[RedDevil]

I used to move my old Civic on the starter motor every once in a while as my driving instructor gave me that tip to move the car away from danger when it won't start, and even mailed an auto mag where the reporter pushed his misfiring car off a busy highway while the starter motor could apparently have solved that for him.

I stopped doing that when the starter motor mount broke and the motor was dangling down in the engine bay hanging on its power cable... Apparently the stresses on the motor mount were too big.

And Darin, I could not disagree more.
Who cares if the pistons move as long as it uses no fuel it is a pure EV. I can see it uses no fuel, the UltraGauge tells me so. It needs to move so it can resume operation smoothly when EV mode ends. It would be able to maintain EV mode slightly longer if the pistons did not move but it would also need to keep a bigger reserve to rerev the engine when EV mode ends.
By saying that the IMA system has no true EV capability Toyota implies that it cannot move under electic power alone, but it does that just fine. That, and the Prius' more optimistic EPA ratings, killed the Insight...