No sympathy for the SUV

[Junebug68]

I don't care about what people drive, but I just can't understand why you would choose to spend more money than you have to on transportation. I drive a Honda Civic and it does it's job very well - gets me to and from work, and wherever else I need to go.

I would rather spend the extra gas money on something fun. To each his own I suppose.

It would cost more to sell my car and buy a more gas efficient car than the savings on gas would be. Besides, I own my dream car and I spend a lot of time in it, so I consider it a good use of money.

Zapod: Every time I see a "smart car" I point and laugh.

Bwahaha me too! They're basically a shoebox on wheels. :p

[biccat]

It would cost more to sell my car and buy a more gas efficient car than the savings on gas would be. Besides, I own my dream car and I spend a lot of time in it, so I consider it a good use of money.

Good point! I always laugh when I hear about people dumping their SUV's to buy a sedan when they will never earn that money back in gas savings.

[movie buff]

The reason this caught my attention is that envy often seems just as large a contributor toward a drift to socialism as a true concern for the welfare of others.

True. Most ultra- liberals I know are textbook examples of two of the Seven Deadly Sins (And they're two sins which often go hand- in- hand with each other): Envy, and Pride.

[LogansPapa]

SUV’s here in the OC are parked on every corner with ‘For Sale’ signs and car dealers are giving joke sized compensations when people attempt to use them for trade-ins.

Personally, I have an addiction for "hurting the pavement", so I don’t care.

[Cold Warrior]

The price of oil is a serious matter, as it is having extensive ripple effects throughout the economy, from the cost of transported items, including particularly food, to the basic cost of doing business (travel, etc.). As transport becomes more and more expensive, Sam Walton's business model, i.e. produce things where they can be made cheaply and transport in bulk to the buyers, may be invalidated.

However, it is very, very amusing to watch defenders of the SUV pay through the nose for their gas. I once started a thread asking (seriously) why people bought them as they obviously (to me, at least) cost more to operate, were bulky and harder to handle, and possessed all the style of a pick up truck. Most people answered that they needed them for their family (not commercial) transport. I translated that into needing a place to put the screaming brats as far away as possible, in front of their individual DVDs to keep them pacified.

Most amusing, however, was a recent thread at Clietus' Cesspool, started by one of the very posters who defended the SUV here, bemoaning the high cost of operating the same! :D Life does, indeed, work in mysterious ways.

[lacarnut]

The price of oil is a serious matter, as it is having extensive ripple effects throughout the economy, from the cost of transported items, including particularly food, to the basic cost of doing business (travel, etc.). As transport becomes more and more expensive, Sam Walton's business model, i.e. produce things where they can be made cheaply and transport in bulk to the buyers, may be invalidated.

However, it is very, very amusing to watch defenders of the SUV pay through the nose for their gas. I once started a thread asking (seriously) why people bought them as they obviously (to me, at least) cost more to operate, were bulky and harder to handle, and possessed all the style of a pick up truck. Most people answered that they needed them for their family (not commercial) transport. I translated that into needing a place to put the screaming brats as far away as possible, in front of their individual DVDs to keep them pacified.

Most amusing, however, was a recent thread at Clietus' Cesspool, started by one of the very posters who defended the SUV here, bemoaning the high cost of operating the same! :D Life does, indeed, work in mysterious ways.

All I can say about your post is this; I was working as an assistant golf pro at the primo country club in Baton Rouge and the golf pro was checking out these expensive shirts and sweaters that the salesman had brought in. The Golf Course Superintendent comes thru the door and after listening to the golf pro tell the salesman what he likes and what he does not like, he blurts out "Charlie you are not buying that for yourself" in which this irishman with a flushed red face whips around and replies "It's my fucking money and I will buy what I want." That was 40 years ago and I still find that very amusing.

[Cold Warrior]

All I can say about your post is this; I was working as an assistant golf pro at the primo country club in Baton Rouge and the golf pro was checking out these expensive shirts and sweaters that the salesman had brought in. The Golf Course Superintendent comes thru the door and after listening to the golf pro tell the salesman what he likes and what he does not like, he blurts out "Charlie you are not buying that for yourself" in which this irishman with a flushed red face whips around and replies "It's my fucking money and I will buy what I want." That was 40 years ago and I still find that very amusing.

Front porch life parables told by grandpas chawin' tabac are interesting, particularly if they are applicable to the discussion. Unfortunately, yours was not. The point of your little story would seem to be that people can spend their money any way they want. That is something I agree with and did not dispute in my post. In fact, I didn't even dispute the fact that people have the right to complain afterwards about how they have spent their money. I simply pointed out that it's amusing that those SAME people are now whining about the consequences of their decisions. Some of us on this board frequently make this point with regards to the DUmmies, btw (oh! I forgot MrBackoftheBus' Rule: When they do it, they're stupid; when we do it, we're smart).

Your story would have been more to the point if the Superintendent had told red-faced (probably drunken Irish) Charlie that while the shirt was expensive, cleaning the shirt required a special detergent that was expensive and was likely to increase in price. Then, weeks later, Charlie, when he finds himself spending more on cleaning the shirt than the benefits he is deriving from it, comes into the shop to complain that the Superintendent should have warned him about the attendant costs of the shirt.

ppffftttt .................................................. ....................................... ding!

[AmPat]

I like SUV's. I don't have one now but I like them. If people can afford them I don't see any problem. My friend has one that gets slightly less mileage than my Jeep. He has at least a thousand pounds and two cylinders on me and only slightly less mileage. My Jeep gets about the same mileage as my Mustang. I can't put the whole family in the Miata so mileage is a secondary consideration.