Reply to "How can this happen in America?"

I was always a fan of American cars until the late 90's. I've owned American cars since high school and throughout the past 25 year as a police officer here in Hawaii. We use subsidized personal vehicles for patrol cars here and all with the exception of my last Nissan Pathfinder have been American made. American automakers have been raping consumers and are now paying the price for it. My domestic cars have ALL had loads of problems and I have had problems with warranty work, too many time to count. A parts worker told me that parts are engineered to fail over a predetermined time. He asked me "How many problems did you ever have with a car from the 60's era? They were built to last back then. Now everything is made of plastic, even high use parts which will fail from either age or frequency of use". Door latches break, electric window components fail, etc., we all know the story and replacement parts are expensive. My daily driver is a 2000 Lexus. It has never needed any work outside of normal maintenance. Nothing has EVER broken on this car. It's the best car I've ever owned next to my '66 Plymouth Valient w/slant six! Now that was a dependable car! People are buying to get their moneys worth in these hard economic times, and the truth is that they get their moneys worth buying foreign.