I recently saw in the news that the top 3 most reliable car brands were Scion, Toyota, and Honda.
I flat out REFUSE to buy a car from ANY car manufacturer who took bail out money. Our last car, a Ford Taurus was a TOTAL peice of junk. It steadily fell apart the entire time we owned it. NO WAY I will buy another Ford. Their quality may be a lot better now but they are STILL junk compared to good quality cars like Honda and Toyota.
We needed another car for my oldest daughter who will be attending college in the near future. I wanted something cheap and reliable. We looked at used cars, and the cheap models either had a zillion miles on them and were junk or the good condition used cars were 75% to 85% of the price of a new car and still had high mileage on them.
We finally went through USAA car buyers service and bought a 2009 Honda Element SC. So far, it has been a GREAT car. No problems with the exception of my daughter backing it into a drainage ditch.


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Very practical, great gas mileage, and LOTS of room. Handles pretty good as well.
About the only thing Dodge has the interests me is their Ram pickup and that is ONLY because it has the Cummins engine. The new $50,000 plus trucks are a PURE NON STARTER for me. They are just NOT worth the prices being asked.
Chrysler has dug its OWN hole and they will have to build a QUALITY, RELIABLE, LONG LASTING vehicle on par with Honda and Toyota before I will ever consder them again... ... . provided they pay back the bail out money.
After spending a LOT of money to modify out the design flaws and crappy workmanship of my 2002 Dodge Ram, I plan to keep it for a LONG LONG time. Over all it has been a good truck but could have been built a LOT better.
The American car manufactures are symbolic of American culture, mind set, and halfassed values & standards... ... ... they are circling down the toilet along with the rest of the country.