The damage that Japanese automaker Toyota Motor Company (TM) is sustaining is sizable. Once a bastion of reliability and trustworthiness in the auto industry, the perception has swung rapidly the other way in just the past six months.

Indeed, the footage showing Toyota vehicles apparently racing down highways with little control happening from behind the wheel are powerful -- more powerful than Toyota's meager "We thank you" advertising campaign. Which automaker is taking advantage of this situation by proxy? Why, Ford Motor Company (F) of course.

Ford's (F) Alan Mulally believes that the U.S. automaker stands to gain more market share in the U.S. at the expense of Japan's Toyota, which is in the midst of a huge product recall and public relations nightmare. Mulally's statement sounds pretty obvious, but it's true. It's already happening.

In light of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM) string of recalls recently, one can wonder what the large automaker is going to do in the U.S. to salvage its reputation. Toyota, as far as this writer can recall, has never seen a model-variety recall like this in its history. So much is wrong that the world's largest automaker has halted production of eight separate vehicle models until it finds out just what is causing some of them to accelerate uncontrollably.

Five assembly lines that help build these models are being suspended as of Monday, and Toyota has sent messages to 1,200 U.S. dealers asking them to stop selling the models in question immediately. The models include some of Toyota's most popular: RAV4, Corolla, Matrix, Avalon, Camry, Highlander and the Tundra pickup.