Random Politics & Religion #00

I have a 2013 Mercedes Benz S-Class I use for special events

Maybe. But we create our situation and our environment and promote or demote different ideas through marketing and popular culture. A lot of those ideas promoted are based on profit motive. Which means, we're assigning profit motive to a lot of our decision making. And lets face it profit motive has made some terrible decisions in the past, if left alone. I don't feel it's much different when it comes to job resources allocation either. It's not that we need all the useless stuff or crap that breaks down 15 years early as much as we could use advancements in science and technology, it's that that's what individual groups decide the profit motive decides is best for them so that's where the jobs are. Surplus creates other jobs, and nothing else. Specifically a surplus in food supply. After that you can make pretty much any structure for economies and valuation of other jobs you want. We use this because we stumbled blindly in the dark for thousands of years and this is the best that worked so far. Don't get me wrong it's been amazing but we have to fix blind consumption sooner or later.

So, don't buy shitty TVs then.

There is a difference between a $50 TV and a $500 TV. Quality does enhance the life of the product....

That's a bit of a stretch for this particular instance; the device used did not meet the required performance.
In general, recalls are not issued due to the stupidity of users, but due to the product not meeting the required behavior.
Mistakes are made. ***happens. The absolute wrong thing to do is attempt to hide the issue and hope it goes away/doesn't have much impact.

A higher price isn't necessarily indicative of a better quality product.

Oh, there are certainly tangible metrics for quality of products.

Did they hide or attempt to hide it then?

Complete sidetrack, but you made me wonder how much I could pickup a special use luxury vehicle. There are some amazing deals on low-mileage lease turn-ins available.

I think there's a middle ground to be reached between "Greed is good" and "save the planet, hand-holding hippie hug everyone".

I just don't think we're there yet.

A higher price isn't necessarily indicative of a better quality product.

No, but in this particular instance -- and when it comes to consumer electronics in general -- I tend to feel you get what you pay for, though when you play your cards right you can get some good deals on quality items.

Got me, I don't know the running values of luxury vehicles in Pennsylvania. Probably have to shop around for it.

I don't think we can ever get there to be honest.

If you want to see something amusing/depressing, go look around for pressure washers / air compressors. You'll find quite a few brands which are the exact same design, but with different paint colors/badges, with insane variance in prices.

Vehicles with under 20,000 miles at good prices.

Are the investigations finalized? Not defending GM's actions though, just curious.

Not as far as I know. I believe GM has admitted that the information was buried in a public statement, if I recall.

That's why.

When I bought mine, I bought it with 3 miles on the odometer. Cost me a little over $100k after taxes/licenses/other ***.

I think it has a total of 1,500 miles on it now, I really don't use it as much as I should lol...

Well, yeah. New Mercs are spendy. That's the whole point of buying a Merc new. Showing people you have it!

Still, under 20k miles and 2 years old for half that? If you're interested in a luxuray car for regular use, that's a pretty great deal.

which, honestly, in your situation, I would have done because you pay less long-term and can trade in for a new flash car in a few years

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has appointed John McCain, a hawkish US senator who has pressed Washington to send lethal weapons to war-torn Ukraine, as his advisor, his administration said.

Ukraine's pro-Western authorities are putting together an advisory council to help the ex-Soviet country conduct reforms and build global support for Ukraine.

Pending his agreement, McCain, the Republican senator for Arizona, will become a member of the council, along with Carl Bildt, the former prime minister of Sweden known for his vocal criticism of Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to a decree released by Poroshenko's administration on Wednesday.

The Advisory International Council of Reforms is to be headed by Mikheil Saakashvili, the fiercely pro-Western former president of Georgia, and will also include Elmar Brok, a member of the European Parliament, and economist Anders Aslund.

The US senator said he would be honoured to take up the post, adding however that he first had to be cleared by the Senate.

I'm the type of guy who buys a car every 10 years or so.

This was my first "snobby" car I bought, only because my bosses commented me on driving my Dodge to events with clients in it lol.

I don't like doing the whole "dress to impress" ***, but you got to do what you got to do. It got me this new CFO gig at least.

This will surely end well...

Ukraine appoints US senator McCain presidential aide

Depending on what security clearance and knowledge he has he can be subject to US export controls/ITAR. If he falls under that he can get permission to advise/work with foreign nationals.

https://www.umb.edu/research/policies_procedures/research_compliance/overview_of_export_control_laws