One of today’s great Chicago architects likes to critique buildings by asking: “If this is the answer, what was the question?”

It cuts to the chase. Imagine standing before this…thing and applying the above critique. The question becomes: “Can you build me a poorly lit maximum-security prison tower to live in? Absurd, right? Just like the result.

Similarly, to properly understand the absurdity of the U.S. Government backing car warranties, we must ask ourselves what the objective is regarding the auto industry. Improved sales? Economic viability? Something along these lines, surely, is the answer.

However, due to a decades-old quality gap between Detroit  and their Japanese rivals, people will paradoxically be less inclined to buy homegrown cars because taking them to get fixed now means maybe dying a slow death at a DMV-style government warranty bureau.

What was the question, again?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fi9XCpSYJbY&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]