I love good journalism; this is a brilliant opening paragraph. Insightful, well-researched, and well-written. And slightly provocative.

Last summer, Automobile Magazine editors had the opportunity to interview Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, as the company launched its all-new electric sedan. A well-known industry insider warned us not to fall for Musk's smooth talk. "Don't bring any cash," he said. "Because you'll be offering to give it to him twenty minutes into the interview."

To say there's healthy skepticism regarding Tesla and its new wundercar is an understatement: in many industry circles, it borders on outright hostility. We understand why. Building a car -- any car -- is really hard. Musk, the PayPal billionaire whose automotive accomplishments were limited to converting 2350 Lotus Elises to run on batteries, was not only proposing a class-leading sport sedan, but he promised it would have a more advanced electric powertrain than anything global automakers could muster.

He was doing this with our money -- your money -- courtesy of a $465 million loan from the Department of Energy, and he claimed to be doing it for our own good: "Since we are not appropriately pricing the CO2 capacity of the oceans and atmosphere, then the only way I could think to address that was with innovation."

We believe the proper business term to describe such a gambit is chutzpah.

You know what's great about Tesla?

They're pushing forward the state of the art, and the entire industry benefits.

Thank you for sharing this article.

Absolutely; win, lose, or draw his company will help change the industry. I like that.

Re read the review.

What's amazing is it OUTPERFORMED other cars.

Wow.

More: http://businessinsider.com/model-s-automobile-mags-car-of-the-year-2012-11

That Subaru BRZ looks like a beaut, too.

Hopefully Musk's buddies can help keep Tesla afloat long enough for them to do something big; I wonder, though, if Elon is more passionate about SpaceX.

How could he not be? Cars are fun, but they're not outer freaking space.

I thought the answer was simpler; he started SpaceX from his own investigations in 2001-2002, while he joined Tesla later as investor, then chairman, then CEO, IIRC.