Are American Cars Any Good?

If your a car-nut like me you probably are aware of the show "Top Gear" (UK).
Jeremy Clarkson is one of the hosts of this television program, he is also a columnist. Now, I have watched his shows and read a lot of his articles. His opinion on American cars is that they pretty much suck. He mentions how they are too big, ugly, slow, bad on gas, poorly built, and how they can't go round corners. I am going to have to agree with him. But as Mr. CLarkson brought up, American cars are perfect... in America. Take for example the new Dodge Challenger, it would not "work" in Europe. It's big and does not handle all that well. Heck, the Volkswagen Tiguan handles just about as good as the Challenger. The (SRT 8) Challenger is absolutely a pig when it comes to fuel consumption. In Europe you need a car that can fit in parking spaces and it must be able to be flicked around the city with ease. In America this is another story. Picture this, your travling down a freeway with very little traffic. The temperature is 76.5 degrees and you have your windows rolled down. Your arm is hanging out the window and the breeze is blowing through your hair. With that big V8 growling as you cruise down the road, you feel free... you feel alive. That is what the American car is about. We don't just use it as a tool, we don't care that it only gets 8 MPG, and we don't care that the door gaps are bigger than the Grand Caynon. We care about how the car makes us feel.

Side Note:
Also, we Americans like our cars to be a little more plush and our straight roads allow our cars to be plush. This is why American cars don't usually corner as well as a European car. You see in Europe the people tend to drive much faster, their highways have speed limits of 80 MPH. Except on the German Autobahn where you can go like you have bees up your back side. Unlike America's straight as an arrow roads, the roads in Europe tend to be very curvy like a dragon's tail. The European's need a car to be able to handle these curvy roads. They need a car to get good gas mileage too. You see gas prices in Europe are so high, that people are known to sell their grandparents to "employers" in Ethiopia.
I still say that European cars work great in the States though. Some people will say the cars are too small or the car will steal their job at one of the big 3. That is a whole other topic in itself.
I love a European tuned suspension even though our roads are flat. Yeah it might get jigglier then jello, but so what? I love to be able to feel like I am part of the car. A European car might not be as fast in a straight line but it defiantly makes up for it in the twisty bits.
Whatever you choose, American or European, take it out for a test drive. Both have their pros and cons. No matter what you pick, it will be a great vehicle.