Classify Auto Quotes

Some days it seems like every lowlife in town has Tail ’Em and Nail ’Em on their grease-stained Rolodex. A number of phone messages have piled up on the answering machine, breathers, telemarketers, even a few calls to do with tickets currently active. After some triage on the playback, Maxine returns an anxious call from a whistle-blower at a snack-food company over in Jersey which has been secretly negotiating with ex-employees of Krispy Kreme for the illegal purchase of top-secret temperature and humidity settings on the donut purveyor’s “proof box,” along with equally classified photos of the donut extruder, which however now seem to be Polaroids of auto parts taken years ago in Queens, Photoshopped and whimsically at that. “I’m beginning to think something’s funny about this deal,” her contact’s voice trembling a little, “maybe not even legit.” “Maybe, Trevor, because it’s a criminal act under Title 18?” “It’s an FBI sting operation!” Trevor screams. “Why would the FBI—” “Duh-uh? Krispy Kreme? On behalf of their brothers in law enforcement at all levels?” “All right. I’ll talk to them at the Bergen County DA, maybe they’ve heard something—” “Wait, wait, somebody’s coming, now they saw me, oh! maybe I better—” The line goes dead. Always happens.

the world car market had changed in the fourteen months since that 1962 auto show, when big cars seemed resurgent and Henry Ford II had talked so confidently about Detroit’s position against foreign competition. In 1963, for the first time, even as the Big Three were enjoying their best sales year ever, more than half the cars in the world were made outside the United States, with estimates that the gap would only widen year by year from then on. Volkswagen was rising, and even Japan was beginning to stir, both taking hold of the worldwide small car market. Between 375,000 and 400,000 imports were sold in the United States in 1963, and estimates for 1964 were up to a half million. One reason, experts said, was that the compact cars the U.S. automakers started manufacturing in the late fifties in response to an earlier foreign surge were getting so much bigger every year that by now that might as well be classified as midsize vehicles.