One of the reasons for liking old cars is they don’t try to parent you. The new stuff won’t quit trying to.
The 2018 VW Golf GTI I am reviewing this week, for instance. When you put the transmission in Reverse, the radio’s volume’s is peremptorily turned down – apparently because someone decided it wasn’t saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaafe to back up while listening to the radio.
One can almost see the liver-spotted hand of your mother-in-law adjusting the volume control knob. Many new cars have this “feature” – not just new VWs.
It’s incredibly obnoxious. More so because it’s not your mother-in-law and you can’t slap her liver-spotted hand down or – better – hit the unlock button and tell the old bag to get out now if she can’t mind her own business.
Speaking of door locks . . . .
They are just as peremptory. Some can be programmed not to be – but the default is uber peremptory. As soon as you get in and close the door, it locks. All locks. Some cars are incredibly aggressive about allowing access to the car, denying the owner access to the trunk or rear cargo area unless he very deliberately unlocks the locks, which the car slammed shut without him having asked it to.
Again, for saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaafety.
The latest BMW vehicles will countermand your decision to inch the car backward with the door open – by taking the transmission out of gear and pestering you with a cloying chime that sounds kind of like this: Brrrrring! Brrrrring! Brrrrring!
Sometimes, backing up with the door open makes sound sense. You get a better idea of where the curb is and also the distance remaining between the back of your car and the car your backing up toward using your own two eyes – which have greater depth perception and peripheral vision than any fish-eye camera.
But BMW wants you to use the camera instead. No, check that. BMW insists you use the camera. The car will not let you back up with the door cracked. The nanny cannot be told off.
There is no Off button.
And that’s the rub.
It’s one thing – an acceptable thing – for a car company to include a feature it thinks may be helpful. This isn’t a bad thing. It’s another thing when the feature isn’t wanted – and you can’t countermand the “help.”
This is, however, the new Nudge way of doing things. The mother-in-law you can’t make shut up or kick to the curb.
Busybody-ism.
Which didn’t used to be the American cultural norm. You can watch sitcoms from the ‘60s to confirm this. Some readers may remember the annoying next-door neighbor in the series, Bewitched. Gladys Kravitz. She was an object of ridicule then. There is always a way to best your previous record with their amazing range. Today, she’s in your dashboard – and touted as the most marvelous thing since hot and cold indoor plumbing. Speaking of which. One wonders how long it will be before you’re only allowed to turn the Hot up so high – and no higher? Probably with a cloying jingle warning you it’s not saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaafe to take a shower so hot.
We are not far away from that, actually.
All washing machines now lock themselves up as soon as you start the cycle. It is not possible to add something to the wash, as was routine practice for decades. Apparently, a child went for a swim and its parent wasn’t parenting – so now we are all parented.
This is why cars have back-up cameras now, incidentally. A handful of negligent parents didn’t parent their kids – backed up over their kids, whom they’d lost track of – and now we are all parented.
More examples:
Most new Toyotas will not allow you to disengage the traction control unless you first come to a complete stop – which is extremely unhelpful if it’s blizzarding outside and the roads are slick and the very last thing you want to do is come to a complete stop as this often makes it exceedingly difficult to get moving again. Once more, there is no way to countermand the dashboard nanny.
It knows best – and it insists.
The Lane Keep Assist systems now standard in probably half the new cars on the market and soon to be standard in every car as automated car technology further infiltrates – object if you do not signal prior to making a lane change. Even if there is no reason – other than mindless obedience to a pointless protocol – to signal. For instance, the absence of any traffic in the vicinity. Not everyone lives in a busy city. Some live in the country, and sometimes, you are the only car on the road.
Signaling in that event is kind of like knocking on the door to the bathroom in your own house when you know there’s no one in the house except yourself.
The Lane Keep Assist, however, insists.
If you don’t signal and try to change lanes, motors connected to the steering gear will countersteer to try to prevent you from changing lanes. You have to fight the computer’s determination to prevent your lane change. This is actually far more dangerous – far less saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaafe – than not signaling a lane change when there’s no traffic around.
