| Author | Message | ||
     Cato Nova Citizen Username: Cato_nova Post Number: 24 Registered: 12-2003 |
Anyone who read the NYT's piece this morning about how Subaru will make minor changes so that its sedan can be classified as a "light truck" and hence subject to less stringent regulations should be struck dumb about the inherent stupidity of this nation. What is our gravest problem (according to our nation's great leaders)? Terrorism, and/or the risk thereof. Why are we vulnerable? Because we are an oil-dependent nation, and thus must be deeply involved in the volatile Middle East. So what do we do as a nation? Our government promotes fuel inefficiency by exempting so-called light trucks from regulations, and also gives tax breaks to the worst SUV behemoths, so that people like you and me, who commute to work, effectively subsidize those selfish idiots tooling behind the wheels of their SUV's. And the American people gleeflully applaud. No wonder the world hates us, for our selfish, short-sighted, piggish ways. Americans are like the young tart who parades past a church in short skirt, her thong showing, her midriff bared, and her pierced nipples gleaming through her skin-tight shirt, and then complains and acts surprised when the old ladies spilling out of the church doors yell out "Whore!" | ||
| tjohn Citizen Username: Tjohn Post Number: 2068 Registered: 12-2001  |
Oh dear, another America-hater that can't understand that we have a right to act like a whore and be treated like a lady. | ||
| themp Citizen Username: Themp Post Number: 360 Registered: 12-2001 |
Honest truth - I was going to buy a Subaru this month, but that article annoys me so much that I'm considering getting a Toyota Matrix instead. | ||
| lumpyhead Citizen Username: Lumpyhead Post Number: 614 Registered: 3-2002 |
And Democratic liberal Maplewoodians keep buying these giant SUV's to cart their precious little one around. If people didn't want these stupid cars, no one would make them. | ||
| gozerbrown Citizen Username: Gozerbrown Post Number: 295 Registered: 3-2002 |
Although I don't usually subscribe to The New Yorker's political agenda, there is a great article about SUV's in the 1/12/04 edition. Basically, it states that people buy SUV's because their perception is that they are safer...and that seems to be more important to consumers than the reality: they aren't necessarily safer. | ||
| Cato Nova Citizen Username: Cato_nova Post Number: 26 Registered: 12-2003 |
Lumpyhead: How convenient to have a username that describes your thought processes. It is not just a matter of unfettered choice. There are strong incentives that government has provided. First, it makes it cheaper for companies to build SUV's by exempting them from the regulatory scheme governing cars. Second, it funds some of those purchases with tax breaks for some SUV's. Third, it siphons funds from public transit and applies them to ensure that gasoline prices are as low as possible. But, in addition, people are also selfish and short-sighted, and would rather increase highway fatalities by driving some outrageous behemoth than act in a rational, public minded way. However, public policy applauds and facilitates that choice in a way it doesn't for public transit, hybrid automobiles, etc. | ||
| themp Citizen Username: Themp Post Number: 363 Registered: 12-2001 |
Lumpyhead is like a primitive artist. Her (?) style is gauche, clumsy, and ill informed, her statements terse, strident and predictable. But she is no slave to this "fashion" of knowing what your talking about like all these snobs do. And the stark patterns of her statements is like a stream of consciousness novel about a poor dope wrestling with a dark angel of unfocused anger. | ||
| tom Citizen Username: Tom Post Number: 1762 Registered: 5-2001 |
Subaru is a Japanese company. Was the decision made there? | ||
| cjc Citizen Username: Cjc Post Number: 679 Registered: 8-2003 |
Using that short skirt/church analogy, this is the first time I've heard someone I'm guessing is from the left justify the "she was asking for it" line. Nice. We'll be dependent on oil so long as it's cheap relative to any other source, and it will remain ever thus for everyone's lifetime on this board. Hybrid cars are coming out more and more, and if there's a market for them -- people will buy them. Currently, there's a market for SUVs. That's the way it is. You are safer in an SUV. Same as people are safer in tanks, with even worse gas mileage. Don't get me wrong, I'm not thrilled with clueless SUV drivers. I also think it's stupid to buy an SUV if you really don't need something that size. But it's their choice. | ||
| Cato Nova Citizen Username: Cato_nova Post Number: 27 Registered: 12-2003 |
CJC: Clearly your ability to read simple English is equivalent to your ability to properly judge safety and understand how markets are created and sustained. There is no such thing as a natural market. The market for SUV's is aided and abetted by government policy. It is thus a public policy choice, not an individual choice alone. Moreover, as the New Yorker article Gozerbrown references demonstrates, you are not in fact safer in an SUV. That is a perception created by advertising. Furthermore, SUV's create a greater danger to other drivers. This risk to others simply doesn't bother SUV drivers because they are, inherently, bad people who have made an immoral choice. | ||
