The American Spectator

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Motor Trends

5.9.07 @ 12:01AM

(Page 2 of 4)

Or, he could just report his blinkered views.

Cheers,
-- Ed Arcuri

I haven't agreed with the last couple of Peters's editorials but this one nails it. Two of his points made me think of something that has shaped my opinion of the U.S. car industry.

1) Toyota's incremental improvements. Late last year there was an article in the paper lamenting the closure of a plant where they built a variety of Oldsmobile for over 10 years. And yet, the car never got above an "average" long-term quality rating in Consumer's Reports. In essence, that was 10 years where very little if any "tweaking" was done to substantially improve the myriad rattles and squeaks that bedeviled this car.

2) What it would take to "get me back" as a buyer. My earliest auto-related memories include my Dad struggling to get the engine on the buzzy, rattle-prone Ford Maverick to turn over on a winter's day, the day that the Chevy Cavalier's battery died outside the dealership when we tired to trade it in, and my mom almost getting rear-ended on a weekly basis trying to get the wheezy Chevy Chevette to make it up a steep hill on the highway.

True, a lot of the problem was that they bought cheap, low-end cars that were the only things they could afford at the time. As far as I'm concerned, that's irrelevant today. All I know is that I've owned imports (Toyota, Nissan, Honda) and would never, ever want a U.S. nameplate in my driveway unless a) domestic nameplates exceeded the Japanese "big three" in quality, and b) these same companies began treating me with the same disdain as the U.S. big three did my parents.

I mention these experiences and my current buying patterns as a 30-something not because I have a personal grudge. It's because these experiences in my generation are common. Check out the people driving around you on the freeway and I guarantee that you'll see a preponderance of 20 and 30-something Americans in their Honda Civics, Toyota Corollas and Camrys, and Nissan Altimas. Look at who's driving the Cadillacs and the Buicks and you'll find more folks who like covered suppers and play bingo.

As an otherwise patriotic, conservative-leaning individual, I think we should perhaps celebrate that the creative destruction caused by capitalism is bearing down on the remnants of the old auto industry. Yes, it's sad seeing families out of work. Yet at the same time, many of these people are the same ones who reliably turn out Michigan for Democrats and provide loyal foot soldiers, in-your-face activists, and petty thugs for unions.

Good riddance to bad automobiles.
-- Michael B.
Los Angeles, California

In the 1980s I bought a Chrysler. It was purchased from a sense of loyalty to American car makers. Lee Iacocca said, "If you can buy a better car, buy it." Well, I should have.

I sold that car within 6 months, several of which were spent with the car in the Chrysler dealer's shop because the engine was no good. The dealer I bought the car from said it had no trade value and offered me $1,000 as a price reduction on a new Chrysler, but said I'd have to keep the lemon. A BMW dealer took pity on me and said he could sell the "junker" in South America for $5,000 or $6,000 and offered me 3,750 on a new 5 series.

That Chrysler was the last American car I ever owned. I have driven Beemers, Lexi, Hondas and Toyotas ever since, though in reverse order. I used to drive my Hondas for 200,000 miles and still get $3,500 dollars on a trade. I now drive a Lexus and love the car. It gets 31 miles to the gallon on the road and requires no repairs. It is my second and for my money it puts any comparable car on the road in a distant second place.

American cars? Yes, I've put a lot of miles on three Ford company cars, almost 300,000 miles, and they ran well. But they got poor gas mileage, and every single item is an extra and to get the items you want as extras you have to buy two or three things you don't want.

Sorry, Detroit guys. In my opinion, you still don't get it. I do have an American car now but just for weekends -- a great gas guzzling muscle car from the '70s. I run it only on the weekends because that gives me the week to work on it so it will run next Saturday.
-- Jason Brutus Kane
Jupiter Farms, Florida

Eric Peters's article was a nostalgic trip down memory lane. I owned two Cutlasses and an Omega. Loved them. If I drove my Cutlass to Vacaville and let it sit in the hot sun for a few hours, the electric windows wouldn't work until the car cooled off -- and of course, it couldn't cool off because the windows wouldn't go down. So we would go back in the restaurant until sunset. I could never demonstrate this problem when I got back home, because it doesn't get hot enough here. Still, if they came out with one next week that looked exactly like my first one and got 11 miles to the gallon -we are currently paying $3.77 a gallon -- I'd buy one.

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