From the Detroit News: http://detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080807/AUTO01/808070477

I'm not sure I would agree with that, but my sample size is very limited. When I travel I try to rent foreign brands, usually a Maxima. When I rented in Phoenix in June we got an American car. It was noisy (engine and road noise), the seat was uncomfortable, the A/C barely kept the car cool in 104 temps, it was noisy, and rode hard, and had too little power.

After less than 24 hours I swapped it for a Maxima and that reaffirmed my belief that American cars aren't on the same level. This was not the first time I've rented American cars and every time my experience has been much the same.

Granted, that's a very limited sampling, but the American car was an upgrade from a "full-size" car. Very disappointing IMHO.

I have found that it really depends on the price point of the car. I have rented "standard/economy" cars in both foriegn and domestic, and wouldn't want to drive either more than down to the corner market.
All of the "full size" cars I have had both foriegn and domestic have been quite acceptable, especially the newer GM's.
Two cars that stand out as unacceptable to me, are the Dodge Caliber, and the bigger Kia, can't remember the name.

I drive a large sampling of rental cars in my travels.
The noisy rental cars I've driven lately have all been as a result of noisy tires - hardly the car manufacturers fault.

My opinion is that there is almost no gap on new vehicles.

I would say if you are buying a new vehicle and driving it for the first 50,000 miles - pick any car you want, they are all good, however perception does alter the resale you will get.

If you are buying a car and driving it for the next 10 years and 200,000 miles - well, then resale doesn't matter really, but long-term durability really matters. There are brands I would pick and a few that I would stay away from. Same applies if I were buying a used car with 50K plus miles.

One other problem - cars can vary widely within a brand and from model year to model year. The reason for this is that cars are developed by people - some more or less skilled than others. They also have to make trade offs on cost vs. quality and weight all the time - any single one of those deciisons can affect the durability of the vehicle you buy.