Just like a show dog or thoroughbred race horse, the Chevrolet Cruze has a good pedigree—good enough to compete in the compact segment currently ruled by the Toyota Corolla and Honda Civic.

General Motors will debut the North American version of its new, global small sedan, the 2011 Chevrolet Cruze, at the L.A. Auto Show.

As cab rides go, the one I took the other day wasn’t all that interesting despite the pastoral scenery of rural eastern Pennsylvania. What really caught my attention was the blast of cold air coming through the door handle of the previous generation Chevrolet Malibu. The last time I felt a draft like that was in a 1946 MG TC, a car that didn’t have roll-up windows. The MG had side curtains, which only approximate a seal against the weather. While I could take the easy-cheesy way out and turn that drafty Malibu into another trite weather analogy for what ails Detroit, I won’t. There’s a far more direct point to made.

The dire circumstances that General Motors finds itself in have been compared to the English-speaking peoples’ favorite epic failure–the sinking of the Titanic. While that tragedy and GM’s troubles to date share such similarities as the rush of water through the luxury liner’s hull and the gush of red ink from the Renaissance Center, the latest turn of events is more like a submarine sinking toward inevitable implosion.