MAY 6, 2024
VOLUME 28
POLITICALLY INCORRECT, CENTER-RIGHT PERSPECTIVE OF CURRENT NEWS EVENTS
WHAT THE HELL ARE THEY THINKING?
If you have been reading my blog for any length of time, you know I’m a hopeless “gearhead” car nut. I was born that way. It’s genetic, my father was, both of my sisters, and my younger brother all loved automobiles. After all of these years of labor, I don’t have lot of money piled up in bank account. Spent most of it on cars, and just wasted the rest.
All of that said, I keep up with the automobile scene pretty closely. What I see in recent years is the price of cars is getting completely out of hand. A lot of things are contributing to that, but what I see as the main factor, is car manufacturers are trying to make cars do everything, including your housework. I’m serious, today’s cars have tons of features that are not even needed to get you from point ‘A’ to point ‘B’. In the end it makes the cars less reliable and way more expensive.
They gave me a new Chrysler car to use while my Suburban was in the shop. That was the most obnoxious car have ever driven. It had an irritating touch screen in the middle of the dash to turn on the HVAC system, set the temperature and so on. I hated it. I had to pull over and stop to use it. My Suburban is 17 years old and it’s bad enough with all of the stupid little buttons. None of this stuff is tactile, it takes your attention away from driving when looking at the digital displays. How about a three-position switch, low, medium and high, with a sliding lever to set the temp. You don’t need to know the precise temperature, adjust it to your comfort. That’s what you’re doing anyway, and you can do it without taking your eyes off the road.
The Chrysler had a ten speed automatic transmission. The damned thing never stopped changing gears. It was totally irritating. My Suburban has a three speed automatic with overdrive and a big 5.3 liter V8. It has enough power, that it doesn’t need to constantly search of gears, besides it’s busy searching for gas stations. But trust me, there are more important things in life than miles per gallon.
This one really gets me wound up. Why the hell do I need a screen the size of my computer monitor in the middle of the dash showing me fourteen different views of protestors beating my car with baseball bats, when it really needs machine guns. I’m serious, why do you need to watch yourself driving as if you and your car are having an “out of body” experience unless you’re driving while in a strait jacket.
RAIN SENSING WIPERS? Have you ever been in doubt when to turn on your wipers? Another expensive little feature that is totally unnecessary that will break just after the warranty expires and will cost just under a thousand dollars to restore it. That’s why RAIN-X is really good to carry in your trunk. Maybe they add this feature to keep you from crashing while you’re trying to find your wiper app on the touch screen.
SELF DRIVING MODE: If you’re too damn lazy to drive your own car, take public transportation and save someone’s life because your too stupid to be driving anyway.
AUTOMATIC PARKING FEATURE: If you such a lame ass driver that you can’t park your own car, UBER might be your best bet. Besides it will save the rest of us the pain of returning to a damaged car.
LANE DEPARTURE WARNING DEVICES: This feature became necessary when the installed the big ass touch screen on the dash, because you’re all over the road while your trying to find the app to turn on the wipers or adjust the air temp. Most people that are of average intelligence and not drunk don’t really need this. It could be useful for drivers in self-driving mode while trying to have sex with their cousin and live streaming it on FANS ONLY.
The point I am trying to make is that car makers in their efforts to attract more customers are loading their cars with unnecessary garbage features that fail after few years and cost an arm and a leg to repair. I quit buying Ford trucks because the electronic features are prone to failure more than the other trucks I bought in the past. My Suburban is 17 years old and all of the electronic displays still work fine. All of these added features drive up the initial cost, and ownership maintenance. Another problem is that if you are looking for a less expensive car, your choices are some piece of crap econobox that is equivalent to driving a cardboard box on wheels. Why can’t you buy a mid size car with basic features that doesn’t break the bank? They used to make them. I had a 2004 Buick Century sedan with basic features, got fantastic gas mileage, comfortable, reliable, and we drove it for years with very minor repairs.
When you buy a car that you have to finance for 8 years so you can afford the payments, you will likely never own that car. You will likely trade it before it’s paid off and go into debt for another eight years. Your life will be divided into car payment segments. I got into that revolving car payment lifestyle years ago so I could be seen in the latest model, with the most features, and fanciest colors. Then I figured it out that I was being played for sucker. Now we drive nice older cars, that look stylish, and don’t have eight-year contracts. It pisses me off I didn’t figure that out sooner, I could have owned more motorcycles.
Stay safe and free my friends. God bless you and your families.
VERITAS VINCIT ~ LIVE FREE OR DIE
MY WEAKNESS
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