Yeah its retarded, especially when considering torque is measured in so many ways on a car, normally newton meters or lb/ft but you even see it in kg/m and all sorts these days. The other one that annoys me is when journos or yanks describe torque in 'foot pounds' what the hell is that? How many feet you can get in a pound?
Got to pull you up here I'm afraid (cos I'm a pedant)
newton meters newton metres
lb/ft lbf ft
kg/m kgf m
as for 'foot pounds' ...... that's a little bit American but OK in my book
and whilst we are at it
dyn cm (erg) and N m are both also correct units of torque