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Oddly, Grouch, I think we pretty much agree with one another. We just don't know it yet.
FYI: I grew up in the Sun Belt, not the Rust Belt. My family's in Arizona because my dad spent most of his career at the GM Desert Proving Ground.
I agree that when it comes to recent Pontiac styling, there's a not lot to like. Thank goodness Bob Lutz felt the same and took an ax to the Aztek, body cladding and cartoonish styling. When the '93 F-bodies bowed and I was choosing between them, the Camaro got the nod over the Firebird because I thought the 'Bird's styling was just plain over the top.
I also agree that the mullet-wearing, My-Name-Is-Earl crowd gave the F-bodies a bad name (particularly during the IROC-Z era). Smokey and the Bandit and Knight Rider didn't help, either. The "Cheese Era" for these cars lasted far too long, eventually overshadowing their foundational Trans-Am years when guys like Mark Donohue and Roger Penske gave them glory. A shame.
Cars--and brands--can emerge from such shame, though. The Corvette has successfully shed its image as a poseur's chick-magnet, and Cadillac is making great strides toward once again becoming the Standard of the World. Thank goodness the Corvette isn't defined by the horsepower-deficient '76 model year, nor Cadillac by the Cimarron.
I guess I look at my GM fan-dom the way I look at my love for the Arizona State Sun Devils football team: There was a Golden Era when Frank Kush was coach and the Devils were a scrappy, up-and-coming team that routinely took down the national powerhouses, going so far as to beat Nebraska in the '75 Fiesta Bowl. Then there were some horrible, awful, lamentable years when we hung our heads in ignominy. But I stayed a fan throughout all of that, and I still am. For me, the "stigma" of the bad years is overwhelmed by the program's overall success.
Call it selective memory if you will, but I do the same with Pontiac and Chevrolet. I mourn their failures and boneheaded market moves, but I forgive those gaffes and focus instead on their successes.
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