left enough of the previous inhabitants alive to comprise 20% of their citizens! boy if the US or Australia or Canada or new zealand had left 20% of the previous inhabitants to be their citizens, they'd have no right to exist either!

boy, i'm glad you pointed this all out, as i have to say i never would have figured this logic out by myself. it's wonderful to live in one of the countries which has a right to exist because of our fine record on human rights so that i can throw stones at those who live in Israel.

that brings up another piece of SUV weirdness; net weight payload capacity. not well documented in general, you have to subtract the actual weight of the vehicle from the GVW to get the max payload weight. and you find that a BMW x5 4.8, for instance, is rated at a net payload of 1200 lbs, even though it claims to seat 7. so, in fact, even with 6 medium large men aboard, you are at the manufacturer's rated limit; and if half a dozen middle management types were sent from company HQ to regional office for a meeting and decided to take this vehicle because they need the "capacity", they better not bring any luggage.

if you need a big truck, ford trucks are damn good. dodge and chevy/gmc big trucks have their fans as well, but i think the nod goes to ford. jeeps are still pretty well regarded for offroading.

then there's the american cars that gm actually gets from abroad; pontiac g8 from holden in australia and various cadillacs from opel and saab. quite well regarded.

but good small middle-of-the-road cars from america? scarce.

even though the manufacturers make and market them in other countries, apparently they are dedicated to the proposition that americans will only buy crappy small cars, so we don't get the well regarded european ford focus, for example, we get a homegrown pale imitation.