Stephanie Mencimer's otherwise excellent review of Keith Bradsher's new book High and Mighty: SUVs ("Bumper Mentality," December) was unfortunately marred by the false assertion that most SUV customers are affluent, and often socially liberal, baby boomers. In fact, automakers know--and their marketing efforts reflect--that the biggest consumers of the biggest SUVs (Lincoln Navigator, Ford Excursion, Cadillac Escalade, etc.) are affluent conservatives. As Bradsher points out, large SUVs are also favorites with law enforcement agencies, fire departments, and other groups that could easily function with minivans--and could hardly be labeled as socially liberal.

WILSON HUBBELL
Santa Barbara, Calif.

An otherwise great article slips badly when it reinforces the tired stereotype about why SUVs aren't popular in Japan: "Cultural checks that emphasize the good of the community over that of the individual." Nice try! Japanese are just as selfish as people anywhere else. The reason SUVs haven't caught on, just like most large American cars never catch on here: The roads are too narrow. Good luck trying to maneuver an SUV down the maze of side roads in any Japanese city.

LARRY WIEBE
Tokyo, Japan

Three cheers from up north, where SUVs aren't quite as popular--save for Alberta, our most Americanized and insecure province. I (carefully) drove my non-ego-inflating Ford Tempo in that province for several years, always checking around me for the arrogant--and usually incompetent--drivers who massaged their tiny self-esteem in these portable kill vehicles. Perhaps Canada suffers as a nation from a bit of the "soccer-mom" complex, but this, after all, is not such a bad thing. My compliments (and thanks) for placing this story into the public discourse where it belongs.