The engine sounds like it could be sweet... but American manufacturers have never "gotten" sport compacts, and lost touch with sports cars a long time ago as well (exception: Z06). It took a German operated company to make a successful "american" sport compact (SRT-4)... the Mazda 3, to my eyes, looks like the Ford part of mazda made it! I haven't heard much good press about the 3's performance either (at least the Focus SVT was somewhat fun to drive)... I suppose they've stepped out of the sports arena almost in its entirety: can anybody think of a successful American convertible (other than Corvette) in the last fifteen years? Although the've produced an enormous amount of unimaginative, cookie cutter, super sized, inefficient and gas guzzling trucks and SUV's over the last fifteen years...
And this rant is from a guy who wanted a Camaro from the age of 6 until i was about 20...