As Toyota has so publicly learned of late, ignoring a vehicle defect will not make it go away.

Ford, likely not wanting to derail its slew of successes of late, has apparently been paying attention, and learned this lesson.

After Consumer Reports contacted Ford following an incident in which one of the magazine's engineers experienced perceived brake failure ("perceived" because, as tests later showed, squashing the brakes into the floorboard would have activated a braking response) in a Fusion Hybrid, the company immediately instituted a "Customer Satisfaction Program" in order to fix, for free, the brake system software responsible for the defective-feeling pedals on all Fusion Hybrids and Mercury Milan Hybrids made on or before October 17th, 2009.

I've mentioned this before, but it bears repeating: I'm no fan of the feedback loop created when the media jump on a story, grab it by the throat and shake the ever-living hell out of it for a week or two, to the exclusion of almost everything else, before moving on and never looking back. Such has it been with much of the media and Toyota, which is not to say I think all the recent Toyota news is a nonstory -- far from it. It's become increasingly clear that the company has been, at the very least, obfuscating and avoiding very real problems, and this behavior is now biting it squarely in the ass. We've reported on Toyota quite a bit, befitting the relevant -- and this is the key word, relevant -- stories that pop up every day, while also realizing that automotive news isn't relegated only to that brand.

That being said, I was working on an addendum to this post, earlier today, about the Prius recall, wherein I wanted to touch on the conflicting reports, confusion and possible underlying causes for Toyota's recent implosion when I realized that while the scope of the Toyota story has been reported here, it's always been in mosaic form -- news on a recall, reporting on the contents of a press conference, relaying a new finding or study or what have you.

Throughout the whole long, drawn-out Toyota recall ordeal -- covering eight different models and 8 million vehicles -- the bright spot (if one could call it that) was that at least the company's vaunted Prius, the top-selling mainstream gas-electric hybrid in the U.S. was by and large unaffected.

No longer: As we called yesterday, the 2010 Prius is now the subject of a global recall involving approximately 437,000 vehicles, in order to address braking issues. Two other Toyota hybrids -- the Lexus HS250h and the Japan-only Sai model -- are also being recalled.

Toyota Motor Corp. faces yet another possible federal investigation, this time of the electric power steering in 2009 and 2010 Corollas.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is considering a formal investigation of alleged defects reported in the compact car, agency spokeswoman Karen Aldana said Monday.

Automotive News found that the Corolla has been the subject of 83 power-steering complaints since April 2008, 76 of which have reported that the vehicle unexpectedly veers to the left or right at 40 miles an hour and up.

When BMW introduced its first SUV, the X5, in 1999, it was a good time to be getting into the luxury sport-utility market. Americans were consuming high-riding machines at an unprecedented pace, and while there were more than a few examples on the road with plenty of technology and leather seating, few walked the line between off-road capability and on-road civility the way the X5 did. Well, sort of: The X5 has always been slightly more at home picking up the kids from school than battling its way over your favorite muddy trail, but that’s OK.

If you're bad at your job, don't mess with the power of the Internet.

A driving instructor from Thunderhill, Calif., discovered this fact when he went nuts on an unsuspecting first-timer looking to test the limits of his MazdaSpeed3. Despite the fact that one of his first questions was, "Is this your first track day?" -- to which he received an affirmative -- and the fact that he tells the driver he'll simply observe the first lap before giving out instructions, the guy starts in almost immediately with condescending questions and flat-out insulting comments, none of them helpful. Highlights include:

• "What were all the jerky shifts for?"
• "They didn't teach you the line when you were driving here?"
• "You don't know about smooth? They didn't teach you about smooth?"

He then goes on to demand that he be let out of the car -- despite the fact, as you can see in the video below (note that there's one use of possibly NSFW profanity around the 15-second mark), the driver was plenty competent and never out of control or dangerous. We're not sure if the instructor was just pissed off that he wasn't sitting next to Valentino Balboni or something, but what we do know is that this guy's boss saw the video and promptly fired him.

Toyota Motor Sales U.S.A. Inc. said its dealers across the country have received the parts, information and training they need to fix accelerator pedals in recalled Toyotas and that repairs have begun. The repair takes about 30 minutes to complete.

The company also said it has begun mailing letters to owners of recalled vehicles to tell them when to bring their vehicles in. When they get the letter, owners should contact a local Toyota dealer to schedule an appointment.