Wait, wait, help me understand...

With the Big Three begging for money from Congress, I have seen many folks publishing comments along the lines that the American car producers need to build tiny, inexpensive fuel efficient cars that "Americans want".

Wait, wait, help me understand. As I recall that is EXACTLY what they were doing in the past, making large SUVs and trucks to the tune of 16 million units per year (record breaking sales). The further reality is that with the energy costs on the upward side of the spiral and a credit market crisis, Americans actually are buying NO cars of any kind. How exactly does this translate into the Big Three needing to build crappy econo-boxes in order to survive?

True, to survive they must build cars that Americans want to drive, but extrapolating that to mean tiny gas sippers is ridiculous. Detroit has tried that numerous times and found out that Americans don't buy small gas sippers from American car companies, only from Nissan, Toyota, Kia, etc. Those companies, unencumbered by labor unions and benefit costs (health care and pensions for retirees) are in a much better position to be able to make a profit on small cars that American manufacturers ever will be (unless they go bankrupt and shed their contracts and liabilities).

The ONLY way for American car companies to survive is to rapidly retool themselves to make mid-size and large cars that Americans will buy. That means they will need to dramatically increase the fuel economy of those cars to be positioned for the next upward energy spike (which will be back within a few years). And to do that they need to be developing entire families of plug-hybrid vehicles. Something like the Volt is a baby-step in the right direction, but needs to be sold at 10 times the volume GM is planning (which would help to reduce the absurd $20K premium the Volt is expected to cost over a traditional power-train). Detroit needs to be bold and do this across the board -- in all makes and models -- in order to differentiate themselves from other producers.

If tiny econo-boxes are what Americans want, then write off the big three today and end the suffering now.