what kind of used car should I get?

I've heard really good things about Kia. I rented one and drove one and it's a really cool car but it wasn't for me.
What I mean is I'm more of a muscle car kind of person. A kia would feel right to me if I was in Japan or somewhere everyone drives compact cars and I wouldn't feel out of place. I toyed with the idea of getting one I've decided I'm more of a corvette person.

Yeah, I know. The simple answer is what I posted. The longer answer is that there are many good domestic cars and trucks that are very reliable in that price range, if they were well maintained by previous owners. That's a big " if". My old S-10 had 225,000 reliable miles on it when I sold it for $500 to it's current owner and it's got something like 240,000 on it now, still going strong - but I took really good care of it for the five years I was working on it.

Finding a car that has been well-maintained at that price is at least as important as the make selected. A well-taken care of Buick will be better than a neglected Toyota.

PS - the Corolla, Vibe, Prizm and Matrix are/were all assembled by the UAW in a joint venture plant in Fremont, California using mostly american sourced parts... making those "foreign" cars less foreign than a Dodge 2500 Cummins turbodiesel pickup, built in Mexico.