Two things, first, I was out of town until just now and I wasn't speaking to only American cars, but cars in General. You simply assumed it was an American car. The orignal poster was griping about plastics and on board new fangled computers mucking up the works. My point was that now we have cars that go longer, go faster, have less emmissions and get better gas mileage, all due to the things he's ranting about in his original post.
I guess he was right in a way. Had Detroit stuck to the utter crap 75k mile throwaway cars that blew fan belts, alternators, cap and rotor, plugs, wires, fuel pumps, batteries, radiators and brakes continuously while getting 8mpg and belching fumes like the tires were on fire we wouldn't be having this thread. They'd have long gone the way of the dodo.
For the record, I own a WRX.
The title of the article was “Where DETROIT lost me” -
So argueing that a WRX is an effectively smarter car than the standard GM crap is kind of off target.
I have two Alfas, a Sienna, and a Mercury Sable. I drive the Sable with the idiot light on. It passes smog with the light on, and mileage has not changed. It is a fine car - probably the volume production helped them iron out many of the silly things.
Have you had an American car with greater than 70,000 miles in the last decade? Go back and read the original note - not your biased interpretation of it. The author does not mention engine management system - he mentions overcomplicated diagnostics - which is accurate. Cheap plastic connectors? Problems for domestics and Europeans - seldom a problem for Asians.
Maybe you can write a response - “Where Detroit lost ME” - there is no American equivalent to a WRX - why not? Ford had Escort and Cosworth RS - and Cortina and Lotus Cortina before that - when Subaru was struggling to import grocery getters.
How is Toyata able to launch and support Lexus - with re-badged Toyotas - but Ford has to kill Mercury (re-badged Fords?) -
There is much that could be simplified on a modern car without affecting any of the engine management system issues you bring up. And reliability - and performance - of American and Euro cars would be improved if they paid attention to the details - such as connectors and switches. And ease of maintenance, and part interchangeability.