| drewdix Citizen Username: Drewdix Post Number: 436 Registered: 7-2001 |
I'm not necessarily lumping cjc into this category- but lack of concern with what happens (to the environment, our energy policies) beyond everyone's lifetime on this board is my major concern with many decisions made by our gov't. | ||
| newone Citizen Username: Newone Post Number: 112 Registered: 8-2001 |
Wow - never knew I was a bad, immoral person for driving SUVs for the past 12 years. Thanks for the heads-up. I know my abilities as a driver and the great thing is I'll drive whatever the hell I want. I don't have to answer to you or anyone else - ain't personal choice great. ESBAM. | ||
| lumpyhead Citizen Username: Lumpyhead Post Number: 615 Registered: 3-2002 |
Supply side economics huh? So whatever they make, we will buy? We have no choice in the matter? With all those subsidies why are SUV's still more expensive than other cars? Themp- Easybake ovens, castrating political prisoners and now wrestling with angels? You sound insane. | ||
| sportsnut Citizen Username: Sportsnut Post Number: 841 Registered: 10-2001 |
Wow I looked outside my window and I see an SUV in the driveway and a Porsche in the garage. I must be one bad, bad man. Immoral too and gullible, and stupid etc. Oh and I sleep very well at night. As newone says ain't personal choice great. Cato......... oh, never mind. | ||
| ligeti Citizen Username: Ligeti Post Number: 45 Registered: 7-2002 |
Several Europeans I know have remarked on the plague of SUVs on American streets. For foreigners, the idea that someone needs one of these repulsive tanks to drive to the grocery store and playdates is absurd. It's embarrassing -- reinforcing our reputation for greed, size and domination. Buy whatever you think you must, I guess. But there's also the issue of how awful people become as drivers when they climb into one of these hideous things. | ||
| themp Citizen Username: Themp Post Number: 364 Registered: 12-2001 |
Isn't this about economics and what are called "externalities"? In other words, rational consumer choices can't be counted on to shape the "external" effects of those choices. Like air pollution. That's why total freemarket libertarian arguments are a little insincere and unrealistic. On the frontier, where one person's choices barely effect someone else it works fine. But here in Jersey, you can't count on consumer choice to make the GSP safe, or make your neighbor have safe wiring in his house. | ||
| cjc Citizen Username: Cjc Post Number: 681 Registered: 8-2003 |
Cato -- I don't have any text from the New Yorker that backs up the claim that safety is perception only. But in head on collisions, I'll take the SUV. And you can rail that policy favors the combustion engine, but the fact that cost-wise there is no cheaper form of hydrocarbons has more primacy than any policies that favor cars and SUVs. The only way to make them less favorable is on a cost basis through taxing them or the driving activity as they do in Europe. And that isn't "natural" either. Unless of course you are like others on this board where taxes are part of the natural state of all things good. | ||
| robdan Citizen Username: Robdan Post Number: 348 Registered: 7-2001 |
Subaru (aka Fuji Heavy Industries) is part-owned by General Motors. | ||
| Tom Reingold Citizen Username: Noglider Post Number: 1699 Registered: 1-2003  |
I believe in free choice, too, once the true costs are passed to the consumer. If the dangers that SUVs present to the environment, to the energy supply and to our safety are evaluated and passed on through taxes or other means, SUVs will be more expensive. No need for laws prohibiting them. Yes, a tank is safer to the occupant than an SUV, but it is more dangerous to those outside. You are defending yourself from dangers, and at the same time, you are posing dangers to others. If we all need 5,000 pound vehicles to protect ourselves because everyone has 5,000 pound vehicles, we have entered an arms race. If personal responsibility is important, we should consider our actions' effects on others. Tom Reingold the prissy-pants There is nothing | ||
| Habanero2 Citizen Username: Habanero2 Post Number: 18 Registered: 12-2003 |
I love it when a company like Subaru, that caters to the "green" crowd, shows that it is just like every other company. The "greenies" that drive subarus once again fell for BS "good for the environment" marketing. Unless you "drive" a bike everywhere, you too add pollution to the environment, so stop complaining about SUVs. "You kids today have it easy. When I was a kid everything was HUGE. My dad was nearly four times bigger than me. You couldn't even see the tops of counters.... Then gradually everything became smaller until it was the manageable size it is today." |
