While Clint Eastwood‘s stirring “Halftime In America” ad for General Motors has been the feel-good success story of the annual Super Bowl Look-At-Me Advertising Pageant (and Football Game)™, another car commercial is engendering more negative feelings. Chevrolet‘s post-Mayan Apocalypse entry “amusingly” posits that drivers of Chevy pickups stand a better chance of surviving such a catastrophe than Ford customers. Apparently, that’s a claim that can be challenged, says Ford.

On Wednesday night, Fox News’ Sean Hannity reported on the controversy surrounding Ford’s much-publicized commercial commenting on the auto industry bailout and on an article from the Detroit News that said the commercial had been pulled by the company following questions from the White House. Ford maintains that the ad was removed from circulation after running for a normal, standard length of time. To comment on this, Hannity brought on none other than Chris McDaniel — the Ford driver who appears in the commercial.

Earlier this month, we looked into a report Fox News’ Megyn Kelly presented on an anti-bailout ad from Ford Motor Co. Was this commercial, she wondered, trying to piggyback onto the Tea Party movement’s energy (and its wariness) by voicing disapproval of American car companies that, unlike Ford, agreed to take government bailout money?

Well, now Detroit News columnist Daniel Howes is reporting that the car company has pulled the ad after questions from the White House.

This afternoon on America Live, contributor Mike Tobin reported on a new Ford ad that casts a negative light on the government’s bailout of the motor industry. You’ll recall that Ford Motors refused to take bailout money from the government — bailout money which happened to breathe new life into and create additional jobs for Chrysler and GM despite the fact that both companies are still in the process of repaying their debts. Well, it would seem that this refusal resonated deeply with at least one car buyer.

In the commercial, an “average guy” is pulled off the street and into a press conference, where he is asked various questions about buying a Ford vehicle, including whether driving an American car is important to him. His response was interesting.

The family of late New York Mets prospect Brian Cole finally gained closure after being rewarded $131 million by the Ford Company in redress after the star was killed in an Explorer crash. In the mainstream media, that’s where the story ended. To find the real story– that this exact accident has occurred in about one in 500 Explorers manufactured– you’d have to go to Twitter.

It’s no secret that large corporations still have to figure out social media. Even when they’re not buttoned-up and unresponsive, they’re routinely outmatched by smaller, chattier Tweeters. We put together seven surprising comparisons between deep-pocketed companies and their offbeat Twitter competitors. Spoiler alert: a farting robot is in the same league as a $30 billion corporation.

Despite a crippling recession and the worst market for American car manufacturers since horses & buggies, Ford announced today that it had made nearly $1 billion in profits in its third quarter. No doubt many factors went into this result, but in an industry where millions are spent on marketing, could Ford’s embrace of social media deserve some credit?