But no, I never assumed that Lexus wasn’t going to make it. I am one of those “wait and see, not too optimistic, not too pessimistic” type of people. I did appreciate Toy’s quality BACK THEN so I thought they had a better chance of making it than not. Their first car, the LS was quite impressive…..they clearly put alot of money and effort into it.

I won’t pretend I wasn’t surprised that they are #1 in the US though. I could see Cadillac and Lincoln losing that spot, but I expected Germans to occupy it before Caddy took it back someday, not Lexus

how would that work?

Commodore: It was Wrong to just give Saab cars from other divisions and rebadge them? A Saab buyer wants a Saab, not a trailblazer

I can agree with you that GM fucked up Saab, hopefully the 9-4x and future 9-5 will be as good as the 9-3 refresh. Subaru was never fully owned by GM….they just used the Legacy (I think) and made it into a Saab 9-2 (bad idea). Isuzu was just used for their diesels, so yeah GM pretty much raped them. They did produce the Axiom which I still think is a good vehicles…it looks good.

Yes, everyone wants Ford to bring Euro models to America and they will soon. The next Focus will be the same internationally. The reason they don’t do it immediately is because it takes time to make all the modifications to comply with a different market and that sort of thing which takes about 3 years to do (as evidenced by the Astra). As for beautiful cars like the Interceptor and 427 – they are not built because of our government’s CAFE standards. That is the same reason that GM’s Zeta program of RWD large cars may be halted. Luckily, GM starts plans to build their sweet concepts and import their best cars from abroad early, so they were able to do it before Ford. It’s kind of ironic that it happened this way because the reason GM is in a better position than Ford right now is because GM started to tank before Ford so they started their recovery plan before Ford did.

ford on it’s home market frankly sucks when the could achieve so much with lincoln it continue’s with mercury. It has had some amazing concept models (427 sedan,interceptor) yet put’s none of this creativity into practice.

Every American car that you call crap pretty much is NOT. What are you comparing them to anyway? What direct competitor to the Solstice/Sky does Toyoda have? NONE, because Toy does not make exciting cars…I’m sorry – it’s just a fact. And why would it be a bad thing that the Sky has 1/2 the cylinders of the Corvette? That doesn’t matter because the Sky is HALF the weight of the Corvette so it doesn’t need more power plus it is HALF THE PRICE!!

The HHR is a great car for what it is made to do, and again beats out anything from Toyonda because they have nothing like it. Also, notice that the HHR has an exciting design (no matter if you think it is a good or bad design, it is certainly not conservative like a Toyonda product).

Obviously, you are influenced by biased publications like TopGear that only favor European cars and also you are influenced by your racism and anti-americanism (you clearly believe every stereotype). It’s like if I start talking about British people’s horrible teeth. Who cares? You need to STOP generalizing and stereotyping American cars because, if you haven’t realized, this is a Lexus IS-F topic and it has nothing to do with neither Europe or America.

O, and what about Ford? I have heard tons of good stuff about how well Brits think of Ford (especially cars such as the Mondeo and Focus)

‘HotMustard’, you’ve hit on something rarely addressed … magazines, and LLN, keep their mouths shut when a car is current and only truly comment on its aesthetics after it’s redone. NEVER rely on their views. Mine on the other hand … I tell it OBJECTIVELY. And this front end is WRONG, as is the exhaust design … mark my words, in a few years ALL the mags will tell it like it REALLY is.

I agree with you, however that the HHR is a joke. It’s no significant advance on the PT cruiser, which was too small and cheap.

BRYCE you then say I have proven your point by saying the solstice and sky feel like a corvette with half its cylinders missing, that is not a good thing,the corvette would be pure crap with half it’s cylinders, that V8 is very good and the only thing that saves it.
we get the sky,solstice in europe as opel GT and it is no good in terms of dyanmics compared to the MX-5 and has been rated as average here.we also get the captiva here and it is still recongised as a DAEWOO.maybe because it is and is built in s.korea by daewoo.

XLR is caddys attempt at a MERC SL rival and it falls way short in terms of everything, its only more reliable and a bit cheaper in more ways than price. it recieved 9/20 by topgear magazine

the escalade was given 2 out of 5 stars by car magazine.com. you then go on to call it exceptional in terms of ride and interior compared to what, certainly not the X5,Q7,ML ,toureg, landcruiser ,xc90. The HUMMER H3 also recieved 2 out of 5 by autoexpress.H2 WAS WORSE.

as for the malibu, you guys are easily impressed,based on the opel vectra (also no class leader in europe)and saab 9-3, except this has a worse interior. yea id rather have one over a camry, but that certainly ain’t a complement.

american cars are famous for awfull dynamics,your cars are designed for straight roads.

In europe and the rest of the world people laugh at fat american cars to carry your big fat asses around.
check out these websites for test drives of the cars you mentioned and you’ll get the picture, topgear,autoexpress,autocar.
my argument is not emotionally driven and am referring to test drives by motoring journalists who know what the are talking about.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_d5-K109DQ

Or for significantly less, I’d buy a Pontiac G8 GT with a nicer exterior, interior, and quad tips that actually meet the exhaust pipes. I’ll take some of the saved money and put it into a LS2 twin-turbo kit, and then pocket the rest.

And I have the added benefit of NOT having Lexus badges on my car either way.

I can agree the corvette proves a point and does what is supposed to to, provide the driver with a tire smoking laugh, but the interior is more DAEWOO than anything else and it has the chassis technology of a wheelebarrow, (fucking leaf springs), and the new CTS is only car has impressed british motoring journalists but it is still considered the inferior choice to the germans, and I suppose the british are being biased here.

MORE IMPORTANTLY, I am not even talking about GM here!!! I am comparing this car to the car it tries to compete with — the BMW M3!!! Now, can you honestly say that this car has better performance than the M3? The answer is you don’t know. However, LLN has test driven the IS-F and they say that basically the M3 is still better, and all my comment stated was that I am not surprised. I didn’t have high expectations for a Lexus “sports” car (I mean, c’mon – that Lexus LF-A they are talking about is going to be a HYBRID). Anyway, Cadillac doesn’t ever have any car that competes with this (CTS is meant as a 5 series competitors and CTS-V has not even been shown yet).

The point is you are the biased one, the Toyota apologist who defends Toy against everything. When they have a recall (or many recalls actually) you defend them, when their sales decrease you defend them , when they build a not-so-sporty “sports”car you defend them…….why don’t you just admit it when they are bad.

There are things Toyota can do, such as building automotive appliences for people who don’t really like cars but need to go places, and then there are things Toy can’t do (such as building exciting performance cars). Be fair now, c’mon.