whether the nat'l championships be the launching pad or a wrc event be that launching pad for popularity of rallying does not matter in the end. it's that sentence written in post 96 that is the problem: the financial interest. in the usa nothing gets done if it doesnt pay (i've lived there long enough to know that)
the only national championship i know of a bit is the french one where, events basically break even and that's fine. the ffsa is like the government overthere and they over see everything and make sure that the events actually happen. national and local sponsors put a lot of effort into the whole organisation and everyone is happy (well, drivers are never really happy to pay an entry fee). people do it for the passion, not for the money. there has been a long long tradition of doing it for the passion dating back to when you didnt need money to organize a rally. so, their passion was transmited to their kids who are now running the show and sponsoring it. it's that deep passionate bunch that is missing in north america. nowdays the whole damn thing has to be economically viable so it's going to be difficult to actually get it to be popular. though, commercials like:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmm3oVRSKqA will help and these stupid x-games have helped a lot as well (i am friends with a few sponsored skaters and they all know about rallying and most actually follow it a bit). but americans need more than just the mtv kids to follow it, they need true fans and a lot of them.