In all honesty, I think most objective people reading this thread would come to the opposite conclustion.....

Let's say, just because you have made it clear you will never respect a car not built in the fatherland, that I accept your arguement that waaaaaay back in the day, in the time when dinosaurs ruled the earth, MB built good cars - so what? We live in the present time, and there is just no way their current cars are the best available. Do you even have first hand experience with a newer Mercedes or are you just arguing based on a car that is three decades old?

There was a time when a V16 caddy was the best car money could buy, but that doesn't mean squat if you are standing on a Cadillac dealer's lot today. Univac used to build the best computers, so what? That was then, this is now.