But nevermind.
You are supposed to use your signal – no matter the relevance of signaling.
Old cars – those made prior to early 2000s – are largely free of all this stuff. Those made prior to the ’90s are completely free of this stuff. Driving one of those cars is an almost startling experience, if you only have experience with newer cars. You are in charge – of everything. The car simply does as it’s told.
Mrs. Kravitz would have a conniption fit.
. . .
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The Mrs. Kravitz reference is comedic gold! That actress played an excellent clover! I did not care for her replacement along with Dick York’s replacement.
I’m 55. My 2003 Ford Ranger will be my last car. I’ve fixed it so that it thinks the seat belt is always fastened. In my previous Ranger I put a manual switch in the door so I could tell it whether or not the door was ajar. (Sometimes I want to listen to the radio with the ignition off and the door open.)
I also have a 1966 Porsche 912 (the one with the little 4-banger). When arriving at a gas station I love turning off the ignition and rolling a couple car lengths to the pump. People look in wonder, and the Mrs. Kravitzes glare at me.
Bought a 2017 Chevrolet SS last year (when they had the 20% off MSRP fleetwide sale going on, wouldn’t have considered the car at the actual MSRP… but, I digress…)
One of the most asinine features is the ‘e-brake’. The ‘e’ of course does not stand for ’emergency’, it stands for ‘electronic’. I did not come to realize how much I would hate this ‘feature’ until well after I bought the car.
See, the thing is tied into the computer, so, you can’t really engage and disengage it the way you want or at the time you want. Case in point: you ‘must’ have your foot on the brake and pressing it quite hard in order to disengage this ‘e-brake’. I have a manual transmission performance sedan, I like to get in the car, press the clutch, get in gear, and release the brake… with a good old manual hand brake (as in my 2005 GTO), this was all done basically 1 single action while the engine was starting even. Just kind of get in and go.
Now, I have to wait for the engine to start, wait for the computer to accept the fact that I am pressing the brake hard enough, so that it will finally allow me to disengage the e-brake — how fucking obnoxious!
Worse … much worse…
The trunk release is tied to the e-brake. I kid you not! I drop my kids at school each morning, they put their school bags in the trunk of my car. In a car built from a more civilized age, I could simply pull up, cover the brake, push in the clutch, pop the trunk, kids get out, grab their stuff, close the trunk, and I’m off… but … no, not any more! The trunk will REFUSE to open until I have… you guessed it… ENGAGED the e-brake! It takes 2 seconds for this e-brake to engage, then of course once the kids have grabbed their stuff, I have to make sure I am pressing my brake with enough pressure to satisfy computer so that it will allow me to release the e-brake and get on my way again.
But hey! At least I can still put the car into reverse and drive with my door ajar — not sure if the automatic transmission version of this car allows it.
At any rate, If the trend of these ‘features’ continues… I can see this as being the last new car I will ever buy…which sucks since statistically speaking I’ve got another 40 years to live.
You might look into getting a coding program online somewhere. I know with BMW you can code a lot of these silly features out, hopefully you can do the same with your e-brake problem. Sounds like a giant pain in the ass, at least you get a V8 and manual in that badboy though.
My V-6 will keep up with most V-8s off lights, and doesn’t need a manual because it is dumb.
By the time you get to 50 you’ll be wishing, like me, you’d bought a ’55 Carryall which you could then put a complete early 90’s GM pickup drivetrain into and be done with it. A buddy did this with his ’51 Ford pickup(S 10 front and Ranger rear-end) and its an interstate cruiser and mighty salty to boot. I’d go 4 WD if I had one. They made em that way but don’t think Ive seen one alive these days.
My county has high per capita gun count and pre-FI pickup count.
So what happens when a kid, dog, deer or moose jumps into your vehicles path? I we supposed to signal before avoiding them?
What happens when a vehicle crosses into your lane are we supposed to signal first to avoid them?
This is utter BS and it’s getting worse.
Signalling before any change of path is subconscious after decades of doing what one should always have done. If you can’t do it consciously, it may be because you are unconscious.
