I've personally driven a focus and a Mazda 3 for long periods of time. They are very different cars indeed.
Well it depends on the years you are talking about. These things didn't start happening until after Ford lost tons of money in 2004, and started rethinking their strategy in 2005.
Prior to 2005 (maybe 2006?) the Focus was its own deal.
Now if you had said the same thing about a 2006 Fusion and Mazda 6, I would not believe a word, and you might as well be comparing Monster speaker wire to Monoprice speaker wire, and it is all in your head because you have decided you like Mazda better, etc. or because you don't want to buy American
. Seriously though, besides sheet metal and the logo on the steering wheel, there really is no difference (talking of the last few years, of course) in the vehicles under discussion.
EDIT: Bah! I must apologize for arguing. The
European version of the Focus has been on the Mazda 3 platform since 2005, but the US one is still on the original Focus platform, and won't be switching to the 3's platform until next year. Sorry!
I am still correct on the other stuff, but the US Focus is sure is a dated sucker...