The M35x and GS300 AWD are niche awd versions of cars that sell far more volume in their rwd form. But you're right about the options. Acura has been doing the one price, one equipment level thing for a while now, although this has not always been the case. There's a bunch of stuff on the RL that could be made optional to create a lower point of entry pricewise: navigation system, active cruise control, and voice recognition could all be made optional. I would say the stereo too, but the TL also comes with a pretty trick stereo so it would make more sense to keep that for a hypothetical base RL. Make the current car the "Premium Package" or something, then sell a base version with no navi, ACC or voice recognition and knock 4 grand off the price. For styling they could just slap some more aggressive bumpers and side skirts on there, and give it a grille that matches the TSX and TL.

As for you guys bringing up the inability to stick a V8 in a car that mounts the engine transversely, it's no big deal. GM's been making fwd V8 cars for a long time. They're not awd, but Volvo has a transversely mounted V8 (made by Yamaha) in the XC90 SUV, which is built on the S80 sedan platform. It's a V8 that's specially designed to save space, with a similarly space-efficient transmission. If Volvo and Yamaha can pull it off, then Honda could too. It's not a matter of not being able to, but it would be a pretty big investment and be rather out of step with the Honda corporate culture which tends to be very focused on efficient designs. Honda needs to realize that a luxury car is about being excessive, and even if most people don't buy the V8, it provides a halo effect for the V6 because people think of the whole model range and know that it includes a V8.