Another poor choice of words

While in Tennessee, I picked up a copy of The Tennessean. In an article on Saturn, they wrote,

For years, the U.S. auto manufacturing base has been too large for the market, forcing automakers to overproduce to keep plants running and flooding the market with vehicles.

Can one really say that when the foreign auto manufacturing base hasn't been "too large for the market"? Or has it been that—for whatever reason—American auto manufacturers haven't been competitive enough for the market?