DaytonDailyNews.com

Thursday will be the 25th anniversary of the day the first Honda came off an assembly line in Ohio. It was also the first Japanese car made in this country.

The most remarkable part

of the Honda story is that it's been largely positive since then, during tough times for other

carmakers. More and more Hondas have been built here; today the company makes more vehicles in Ohio than anybody. And more and more of the parts are being bought from nearby producers.

Indeed, the concept "Japanese car" hardly makes sense any more.

A Honda news release says, "Of the 1.5 million vehicles Honda sold in the United States last year, nearly 80 percent were domestically made. All of the domestic cars and light trucks were equipped with U.S.-made engines, as well as parts from a network of 610 North American suppliers — 525 of those located in 35 states."

Reports Automotive News: "From 2000 to 2006, American Honda's share of the U.S. car and light-truck market rose from 6.7 percent to 9.1 percent. It moved up to 9.7 percent in the first nine months of this year, and it soon will be the second import company to attain a 10 percent market share."

Honda's expansion is continuing with the introduction of a site across the Indiana border, a location chosen with an eye on the proximity of Honda suppliers. The company is investing a half-billion dollars in Greensburg, Ind., having already put more than that into Ohio just since 2002, it says.

As is widely known, the Honda plants aren't unionized. But that doesn't mean the workers are among the needy. Honda says the average worker makes around $25 an hour (after starting at about $15), and has health insurance, a pension plan and a 401(k).

Honda has changed the face of a portion of Ohio near Marysville, and few people are complaining.

True, Honda is criticized by some for always locating in rural areas. Some see this as evidence that the company is trying to avoid places that have a pro-union tradition, or communities with minorities. One response from the company is that it couldn't get plants located in big cities because of environmental regulatory hurdles.

In truth, however, if any major automaker were eager to put a major plant in an urban area, the powers-that-be would work really hard to make that happen.

Whatever one thinks about the location issue, the fact is Honda employs 13,000 people in Ohio. That doesn't count its suppliers. And not one person has ever been laid off.

Going into next year's presidential election, Ohio is widely seen as a hotbed of hostility to free trade — or globalization, call it what you will. This is primarily because of jobs lost by the old American automakers. Last year saw the election of Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown, who complains a lot about modern trade treaties.

At some stage, however, Ohio has to decide how much energy it wants to put into complaining about the past, and how much into gaming the future. If the future is the main thing, then companies like Honda — thriving in times supposedly difficult for car companies and for manufacturing, and doing it without sweatshops, and while employing Americans — have to get attention. People have to ask how and whether this model can be replicated.

Complaining about American victimization in the world economy — showing a more hostile face — would not seem to be the way.