Buy American

You know, I'm one of the tree hugging liberals who went 14 years of living in Seattle and one year back in New Jersey without owning a car. I have one now, A Hyundai Elantra. I like the small cars, most of the good ones are made by foreign companies.

I never wanted an SUV or a pick up. I'm not that kind a guy. Give me a mini, a VW Jetta or Scion.

These days we see the American auto makers struggling with many Americans not buying cars. The era of the SUV and huge pickups that kept the US auto makers afloat the previous decade are over. Now I can get mad at the American auto makers for being short sighted with not making decent, affordable, fuel efficient cars. But the consumers drove the market for SUVs in the last decade.

Maybe I'm excusing myself of guilt for buying a foreign car because it fits the bill that American cars don't. But what is the excuse of Americans who buy huge pickups and SUVs made by Toyota and Honda?

Seriously, isn't the whole point of buying huge SUVs and pickups to rub it in the face of us "unAmericans" tree huggers?

The right to say "I want my freedom, and America represents freedom and I want the freedom to pollute as much as I want and take up as much space I want, and make as much noise I want because I'm a American dammit."

But the statement of patriotism seems empty when you buy a car from a foreign company, burning foreign fuel in the name of freedom.

If you are going to be an obnoxious SUV or pickup driver, buy an Escalade or a Navigator not a Titan or a Tundra.