The foreign vs. domestic aspect of your incident reminds me of a letter to the editor in one of my auto magz some years ago. The letter was in response to a story about Toyota entering into NASCAR racing. The author of the letter wanted NASCAR to remain as an American-car-only sport.

Below the letter, the mag editor provided a reply stating that the line between American and foreign made was blurring as the Toyota car in question is made in the U.S. and one of the other so-called American cars in NASCAR was actually made in Mexico.

Competition can be a good thing. Look how Ford reacted when certain Japan-based manufacturers continued to dominate the reliability ratings and thus their sales increased: Ford (think it was around 2005) vowed to focus on improving reliability. Last year, Ford entered the upper echelon of reliability ratings.

JD Power mfr ratings

I am of the opinion that the key to American-based mfrs making a comeback is reducing the number of poor quality models they produce. As the JD Power article states, reputations still linger.