by James Glaser
May 3, 2006

With all the foreign born law-breakers marching in our streets demanding their rights, I thought I would patronize the one American business that still employs American workers. . . the auto industry.

When you start looking around for a new car from an American company you discover that things have changed. Ford now sells Jaguars and Land Rovers built in England, and Volvos built in Sweden. Chrysler is now Daimler Chrysler, and is German based.

Toyota, Nissan, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, and Honda all have factories here in the States.

I was looking at a VW Bug thinking they were built some place over here, and found they are now made in Mexico.

The government passed a law that the amount of domestic content must be labeled on every new car sold, but Congress screwed that up, because they mix our content with Canada's content. There is no way to know just how much of a car sold here was made in the United States.

Toyota has a model called Avalon, which is 70% American made, while a PT Cruiser is another model made in Mexico.

Some General Motors cars have Honda motors, and other GM motors are made in Europe and are shipped here for installation.

According to Ann Job at Auto News, the Jeep Wrangler is pretty much North American with 83% of its parts coming from the U.S. or Canada.

Of course if you want to be patriotic these days, it isn't just buying an American made car. Now you have to think about gas mileage, and Jeeps are not even in the running. If you want to help America with oil imports, then you are going to buy a car built in Japan, with Honda and Toyota leading the way in saving gas.

So far there isn't a Chinese car on the market, but there probably will be soon. American Motors has fallen by the way-side, and if you look at the Big Three's offerings you will see why they are not far behind.

I want to buy American, but they make it so hard to figure out what is an "American" car. I want quality, and a good warranty, that leaves Ford, Chevy, and Dodge out of the picture. They figure their cars are good for 36,000 miles, while a Kia made in Korea will stand behind their cheaper models for 100,000 miles. . . . plus they will give you tires for as long as you keep the car.

It looks like the auto industry in America is no longer has it. They don't have the mileage people are looking for, they don't have the warranty we all want, and come to find out, a lot of the American cars aren't even American.

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