When I drive around in this monster pickup, I am reminded that, though Germans fairly own the luxury sedan business and Italians still make unconquerable sports cars, Americans -- that's us -- completely dominate the full-size truck market. Even with the Detroit automakers hanging on by the increasingly strained mercy of U.S. taxpayers, and with the full-size truck segment down a well like nobody's seen since Baby Jessica, the Detroit Three are pickup gods. Honestly, comparing these guys' trucks with those of Nissan and Toyota is like pitting the Carolina Tar Heels basketball team against the Pasadena Polytechnic's boys junior varsity squad. It's just a slaughter.
Dodge Ram 1500: the pickup as Prozac

Los Angeles Times has an excellent article about the all-new 2009 Dodge RAM 1500.

Not only it is a great review of the Ram 1500, but it offers a great insight into the current status of the American automobile industry.

Ah, but the rope sellers and pistol merchants will say, so what? Maybe the D-3 can build decent pickups, but isn't the reliance on sales of big, thirsty trucks and SUVs what put them in the fix they are in?

This is poor, clumsy logic that blames the automakers for the public's folly. Notwithstanding all the other factors -- the miserable failure of the federal government to levy a significant gas (or carbon) tax, oscillations in the price of oil, the sucking economic quicksand of Depression 2.0 -- pickups are the single bright spot for the domestic automakers, a tent pole of reliable sales and profitability around which to rebuild these companies.

Look, America is a huge country whose economic backbone is the entrepreneurial class. Pickups are an utter necessity for work, business and recreation. We can demand that they get far better fuel economy; we can discourage their use as commuter vehicles. But we can't just ban them. Even the Sierra Club needs pickups.