Leave it to the proverbial new guy to come in and make bold pronouncements and claim “things are going to be different this time.” Such was the case when Volkswagen’s new CEO and DCX alum Wolfgang Bernhard, took the helm. With VW dogged by chronic poor quality, Bernhard made the comment that he wanted to match Toyota for vehicle quality.

Uh, huh. The proverb, “You have to learn to walk before you can run” applies here and I speak from experience. As the former owner of a 2000 Golf GTI, I can attest that VW, indeed, has its work cut out for it. In the automaker’s defense, I have not yet driven a new-generation Jetta or Golf, but VW’s problem isn’t first impressions. The first several months of ownership of a new VW are delightful. The GTI’s handling is firm and reassuring, the brakes strong, the fit & finish of the interior are simply a class above. It’s not until the honeymoon period is over that the warts begin to show. Window regulators going out…repeatedly. The car stalling out for no apparent reason. The “check engine” light coming on routinely. Replacing the MAF and oxygen sensors, twice.

General Motors has been roundly criticized for its cheesy, plasticky interiors and vague control responses. But if you’ve looked at the quality surveys lately, the General’s been doing a heck of a lot better overall than VW. It makes me wonder if VW totally blew the budget on the interiors of the fourth-generation cars, and then went “oops” and told the engineers they had to cut costs because the interior designers went overboard. Soft-touch dashboards, polished wood and luminescent gauges are great, but not at the expense of mundane functions like windows and the engine running reliably.

Thankfully, it seems like VW is getting back on track to getting the basics right and returning to its roots of economical, practical, fun-to-drive cars. Sure, the company’s capable of making a very nice ultra-luxury car (the Phaeton), but isn’t that what Audi is for? It would kind of like Chevy deciding it’s going to build a $75,000 competitor to the Cadillac STS. Granted, it has the loftily-priced Corvette Z06, but it also has 50 years of history behind its flagship, not a random, spontaneously-created answer to a question nobody asked. The Rabbit is back, and priced to move and looks like VW’s got a winner on its hands. But until the German automaker can get the basics right, its market share is going to continue to erode to the Japanese and, increasingly, to the Koreans. I hope Bernhard’s boast is backed up with substance, not just the usual Teutonic swagger.