Yes, I am. Right now the only high-mileage, high-performance vehicles I can get are foreign and I prefer to buy American. When Detroit quits whining, they can make the same.
So, you want the government to force Detroit to make the kind of vehicle you want when market forces are driving them the other way?
High mileage means small. Wish it weren’t so, but it is. If you look at Europe, the cars with the best MPG are small - very small.
Compare the 07 Accord and Fusion. They get nearly the same mileage.
Speaking of high-performance vehicles, perhaps some engineers out there can help me understand this.
In the latest issue of Car & Driver magazine, there's an article titled "20 cars worth waiting for", or something like that. Among the cars listed were the new/retro versions of the Dodge Challenger and Chevy Camaro (both of which are slated for a modern V-6, as well as a V-8 engine option). The description of each not-yet-introduced vehicle had a "What could go wrong" comment, where production had or may have hit a snag.
For both of the above vehicles, as well as the new rear-wheel-drive Chevy Impala, there was a comment that the new proposed new CAFE standards had either put that vehicle "on hold" (the Impala) or was raising concern with regard to rear-wheel-drive vehicles in general (Challenger and Camaro).
It appears that GM has been trying to finally wriggle free of the "four versions of the same FWD car" strategy, but the new CAFE regs are likely to kill their efforts to re-shape the model line-up.
Assuming similar aerodynamics, gearing, engine displacement and tuning, and identical final-drive ratios... why should a rear-wheel-drive car be less fuel-efficient than its FWD counterpart?
I sure wish I could buy a RWD or AWD hot-rod like Ford of Europe's 1990's-era Escort Cosworth. That would be a small car that might entice me to give up my V-8. I drove a "taildragger" once; never again.