It's time to glance in the rearview mirror, select the best vehicles I drove in 1997 and hand out my prestigious but fictitious Car of the Year Awards. Then, I'm rounding up Fred, my faithful old dachshund, and heading over to my parents' house for the traditional holiday feast with the rest of the Truett nuclear family. The Big Three are worried. And rightly so. Japan's economy is in trouble.
Japanese consumers are in debt.
Few people can afford to buy new cars. I must confess that the prospect of driving a Mercury Grand Marquis has never caused the blood in my veins to break any cardio-vascular speed limits. But I might very well feel differently if I owned one of these large, comfy sedans. Hardly a day goes by without someone asking me which car is my favorite. Lately, that has been a tough question to answer.