Well, Bill, not al of us here are mindless dweebs stepping to the cadence called by Nannie. Many of us here learned how to drive non cars that did NOTHING until the DRIVER made it do it. Signalling and change of path” (how official that sounds….) are two separate actions. Considering the path onto whcih the change is intended one will, without even calculating it, whether use of the trafficator is necessary. Is the road ahead and back completely clear? WHY signal? Because Nannie Sed So? Nanie can get out right after I indicate with my trafficator to the traffic nearly enough following that they need to know my intention, then when I pull over to the right and unlock all the doors, and ORDER her out she will not be put in any danger. I KNOW when other traffic needs to know my intention, and ALWAYS help them avoid hitting me by informing them. As mentioned by another poster here, WHATABOUT when there is an emergency situation and I MUST move out of lane NOW to avoid jitting the deer walking quickly across my path. That critter does not need to know my intention beyond the danger I pose to her. And my trafficator won’t tell her anything more than she already might know…..
so take your stupid Nannie home and keep her out of MY hair. I want to DRIVE my own motorcar thanks all the same. If I wanted somebody else to drive for me, I’d let them.
I do understand where Bill comes from in a way. I’ve signaled every turn or lane change for so many decades I often signal turning when going into a curve. It’s not a conscious thing for me, simply habit. I’m sometimes jolted back to reality when lights down the side of my pickup don’t flash.
I do not understand Bill at all, he sounds like another boot licker. How can you even think about signalling in an emergency situation?
It isn’t hard to imagine that you would have a hard time thinking about signaling in an emergency situation that a failure to think about preventing was the eminent cause of.
8,
Then there are the experienced pilots that signal turns when there are no other planes in sight. Most people are unaware that planes have turn signals too.
Your failure to signal is not a defense for the ticket that you’ll get for willful ignorance.
Really? Please tell us mere mortals, Bill, just how you manage to signal a lane change when a child or a deer runs out in front of you. What a ridiculous statement.
I wouldn’t make a lane change in that situation, especially in the case of the deer. Anyone who goes too fast to stop in any urban situation is an accident looking for a place to happen. You apparently have never completed a defensive driving program for professional drivers.
I’ve never seen a child run out of a forest.
Why would I signal an inadvisable lane change?
Beyond that, I don’t think about signalling, I just do it automatically.
Thank you for the little clip of Mrs. Kravitz. I sent it off to the wife to get a laugh because we have THAT neighbor.
My pleasure, Anonymous!
I love my 86 Crown Vic more each day I see something like this.
This parenting thing is out of control. It’s everywhere. For two years now, I’ve been taking e-mails out of my “SPAM” folder sent by dear friends who I am in regular contact with. I have never asked that they be censored, but faithfully, there they are, in my SPAM folder. After examining the topics in the selected e-mails, they happen to follow a theme: anything related to LaVoy Finnicum goes in there automatically, and many liberty minded notes, do too. I recently asked my e-mail service provider to just send me the list of “trigger” words its filters are flagging, so I can forward it to all my contacts and we will all know exactly what we’re not supposed to be talking about. 1984 is here. And I hate it.
Pam, there was a good article today in LRC saying what you just said. 1984 isn’t something to dread in the future, it is NOW! The spam folder is a great place for Mises and the like but I have to give it to Yahoo in that respect, they don’t do that shit. I might get some mail from the usual suspect(DNC, RNC, etc. thrown in there(good tastes)but not much relevant stuff for me. The DNC and RNC e’s I take are from advice from an ole friend from a couple decades ago when he said he threw a few dollars to both of them that kept him in good stead and he got the lowdown first thing. His advice was “Know your enemy” and it’s good advice…..always. Keep them sending you the skinny on their notorious plans so you have a leg up on all their unconstitutional bs they plan.
Sun Tzu’s, The Art of War (“Know your enemy”) has lots of gems in it! A little book that packs punches. I’m glad Yahoo hasn’t been entirely corrupted yet. How about, I get to be my own “filter?” Imagine that!
Hi Pam,
Indeed, agreed.
