One possibility is that the tooling for the 3.8L is good for producing x number of blocks before it needs to be replaced and so they want to get their money's worth out of it. That's just a guess though.
They've already ended production of the 5.0, as far as I know, so the 3.8 can't be too far behind
I don't know what's up with the seats, other than that I've been in other Ford vehicles that have had less than comfortable seats. OTOH, Ford seats seem to last longer (the seats in my 88 Mustang GT are practically mint condition...wish I could say the same about the paint....)
Brian
