Autofailblog: Edmunds Inside Line's Appalling Recent BMW X3 Review

It's been a really long time (over a year, in fact) since I've done an Autofailblog post. I read Edmunds Inside Line fairly frequently, and this week I came across this article reviewing the BMW X3 compact CUV.
Frequently, this online site has been criticized for being biased towards BMWs by brushing off faults that would be roundly criticized in other cars and giving excessive praise to certain other traits that would only earn mild praise in other cars. While I feel like that has become more true over the years (I've been reading it for over 4 years), I haven't really been bothered too much by it — until now.
First of all, while I should probably practice better what I'm about to preach, the writing style in that article is the epitome of incoherence. Take a look at this particular gem:

Let the weight of your shoe sink the throttle in a way intended not to clear the roadway but to maintain the integrity of the spiral "with whip" atop your caramel brûlée latte, and you'll have to be an astute gauge-watcher to notice you've moved at all. Of course, the heads-up speedometer reads 50 and the BMW is in 7th gear, but the sensation is like being wheeled into surgery on a hospital bed as someone has you counting, "10...9...8...."

What does that even mean? I know it generally speaks to the smoothness with which the car accelerates, but I had to read this a couple times and I still don't fully understand the point of the above statement.
Continuing on, the author of the article mildly scolds the X3 for excessive throttle lag and overly light steering, yet in both cases, the author quickly makes up for it with words of flowering praise.
Finally, there's this conclusion that made plenty of readers wonder aloud whether the site is in BMW's pocket:

Just don't expect it to be the Ultimate Driving Machine. After all, BMWs are about Joy now, and Joy isn't about responsive driving dynamics or throttle response. Joy, it turns out, is about isolation and comfort and in that, the 2011 BMW X3 excels.

This is straight from BMW's marketing playbook: they've moved away from the "Ultimate Driving Machine" image towards "Joy". Frequently, other competing cars are compared to the "Ultimate Driving Machine", yet the new BMWs are no longer held to that same standard. Furthermore, the author has blatantly defined "joy" to encompass all of the BMW X3's strengths and none of its weaknesses, such that it will seem like a much better car than it really is. In essence, new BMWs are being held to a far different standard than other cars, which are held to the standard of slightly older BMWs. Can anyone say "bribery"?
Reading that article reminded me in some ways of Jim Lynch's disappointing review (which I similarly lambasted), but in reverse. That article managed to turn molehills into mountains, along with disregarding standards to which previous distributions had been held in previous reviews. This one turns mountains into molehills, while also similarly disregarding existing standards. I said I have read Edmunds Inside Line since late 2006. I won't stop reading for the foreseeable future, but I will certainly scrutinize future articles (especially those on BMWs) a lot more.

Autofailblog: Lexuses Unintentionally Accelerating

This isn't "ha-ha"-funny like the pictures on Failblog; in fact, it is rather depressing, but the word needs to be spread.
For the last few months (or maybe longer), vehicles sold under the Toyota and Lexus nameplates have suffered improper installation of floormats. This may not sound like a big deal at first, except that they are on the driver's side. This means that they can often latch on to the accelerator and press it down, causing the vehicle to accelerate uncontrollably (i.e. the brakes won't do anything). Quite a few Toyota and Lexus owners have died from these occurrence.
However, the following is truly tragic.
It seems like one person, 3 days before he died from this occurrence, noticed it in his car and reported it to his dealership. However, his problem got lost on the way to upper management. No one really did anything about it. I think he owned a Lexus ES 350 (midsize sedan), while the dealers threw in floormats from the Lexus LS 570 (fullsize SUV) improperly on top of the existing floormats. That's 3 strikes: wrong floor mats, wrong placement, and placement on top of existing floormats, further increasing the possibility of unintended acceleration.
For this, he died, 3 days later.
If you or your family owns a Lexus or Toyota, please have it checked out thoroughly (and nag them about it if necessary - they are supposed to be the world-class dealers after all!) if that has not already been done. If you or people you know are planning to buy a Toyota or Lexus, please do not do so for a while. The model years date back to 1997, so it's a pretty extensive set of cases.
Toyota and Lexus are not infallible. For all that, Audi had a similar issue ("unintended acceleration") in the 1980s which ruined their reputation for about 15 years (i.e. until then, sales never rose to pre-issue levels). Here, they are quite fallible. Spread the word!
[UPDATE: It seems like the NHTSA is deciding on whether to recall recent (2006-2007) Toyota Corollas and Matrixes (not "Matrices") due to a large number of complaints about unintended stalling. It's yet another reason not to buy a Toyota (for a while now, at least).]

Autofailblog: BMW-badged Mule

The Autofailblog series is an allusion to both Autoblog (of which I am a commenter) which reports on car news and other car-related stuff and Failblog (which I frequent) which shows pictures of funny stupid things people have done.
This particular image was taken from Failblog.

For those who can't see quite right, that's a rider on what looks like a mule; the mule (or whatever it is) has the famous BMW roundel on its head.
What's with that? Is this the new "Ultimate Driving Machine"?
Introducing the new BMW M0.00003 xDrive! (The M stands for "Mule" and alludes to BMW M, the 0.00003 alludes to the mule's lack of power compared to, say, a real BMW M3, and xDrive indicates all-wheel (or in this case, all-leg) drive, for car-neophytes.)
What's next, the Audi leg-Quattro?