RED WHITE BLUE

I saw the Toyota big red white and blue 4th of July sale commercial again tonight. It has been on all week. Maybe I am like the old Confederate General that used to be on a bumper sticker that said "FORGET--LIKE HELL" If it wasn't for the-as Tom Brokaw said THE GREATEST GENERATION-we would all be driving Toyotas or Volkswagens or living under the rising sun flag or the swastika. Now the Japanese car company is profiting surrounding themselves with the RED,WHITE and BLUE. My Uncle was at Pearl Harbor on Dec 7 1941 and I am sure if he seen that commercial that he would turn over in his grave!!-------------Tee

(quoted from post at 19:18:22 07/01/16) I saw the Toyota big red white and blue 4th of July sale commercial again tonight. It has been on all week. Maybe I am like the old Confederate General that used to be on a bumper sticker that said "FORGET--LIKE HELL" If it wasn't for the-as Tom Brokaw said THE GREATEST GENERATION-we would all be driving Toyotas or Volkswagens or living under the rising sun flag or the swastika. Now the Japanese car company is profiting surrounding themselves with the RED,WHITE and BLUE. My Uncle was at Pearl Harbor on Dec 7 1941 and I am sure if he seen that commercial that he would turn over in his grave!!-------------Tee

Click to expand...

WELL SAID! :?

Amen

I don't care where they build their factory,
it's still a foreign car.

Steve A W

I had a Great Uncle that worked for Cincinnati Milling Machine later became Milacron. He was running one of the first hydrotell Five axis machine centers they made. The company was working on a bid to sell machines to a Japanese company. When they came around to look at the machine he was running he went on a "bathroom" break. He would not run it around them. Later that day the foreman cornered him and gave him heck about not being "friendly" to the Japanese Company reps. My Great Uncle said "The last time I was around any Japanese they where not too friendly to me." A little history he was in the Marines and island hopped during WWII. HE almost NEVER talked about it other than a few times about bar hopping with buddies. Never anything else other he would say he served period.

I think it is SHAME that we have foreign ownership of major companies in this great Country. We are slowly being conquered by our enemies, former and present. Many think that the worship of the almighty dollar is a good course for this country. So anything that MAKES share holders/board members money is OK. Foreign ownership GREAT, crappy products GREAT, Close American plants GREAT, all is good as long as the NEXT quarter's numbers are good, the heck with the future, just make the next quarter look better than the last one.

The other side of the story, if America had been building quality cars in the 60's and 70's, it would have stopped the foreign manufacturers dead in their tracks. The politicians wanted the country to play in the world market - and the voters kept re-electing them. A big share of the blame rests with the voters themselves.

Not quite the same

But remember that anything coming from you to us in Oz is also a foreign car

I will take exception to that comment, Dick. We made PLENTY of quality cars back then. The REAL problem was that as gas prices climbed, the automakers did not respond with small economical cars. Instead, they made "little big cars" that were not always up to snuff.
The foreign cars of that era were about the crappiest, lousiest cars that I ever drove. At that time, I was working in a multi-franchise foreign car dealership. I got to road test most of them. They were underpowered, cramped, uncomfortable, and noisy. We sold and serviced cars from France, Italy, Japan, and Great Britain. Quality was NOT one of their strong points.
I know. I was there.

As far as working good they were quality, but they rusted out too fast if you lived in a place that got bad winter.

Let me elaborate some more.
The pedals were in locations that made it nearly impossible to move your foot from the gas to the brake quickly without injuring yourself.
They were loaded with chintzy trim that fell off if you looked at it wrong/
Turn signals and backup lights were bolted on under bumpers as if they were an afterthought that just came from the truck stop as a last minute addition.
Those cars literally ATE brakes and clutches.
They ALL had chronic head gasket failures.
Working in the engine compartment was nearly impossible since they all had around 10,000 miles of vacuum hoses and tubing. Carburetors had more parts than a wrist watch, and most of them that small.
Their only "claim to fame" was consistency.

All in all, the Japanese in general never had a single original thought. They only copied and made things smaller and cheaper.
The French never seemed to be able to make a reliable car.
The Italians got too wrapped up in making toys for the rich and tiny cars for the rest of us.

Then there were the parts costs. A part for a Ford or Chevy was affordable. Similar part for a foreign car was disproportionally high.
Like, I had to change the fuel pump on my Mercury comet. Part cost about $12. Later that month, my dad had to replace the same part on his VW beetle. Part was $60. Heh! The VW wasn't around for long after that!

I drove company lease cars during that period. The 1969 Galaxie 500 and 1970 LTD Fords were pretty good vehicles; by 1971 Ford's quality began to slip. If maintained; we had better luck with Plymouth company cars than the other two brands. We were supposed to turn in the cars and get a new one at 60,000 miles - until we got a letter from the lease company not to exceed 48,000 miles on the Chevrolet cars because they were pitching rods out the side of the block right after they reached 48,000 miles. I suspect the lease company put those cars on the used car lots and sold them to some unsuspecting buyer.

When I bought cars for the ADOT fleet, the standard was to sell those cars at auction at 80,000 miles, but a lot of Chevy's and Fords were put on the auction at 60,000 miles because it cost too much to keep them repaired to get them to 80K. We had a whole bunch of early 90's Chevy pickups with 350 engines that dropped valves at about 50,000 miles; very costly to repair. By then the foreign manufacturers were working hard to build more reliable products to gain market share. Their sales numbers tell the story.