What's wrong with a used sub-compact anyway?

If achieving financial security is important to you -- and it probably is if you're reading WalletPop -- the absolutely worst source of information is the Madison Avenue marketing genius. If you want to be rich and happy, you would do well to take a sledgehammer to your television.

But even by Madison Avenue standards, the message behind the funny FreeCreditReport.com commercials is bad. Here are the lyrics to catchy song I recently found myself humming:

Well I'm shopping for a new car, which one's me? A cool convertible or an SUV.

Too bad I didn't know my credit was whack, so I driving off the lot in a used sub-compact.

F-R-E-E-E, that spells "free", credit report dot com baby. Saw their ads on my TV. Thought about goin' but was too la~zy.

Now instead of lookin' fly and ridin' phat, my legs are sticking to the vinyl and my posse's getting laughed at.

F-R-E-E-E, that spells "free", credit report dot com baby ...

I've said before that I oppose the idea of car loans for the vast majority of consumers, and this commercial makes abundantly clear why they're so stupid: mortgaging your financial future to prevent strangers from laughing at your posse is ... well let's just say that my thoughts on that one sentence would have to be edited considerably to qualify as merely vulgar.

Here's my advice for car shoppers: pick them like upwardly mobile executives pick wives. First get the car you can afford, and then upgrade when your fortunes are improved.