We predicted it a few weeks back--or at least suggested it would be a grand candidate for the scrap heap. Now GM's gone and cancelled the 2010 Pontiac G8 ST, according to our buddy Mike over at PickupTrucks.com.

The latter-day El Camino was to be spun from the Pontiac G8 sedan chassis.  It was due to go on sale later this year, and was named in a Web-based contest that ended up with the unimaginative initials ST.

The dealers who sell Pontiacs were told of the decision this morning. GM has said it's trimming down the Pontiac lineup to no more than three vehicles, and with interesting stuff like the 2009 Solstice, G8 sedan and Fiero--wait, they don't sell a Fiero anymore?--the weird-idea ST will never launch.

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Hard times are coming, predicts the world's largest automaker. Toyota - which captured the global sales crown from struggling General Motors during the first half of 2008 - has lowered its global sales forecast for the year, largely because it expects its first annual decline in the critical U.S. market in nearly two decades.

Last year, Toyota officials threw down the gauntlet when they predicted they would sell 9.85 million vehicles worldwide. At the time, most analysts responded by forecasting that would be enough to push the Japanese maker into the No. 1 slot. But no one counted on the slump in the U.S. and the general stagnation in many other developed markets, notably in Europe.

Now, says Toyota, it expects global sales to reach 9.5 million, this year, about 1 percent more than in 2007. But in the U.S. market, the company said in a brief statement, it will suffer its first sales decline in 17 years. When you combine the Toyota, Lexus, and Scion brands, volume is expected to total 2.44 million cars, trucks, and crossovers, compared with 2.62 million in 2007 - and the original, 2008 forecast of 2.64 million vehicles.

Toyota's 6.8 percent sales slump in the U.S. so far this year is complicated by a variety of factors. There's no question it has been hurt by the sudden, sharp decline in the American light truck market. The Japanese maker has ordered a months-long shutdown of its new Tundra pickup plant in San Antonio, and will pull additional production of the full-size truck out of another factory in Indiana. It has delayed the launch of a new plant that was supposed to build the Highlander SUV - but it will add production, there, of the popular Prius hybrid.

In fact, many analysts believe Toyota could be doing better in the States if it had more hybrids and small cars to sell. There are long lines waiting for the Prius in most of the country, and dealers typically sell the hybrid vehicles the moment a shipment arrives from the factory.

The U.S. isn't the only place Toyota is struggling. It is projecting a very small downturn in the home Japanese market for 2008. On the other hand, such slowdowns have been offset by robust demand in key emerging markets, including China, where Toyota has steadily been pushing its way into the top tier of import nameplates.

Posting the worst quarterly loss in its history, Ford Motor Co. says it is "aggressively accelerating" plans to shift from a truck-based to high-mileage, car and crossover-based company.

Despite an $8.7 billion loss - driven largely by losses in the U.S. and an $8.03 billion write-off of North American assets and bad loans - CEO Alan Mulally tried to put a good face on Ford's worsening performance, touting "strong results" in many of its overseas markets, such as China, and highlighting plans to consolidate U.S. and European product lines.

But it was difficult to spin an upside on a quarter when virtually everything went wrong, where soaring fuel prices caused the collapse of sales of some of Ford's traditionally strongest models. In recent months, the full-sized F-Series pickup, the nation's best-selling model line for 27 years, has been repeatedly surpassed by high-mileage imports, such as the Honda Civic.

For their part, industry analysts had collectively been forecasting a loss of around $0.27 a share for the April-June quarter. But the figures came in at a loss of $3.88 a share, or $0.62, if you exclude those one-time items.

Ford's latest dose of bad news comes in bitter contrast to the positive outlook it had shown prior to the run-up in fuel prices that began earlier this year. Through much of 2007, Mulally and his top lieutenant, President of the Americas Mark Fields, had been forecasting a return to by 2008, but both now decline to say when the company will see any black ink.

If anything, Mulally said during a conference call scheduled to discuss the latest earnings, "The second half will continue to be challenging."

Yet Ford officials refused to remain glum, and highlighted the potential of a turnaround plan that has been accelerated sharply since fuel prices started nearing $4 a gallon.

"We have absolutely the right plan to respond to the changing business environment and begin to grow again for the long term," Mulally said in a statement.

Elements of the updated turnaround plan have been dribbling out in recent weeks and include an expanded role for Ford's European operations in the revival of the company's North American presence.

A sizable number of European models will be brought to the States, starting with the upcoming launch of the Transit Connect, a small commercial van. More significant, at least from a volume standpoint, will be the 2010 launch here of such Euro-derived models as the subcompact Fiesta and next-generation Focus compact. A small car also will be added to the ailing Mercury division's line-up.

During their briefing, Mulally and Fields noted that light truck production will continue to be ratcheted down by several hundred thousand units more than originally planned during the last half of 2008.

More significantly, three plants traditionally used for truck production will be converted to build passenger cars and car-based crossovers. That includes a Mexican facility that will switch from F-Series production to the new Fiesta, and the suburban-Detroit Michigan, truck plant, which will stop building models like the Lincoln Navigator and switch to several unnamed "Global C-Car" models, possibly including the next Focus.

Meanwhile, Ford also hopes to revive its once best-selling Explorer SUV, converting it to a car-based crossover when it launches the next generation of the product several years from now.

Like its domestic rivals, Ford found it highly profitable to produce high-margin trucks, such as the F-Series and Navigator. By comparison, it has traditionally struggled to make money on cars, particularly small models like Fiesta and Focus. Can it improve the business case for small sedans, coupes, hatchbacks and wagons, going forward?

That remains to be seen, but it will help that the automaker will share product development - and many of the mechanicals - with Europe. The savings through expanded economies of scale should be "staggering," said Mulally. Analysts say it will also help that Americans are changing the way they view small cars, perceiving models like the popular Mini Cooper as worth the sort of premium normally paid for larger models. If Ford can change perceptions of products like Fiesta, it may also be able to earn a profit.

But with the transformation of its lineup still several years away, Ford is expected to continue struggling, especially as the automaker doesn't forecast a revival of the overall American market until 2011. The question is whether it can reign in costs - with projected savings of more than $5 billion this year - enough to survive with its dwindling supply of cash.