What halts me is how indifferent most people appear to be to all this. Maybe they have just accepted/given up? I still have some fight left in me; not much – but some.
What the hell… I’m divorced, freelance and not on anyone’s payroll (except EPautos’ supporters!) and so I can let loose as I like!
Yeah Eric, I wonder if a lot of people are giving up. I will be one of those that goes down kicking till the end. It’s not like I have a ton of fight in me; I just save it up for the most important stuff. I get it about being able to just let loose. I can finally live out what I believe now, without it affecting anybody else. And it feels really good to be away from the demands to get back in line; to be like everybody else.
What does parenting have to do with poorly performing software?
I can’t blame Google’s spell checker constantly telling me that the proper spelling of “becuase” is “barbecue” on any properly constructed or operating software.
Bill, If you were referring to my comment, the fact is that the service I use has, and I quote, a “Blacklist of websites.” So, the problem isn’t due to poorly performing software. It is intentional censorship. Censorship is parenting.
Pam,
Having written very well debugged Fortran programs, I can say with certainty that if you didn’t write and debug it yourself, you lack the knowledge to judge whether it is the software in question or co-operating software that is causing the problem. Any parent that has to censor what their children are seeing haven’t done a very good job of teaching them ethical standards, or has made the mistake of letting them get them from their peers, which is worse. The public fool system is a universal deal killer.
I wrote my first computer program in 1968. I didn’t mess with computers for a long time after that. Really lucky no kids since I could have cause them irreparable damage not being a competent Fortran(the first language i learn….and the first I forgot) guy. Oh the horrors, my kids just learning from their parents and living off the land. How wrong can you go?
8,
I studied Fortran V until there were no more instructors in the school that knew it as well as I did. The last one gave me a certificate of proficiency that he filled in on an ancient Underwood typewriter. It was either that or longhand. I love showing it off to geeks that have never used a typewriter.
These are consicious decisions, every one, made by expensive legal departments of the manufacturers. Any *remote*, possible scenario no matter how unlikely to result in a litigation can now be reduced to nil. At the expense of drivers, sanity. Hey—I wonder if those legal nitwits considered these “protections” as food for road rage?
Pam yu might give Earthlink a try. I’ve had them since 2000, and I’ve set my “filter” to “medium” for spam. Once in a great while I’ll find something not supposed to be there, I check daily just in case. Its usually something I get regularly anyway, or from a friend or business I deal with. I have not been able to figure out any “triggers” as to why this one is in there today that one was held up two weeks back. I simply mark the THIS IS NOT SPAM button, it plops into my inbox instantly and I can then read it and do whatever. I’m only payiung five bucks a month, I can access it from anywhere, have five different email addresses, and they don’t seem to be in bed with the government hooh hahs like Google, Yahoo, MS, their customer service when there IS a problem is always in understandable english, the tech listens, and quickly delivers to me a probable solution, often walking me through the process to coffect errors on my end.
The only problem I’ve had with Yahoo was it putting emails I get so regularly I often don’t read them Once I return them to the inbox that setting stays until such time I don’t read them for a month or two. I have never noticed anything there simply by “content”.
8,
Every problem I have ever had with Yahoo mail has been attributable to their only goal being the delivery of advertising. If they really wanted to have customer friendly software, they would offer to move individual emails to the appropriate folder instead of making us select the correct folder for each one.
Bill, I get what I pay for, nada. I take full responsibility for their bombarding me with ads and even at that, they really don’t bombard me. If I had more time I’d pay for my own website and encrypted email. I don’t expect something for nothing.
