It has been cleverly positioned to speak to those emotions particularly appreciated by younger buyers.

The common thread in Nissan and Infiniti models is superior delivery of power, style and innovation. The company's strongly focused product effort suggests a route struggling domestic companies might follow.

There are a group of people out there who really like Pontiac and what they're doing. They're just aren't very many of them.

Detroit needs to increase its competitiveness by focusing on things it does well, like Ford's F-Series pickup trucks, and they need to discard brands that have outlived their usefulness, like Buick, Mercury and perhaps Pontiac.

There's an image issue here. Even though the quality of many American cars is as good, if not equal to those of the Japanese, people don't believe that, and a lot of that has to do with public perception — it takes a long time to turn public perception around. So if they don't produce hits, they'll have more problems.

American vehicle makers are in the middle of a very hard market environment — overseas companies are attacking them with strong products and good prices, and more of them are coming onto the market each day.