America, land of freedom of choice

[C M Smith <cmsmith@domain.elided>]

So, the R &T October issue is out showing the "variety" of cars available 
for legal sale in the USA (and by implication also in Canada).

If you want a European car for US$30,000 (increasing the budgeted price 
doesn't increase the choice much) or less you can choose from a dozen cars, 
one third of which are Volkswagens, and five of which are essentially the 
same car! To wit:

Audi A4 1.8T, BMW 323 i, Ford (yecch) Focus, Mini (???why?), Mercedes C 
230, SAAB 9 3 (yay SAAB), VW Beetle (now that's a stupid car), Golf, Jetta, 
Passat (now three of these are the same car with slightly or weirdly 
different bodies, and the Passat is an Audi A4 or perhaps vice versa), and 
good old Volvo with the S 40 (a Mitsubishi in Swedish (or more exactly 
Dutch) drag) and the S60 (yeah right, find one of THOSE at your local 
dealer for under $30G).

Technically I guess you could add the Cadillac CTS from Allemagne, but who 
would be caught dead driving one of these monstrosities? And dealer list at 
$30G? Come on, not 'til September '03 man, and only if you don't want the 
limited time only ( 'til we sold the last one)  0.0009% financing for a ten 
year lease.

How many of these qualify as sports sedans (or sports anything for that 
matter?).

Now broaden your horizons and add Japanese or "other marques" to the list 
and you get:

Honda (oh sorry, Acura) CL, TL, and RSX,  Honda Civic (now now, the Accord 
is made in 'murrica you know, not Japan), Hyundai barfmobiles, Kia ditto, 
Nissan ( so sorry, Infiniti) G35, Toyota (dang, gotta stop that, Lexus) IS 
300, Mazda Protege,  Mazda Miata (a real sports car, at last), Mitsubishi 
Eclipse, or Lancer, Nissan Sentra, , Subaru Impreza and Legacy (definitely 
a sports sedan in there somewhere, can you spell WRC?), and Toyota Celica, 
MR 2 (another real sports car)

That's basically it folks, unless you want to count the American built 
sports cars! These would include the Mazda 6, and Nissan Altima, and 
Toyota  Corolla, Camry (wow grandma)and the Avalon (huh?). Buick anyone?

My point is that the variety available in  the US car market has been 
shrinking radically for many years now, and just since the US went super 
aggressive on its regulatory scheme. There are more types of SUV, light 
truck, and minivans available than real sports sedans or cars. Sad ain't 
it? Coincidence maybe? Cause and effect anyone? Now I'm sure the American 
consumer is just choosing the SUV route because they like them better, and 
the fact that they CANNOT LEGALLY BUY the sports sedans available elsewhere 
has nothing to do with their buying decision.

Now our European comrades can tell us what range of sporty vehicles they 
can choose from in their heavily protected domestic markets, just to round 
out the debate.

Cheers


Michael Smith
Calgary, Alberta,Canada
91 Alfa 164L
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