I have a 2013 Ford Focus SE hatchback, and it is not bad with the nanny stuff. I might need to hang on to it as long as possible, because anything newer surely will be worser. It does not have a back up camera, but I really wouldn’t mind having one. It locks the doors but only after you are moving 5 mph. It has, what I think is a pretty cool feature, where if your windshield wipers are on and you put the car in reverse the rear wiper turns on as long for as you are in reverse. Also no gas cap!! It used to have a instrument panel setting that would tell me how efficiently (or not) I was driving, which I thought was pretty cool, but that disappeared with a new Ford software update when I had to have some minor trans work done. Also nice little fish-eye mirrors in upper outside corners of side rear view mirrors, which bugged me at first, but now have come to love. My biggest bitch is that I have to push in the unlock button on the automatic trans gearshift in order to go from Drive to Neutral. Next biggest bitch is the annoying buzzer when key is in ignition switch and door is open, but that has been around 35 or so years. I can back up with the door open, no Lane Keep Assist BS, and really no annoying buzzers, except of course when car is running and you open the door. I would say actually nothing but good “new” stuff. Probably last year or so for it.
I love reading your articles Eric because it always reconfirms for me I’ll NEVER want to drive anything remotely new and will hold on to my 99′ Jeep Cherokee till the wheels fall off.
That is what forced me to give up my last van, a 1980 E-150. I was pulling it up I-77 behind a truck tractor I was taking to Columbus, Ohio, when the right rear axle snapped off. The tire and wheel bounced around under the van enough to open a huge gap in the floor before it jumped into the ravine. It was towed to a unused parking lot in Belpre, Ohio, where I returned after delivering the tractor via bus. There was only one full-sided used van in town, a 2003 E-150. It was $4900 when I found it. The owner had received a call from a regular customer asking them to get him a van, and he never showed up to pick it up. Because that dealer only carried minivans and SUVs, he was very motivated to get it off his lot, so it went down to $3500 when I showed up. I sold 3 ounces of gold to the PM guy next door and paid cash for the van. That was 125918 miles and almost 9 years ago. It has been the best of the three vans I’ve owned and I have enough cash on board to R&R or rebuild the engine whenever that is required.
I had axel wheel and all come popping out of a ford truck one time. Funniest feeling to see that combination of parts fall off and pass you up.
I-77 runs alongside a deep ravine for much of its travel through rural West Virginia. Neither I nor the towtruck owner/driver had any indication where the tire/wheel went aside from the facts that it didn’t hit anyone nor was visible from the side of the road. Fortunately their departure was not evidenced by anyone on the scene.
THIS one scenario is precisely why I will NOT own a 150 sized van or pickup. Same running gear, different tin can on top of it. I will NOT run a rig I need to COUNT ON when it has that single bearing, often running right on the shaft, which also takes the side-load. They can, and do, fail in just the way you describe. For a workhorse I won’t have anything but the double opposed LARGE tapered roller bearings, often called 3/4 floating. Careful, though, as many of the 250 and some of the 350 did have the single bearing. These were mostly built on contract for fleets. My E 350 has a third of a million miles on it and still is running strong. I pulled the rear bearings and checked them as I did brakes at about 320K. Everything in there looked brand new. I often run that thing heavy… building a septic system for a friend, I crossed the scales pulling the dump trailer at above 26,000 lbs. I’ve seen 6700 on the rear axle of the van multiple times. It uust don’t seem to care.
That goes for any make as far as I’m concerned. I have my first 1/2 T (Z 71)right now in decades. I won’t repeat that. My old ’93 Turbo Diesel 4WD ext cab didn’t seem to have a weak link.
It appears Defensive driving , crash avoidance techniques , evasive driving skills, and common sense have been legislated out of existence .
Only for those who don’t care how bad their driving records get or how high their insurance goes.
As a commercial driver whose CDL has been clean since it began in 1990, and whose clean driving record for 15 years before that is a source of pride, I can say that wouldn’t be the case without fastidious use of “(d)efensive driving, crash avoidance techniques, and evasive driving skills.”
Legislation had nothing to do with it aside from “the deliberate dumbing down of america.”
Has BMW stopped putting mirrors on its vehicles?
What do the self driving / lane assist cars do on gravel roads or snow covered roads for that matter? No lane markings?
There don’t need to be markings for an accurate enough GIS database to know exactly where they’d be.
Boolsheet. Out where I live the GPS direction systems will send you down some rutted two track across a private ranch where there are a half dozen stretch gates to open and close – if you don’t get stuck or shot for trespassing first.
Your GPS navigator has as much to do with a proper GIS database as the federal government has to do with Constitution.
