There is nothing wrong with the car.
For anyone who is thinking about buying a 2002 Cougar, buy one. I only had mine for a couple of weeks, but I love it and would never sell it. Every thing about this car is good. The seats (I have leather) are comfortable and the stock hood scoop is pretty cool. It also has really nice pickup. The gas mileage is just OK. I get about 20-22 miles to the gal. So I get about 310-340 miles to the tank. But best of all is the looks! It looks like sports car, but without the $30,000 price tag.
I agree with that, they do have have pretty good pickup and they look really nice. I had mine for about 3 months then I changed the stock rims to 18 inch chrome Eagle's.
The leather seats were really nice, but I wish that the hood scoop would have had a purpose besides looking good.