[SentraSE-R]

Originally Posted by Frank Lee

The way I see it, the mid '80s to early '90s cars offer comparable performance- crash, creature comfort, and otherwise- while weighing less.

Thirteen thousand (~28%) fewer deaths/year in the past 23 years, despite a 62 million (~25%) population increase shoots your theory completely out of the water. Unless you think people have improved their driving skills 50% in 23 years, you're going to have to accept that today's cars are a lot safer than you give them credit for being. Those 20 year old dinosaurs would also be gross polluters (think NOx emissions from a 1987 lean burn engine) under today's emissions standards. When I was growing up, the air was so polluted, I couldn't play touch football without gasping from the tickling caused by the pollution. Trust me, we don't want to go back to those days.

Originally Posted by Frank Lee

I just don't like that, as I alluded to before, GM or Suzuki couldn't throw the dies back in the presses and crank out new Metros even if they wanted to, as they'd have to add a bunch of junk that has been mandated since the '90s, and that stuff I don't want on my car, like tire pressure monitors, side air bags, etc.. I think the late '90s Metros, for example, are wholly adequate in every way the way they were, and now they or their equivalent are not made. That's my deal. See it?

You can't go back, Frank. Learn to live with it. You can't smoke at the workplace, women won't wait on you hand and foot, and Vince Lombardi isn't coming back to lead the Packers to next year's championship. I've got a friend who wouldn't wear seat belts because she felt safer without them, despite the obvious facts. At the same time, she hated to fly, because it felt unsafe to her, despite the statistics proving the opposite. Like you, she didn't like the nanny society forcing her in a direction she didn't want to go. She's learned to live with it.