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Johan de Nysschen tells his side of the story

Automobile snagged time with ex-Cadillac, Infiniti, and Volkswagen of America boss Johan de Nysschen. General Motors decided to part ways with de Nysschen on April 18, 2018, after the German spent four years in charge of America's luxury brand. The longtime auto exec is a polarizing figure for enthusiasts, who seem to take a mostly negative view of his work at Infiniti and Cadillac. However, there's no denying de Nysschen is frank, and in the Automobile interview he puts an insider's perspective on a big bag of issues we can only speculate on. One of the biggest bombshells in the interview was that it wasn't de Nysschen's idea to move Cadillac to New York: "When I was recruited, I was informed that the company would relocate to New York," he said. Previous GM CEO Dan Ackerson had made the decision before hiring de Nysschen, then Ackerson let his new hire make the announcement. The big change came only two years after de Nysschen had taken over Infiniti after insisting Nissan's luxury brand move to Hong Kong. De Nysschen explained Cadillac's NYC move with the same rationale as Infiniti's Hong Kong move, so everyone assumed the new guy was doing his usual. He explains in the interview that after the move, "Folks who rooted for Detroit felt betrayed. Cadillac had an enemy." And that became a problem. He has nothing bad to say about GM or Cadillac, believing on the contrary that "GM is in a good position going forward." But he brought clarity to some of Cadillac's struggles. Among the issues was GM's "very vigorous" post-bankruptcy test for green-lighting a project. Another was the lack of specialization for the luxury arm. "Engines were generically developed with the Chevy brand in mind," he said, "and, then, 'Okay, well, yeah, it's good enough for Cadillac.'" That carried over into haphazard technology rollouts. "GM didn't have a specific technology roadmap aligned to particular brands," he said. "The process was, as they were developing new technologies, they would look at what product's launch date would be aligned with the maturation date and market readiness of a technology and go with it, whether Buick, Chevy, or what have you." De Nysschen worked to end such generalized approaches, which is how we get Cadillac taking the GM lead on technology and electrification.

President Trump's new limo spotted testing at high speed

What you're looking at is no ordinary limo. Look past the swirly camouflage and you'll see what appears to be a Cadillac, but don't let those looks fool you. This is the new Beast, otherwise known as Cadillac One, and codenamed by the Secret Service as Stagecoach. This is the car that will shuttle President Trump to and fro. It's hard to get a sense of scale from these images, but this car is huge. It's very likely built atop a heavy-duty truck platform, which is necessary due to the thick armor-like bodywork that's hermetically sealed to keep POTUS safe and sound. It's hard to tell for certain, but it appears this Beastie is riding on Goodyear Regional RHS II tires, which would otherwise be used on trucks and buses. Translation: this thing is heavy. The Beast is ostensibly badged as a Cadillac, and it wears the latest version of Caddy's corporate grille, badge, and upright headlamps at the front. From the rear, there's a hint of Rolls-Royce Phantom, with rear glass that tapers elegantly into the deck lid. In between is a massive slab-sided passenger compartment that's rumored to seat as many as seven passengers. These shots were snapped at GM's Milford Proving Grounds. It seems The Beast is undergoing some high-speed tests, though high-speed here is relative. Those Goodyears are only rated for 70 miles per hour or so, and we doubt the big 8.1-liter gasoline-fueled V8 engine is geared to push the President much faster than that, anyway. Related Video:

Poor headlights cause 40 cars to miss IIHS Top Safety Pick rating

Over the past few months, we've noticed a number of cars and SUVs that have come incredibly close to earning one of the IIHS's highest accolades, the Top Safety Pick rating. They have great crash test scores and solid automatic emergency braking and forward collision warning systems. What trips them up is headlights. That got us wondering, how many vehicles are there that are coming up short because they don't have headlights that meet the organization's criteria for an "Acceptable" or "Good" rating. This is a revision made after 2017, a year in which headlights weren't factored in for this specific award. This is also why why some vehicles, such as the Ford F-150, might have had the award last year, but have lost it for this year. We reached out to someone at IIHS to find out. He responded with the following car models. Depending on how you count, a whopping 40 models crash well enough to receive the rating, but don't get it because their headlights are either "Poor" or "Marginal." We say depending on how you count because the IIHS actual counts truck body styles differently, and the Infiniti Q70 is a special case. Apparently the version of the Q70 that has good headlights doesn't have adequate forward collision prevention technology. And the one that has good forward collision tech doesn't have good enough headlights. We've provided the entire list of vehicles below in alphabetical order. Interestingly, it seems the Volkswagen Group is having the most difficulty providing good headlights with its otherwise safe cars. It had the most models on the list at 9 split between Audi and Volkswagen. GM is next in line with 7 models. It is worth noting again that though these vehicles have subpar headlights and don't quite earn Top Safety Pick awards, that doesn't mean they're unsafe. They all score well enough in crash testing and forward collision prevention that they would get the coveted award if the lights were better.