The depressing reality of the new car biz? Most buyers aren't that interested in driving. For every one of us who savors the sheer joy of running a fast car through the gears, there are 10,000 others who couldn't care less. To most people, driving is a chore. They'd much rather be guzzling a soda, snarfing a burger, texting their buddies, and watching TV -- preferably all at once -- instead of enjoying the interaction with a finely tuned piece of machinery while getting from A to B.It's because of all these non-drivers that today's cars are heavier, less efficient, and more expensive than they need be. If more people actually thought about what they were doing behind the wheel, there'd be way fewer crashes, and so we probably wouldn't need so much complex and costly safety hardware.

We enthusiasts like to think we set the agenda when it comes to all things automotive. We don't. Vehicle design, road design, traffic laws, transport policy: All are calibrated to the non-driver. There are more of them than us. And in America, where everyone loves freedom and a good lawyer can absolve you from the responsibility that comes with it, the common denominator doesn't get much lower. This is the nation that once mandated automatic seatbelts in an attempt to protect people too stupid or lazy to buckle up themselves, and whose most recent contribution to automotive design has been the invention of the cupholder.