Why do people care so much about the country of origin of a car company?

For years, the quality of American cars, as we know, was below that of ones from other countries. Yet, fans of American cars were quick to insult Japanese cars, and they even still do in 2016. I remember, when Toyota was dealing with its acceleration recall, they thought that Toyota's customers would start buying American cars, but instead they bought Hondas from what I know.
What I don't get is why does this only apply to cars it seems? The quality of US airlines is below that of other countries yet you don't see Americans insulting the Asian airlines despite them being rated well, especially ones like All Nippon Airways. So, why do Americans care so much about the country of origin of their cars, but not of other things, such as their airlines?

Airlines have the same guidelines world wide, most of those regulations are American led.

as for quality, Germany has been the best with Italy being close. America has been more consumed with making numbers more than quality. Japan is sometimes good but most are bad. You can run them into the ground and they will still go but beyond that there's nothing really good about most of their cars unless they are really high end.

America makes many cars but not up to snuff