Driving home listening to Marketplace on NPR, which makes me feel smart, even though my real brilliance lies in letting my wife handle our money, a story about GM’s IPO brought me up short when the President asked why we couldn’t build a car as good as a Corolla. Because I’m pretty sure I was driving one.

As you know (Bob), GM has been in a zombiesque state since it was taken over by the US Government (or just plain all of US) in June 2009 with a measly bailout of $56.7B (Billions, and Billions, as Carl Sagan liked to say). The word is we won’t be getting it back. Estimates say the IPO should net somewhere around 10B and I don’t know what portion of that is supposed to wind up in our pockets…but I’m not holding my breath waiting to find out.

But none of that’s what caught my attention.

It was the Obama quote from former car-czar Steve Rattner’s book, “Overhaul” about how the rescue of the automotive industry.

“Why” he quotes the president, ” can’t they build a Corolla?”

Putting aside that Corollas have been built in the United States since 1987, it seems like a reasonable question. Except that I was driving a Chevy Cobalt as I listened to it.

Snicker if you want (I know who you are) but The Cobalt is a terrific, Corolla sized car, and it was certainly in production in 2008 when the president asked the question.

Not long ago I stuck my nose, or rather the Passat’s nose, out a little further than events show to have been reasonable. I expect to get it back from the body shop tomorrow. Meanwhile, I took advantage of my insurance policy’s car rental stipend and went out to get some alt-wheels. I figured I’d treat myself to something posh or sporty since it would only be for a week, but when I called Enterprise, and they asked if I needed it today, I discovered that I would be driving a Chevy Cobalt. Sedan.

Sure. Wheels are wheels. I really don’t mean that.

To my utter shock and horror, I quickly discovered that the Cobalt, priced at $14.9k (base) was one of the best cars I’ve ever driven. Seriously. With 150 hp, and a suspension somewhere between taught and tolerant, the car moves out cheerfully, corners smartly, and parks handily. And when it’s not parked, it gets up to 37 mpg (highway). Even around town the needle moves downward a lot more slowly than my V6 VW Passat Wagon.

It’s got great visibility, fairly good support in the seats, and the sound system comes with a mini-audio adapter for your music player, phone, or what have you. I’m guessing they didn’t put a premium sound system in a rental car, but it had nothing to be ashamed of.

I could only imagine what fun the Cobalt coupe would be to drive with the 5 speed stick. In fact, after a few days I started surfing the web to see what one would cost. Not that I needed a new car, but I like to live a rich inner life, and these are the sorts of fantasies that amuse me. That I could have one nearly to my exact spec for a little over 14k made fantasy uncomfortably tangible.

Now, I’ve driven reasonably expensive cars, but with a few exceptions, the more money you spend the more iron you wind up owning. The most fun I’ve had in cars was in smallish (but not tiny) coupes with moderate four-bangers in them. Frequently VWs. The best of them being a used Type II Scirocco I dropped an early GTI engine into. Good times.

But this car is, in many ways, better. It’s a much smarter car, and has a lot of good tweaks in it that were once really impressive add on, like autosensing headlights and sensors that turn airbags on or off depending on who is sitting where.

I said it moves out cheerfully, and I meant it. No, 0-60 in 8.5 seconds may not be drag race material, though it’s not embarrassing, but at the sort of speeds where you do most of your daily infighting, the Cobalt throws itself into the fray with enthusiasm, winding the tach up to 6k before hopping to the next gear with a growl that’s just loud enough to tell you it’s having fun.

The interior is on the spartan side, I’m quite willing to admit. So, by the way is a SAAB’s, so you’re welcome to consider it spare rather than cheap. An actual XM radio, which I prefer to Sirius any day, is easily available, and as far as I can tell, the audio jack is standard. The seats were firm but comfortable, and my extra long legs were reasonably able to stretch out with the seat all the way back. Woe be unto anyone who tries to sit in the back seat while I drive, though. The lotus position is your only hope.

2010 is the last model year for the Cobalt, and its successor, the Cruze has both less horsepower and poorer mileage. That’s the bad news. The good news is that dealers are offering $3k off on Cobalts as they move them out to make room for the new model year. Like the Saturn, it fell victim to the desire to cut back on the number of vehicle models GM owned. In both cases I’m left wondering what they were thinking.

I’ve driven Corollas plenty of times, in fact I learned to drive on one. Though since I could already drive a tractor with a stick and a manual throttle there wasn’t all that much to learn. Point is, I like Corollas, and would totally agree with the President when he wonders why we can’t build a car as good, if I wasn’t pretty sure we already had, and then stopped doing it.

But then we knew how to go to the moon once, and we moved on from that too.

Afterword: Cobalt Base Coup Test Drive – Oh my!

I figured that if driving the sedan with an automatic transmission is fun, then driving the coupe with a stick should be a lot of fun. So I hunted one up at the Chevy dealer conveniently located about two miles from my office and stopped by on the way home to test drive a base coupe with 5spd manual. Was it fun to drive? Holy cow. If you’re not having fun driving a Cobalt with a stick shift, you’re just plain doing it wrong.

Oh, I could see how a little bit of performance tweaking; wider tires and some suspension work especially, would pay off big time…but right out of the box it was a terrific experience, and equal to or better than any number of pocket rockets I drove back in the 80s.

By the way, if you consider a base coupe ($12.7k) but want A/C, they’ll install a factory unit for $1600.