Remember the first Nissan SE-R? The car magazines went completely nuts for it back in the day. Well, Motive Mag thought it would be fun to pit the rusty, 135K mile example below against a brand new SE-R Spec V. Their conclusion? The new "Sentra has lost its magic. The Spec V is a better car than the 1991 model, but it’s not a better SE-R." Read the full article at Motive Mag.

So you leave your hopped up Audi out overnight, and BAM! it gets booted by the local private parking nazis. Most people just pay up, but this Arizona resident decided to fight the man. After checking with the local police to make sure he wasn’t stealing the boots, he dollied the doubly-booted car into his garage and documented the resulting confusion over on the Motive Mag forums. Be prepared to spend some time with it, it’s been going on for almost a week now. It looks like both the homeowners’ association and the local cops are backing him against the private parking enforcement company. Yeah!

Well, we made it to the final round in the MotiveMag automotive blogs bracket. We’re pitted against our buddies at Hemmings. Be sure to vote in today’s final round!

As much as I like the American Focus, the Euro Focus is just cooler. Here’s the 2008 Focus RS World Rally Car, revealed this week by Ford of Europe. More over at MotiveMag.com.

Motive just did a cool little writeup on the Scandinavian Flick, a move favored by rally drivers in icy conditions. Here’s how Bryan Joslin breaks down the maneuver (for making a right-hand turn):

1. Set up the car in a straight line before the onset of the turn. The car should be just to the left of the road’s centerline, to allow room for the tail to swing out.

6. Exhale, unpucker, and declare to the onlooking moose that you’re the king of the North Country.

Full story and pics at MotiveMag.com.

Earlier this year at the New York Auto Show, GM debuted these three microcar concepts, and invited the public to vote at its website on which of the baby vehicles was their favorite. Today at the LA Auto Show, GM announced that the poll, which attracted a record-setting 1.8 million respondents, showed the Beat to be the overwhelming winner. As a result, the Beat will go into production, becoming available for the global market in mid-2009. While GM assures that the Beat will be ultra-efficient, it was the only car of the three to run a turbocharged 1.2L—the other two micros were equipped with 1.0L engines. Check out the full story at Motivemag.

Motive Magazine has a great article on automotive recycling. Turns out 85 percent of the mass in a vehicle is recyclable, and more than ten million cars will be recycled this year. A streamlined process sorts out everything from the aluminum in wheels and engine blocks to the mercury in navigation system screens and trunklid switches. And thus today’s junk is crushed, shredded, sorted and finally converted back into the raw materials that will make up tomorrow’s new cars.