You knew this was going to happen.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2018/03/19/uber-self-driving-car-kills-arizona-woman/438473002/
Nothing is going to be perfect. If you walk in front of a self-driving car, it may hit you. That’s what happened in Tempe.
And the guy who was paid to prevent the vehicle being tested from doing so has no liability?
Holy shit I’m pretty sure I have lost all hearing because of the ads on that site. Good god
Makes the “Sentry Signal System” on my aunt’s Chrysler Imperial LeBaron look positively quaint!
Remember first fedgov created crash regs that limited visibility. Then because kids weren’t being seen and run over mandated back up cameras. Just like the airbag unbelted male mandate. They cannot admit the error of their tunnel vision so they add more regs.
The best part is that “stripper” cars are becoming extinct, so the digital crap on top-of-the-line models usually finds its way to the bottom whether you want it or not. I’m an unabashed Geo Metro fan–best car I ever owned–but even my ’93 had doors that locked when the car rolled a certain distance. One night around 2 a.m. I stopped on a desolate road to check the tires, thinking I had a flat. The automatic locking mechanism, no doubt worn and dirty after a couple hundred thousand miles and a couple of decades, locked me out with the engine running. Later that week I had a mechanic disconnect the whole damned system.
Cassandras like me have been warning for years that this kind of digital tyranny was coming. First, the constant surveillance by everyone from Big Brother to Big Corporation. Now we have not just surround-monitoring but active interference in our lives and actions. Hear me now, believe me later: the same tactic used in cars will be applied to our home appliances, as in Eric’s example of the washing machine but even more so. And you know what? The public will just eat it up. Vox populi, vox dei.
I’m feeling claustrophobic already. I guess I’ll just sit here with folded hands.
Oops. New computer. I’m not logged in anywhere.
Has anyone noticed that Americans make up any narrative to fit their worldview?
If a bridge falls down, racists and sexists will say that the bridge fell down because Cuban girls designed it, Communists will say the bridge collapsed because of deregulation, and Libertarians will blame the government for funding it.
If an actor sucks, racists will say he is a Jew, but if the actor is talented, racists will say that he is white.
If Steve Jobs failed, racists will say he is an Arab, but if Steve Jobs was successful, racists will say that he is white.
If politicians want votes, they will say that they are black, Indians, or homosexuals.
If a girl is successful, sexists will say that she is a tranny, but if she is corrupt, sexists will say that she is a female.
Fascists will say Trump can drive up the national debt because Obama did.
Nazis love the police state because they think tyranny only affects blacks, illegal immigrants, Jews, homosexuals, and Muslims.
Socialists think smoking should be illegal because it is dangerous, but pot should be legal.
Communists think voters shouldn’t need an ID to vote, but Americans must have an ID to drive, drink, buy a gun, or check out a library book.
Nazis will say Ron Paul is a globalist because he supports immigration, but Libertarians say Ron Paul supports freedom because he favors secession.
Think.
https://forum.full30.com/c/general
You can extend the same argument to ANY large group or nationality of the human race. Almost everyone does it at least some of the time. You just did it with your comment.
Hi Free,
We’re all vulnerable to solipsism and narcissism – I admit I am. The key, I think, is to be aware of this take care on account of it.
I became a Libertarian because the principles of free association, the rejection of coercive collectivism and respect for the right of each individual to be left in peace so long as he himself is peaceful are universally applicable; a person of average intelligence is fully capable of grasping the moral logic of these notions.
And if these tenets could be presented to people, I am convinced a critical mass of them would “see the light” and agree with them. This is exactly why they are almost never spoken of in schools, to kids – or otherwise. Instead, people are kept distracted and their thoughts kept away from such clean, simple lines of moral reasoning.
So long as they are one or another species of coercive collectivist – whether it’s Republican or Democrat, liberal or conservative, Socialist or Communist – all is well… from the standpoint of those who enjoy power and wealth as a consequence of leading the coercive collective.
Eric,
I have tried for years and years to maintain that exact same libertarian mindset.
Put very simply:
Mind your own business.
Keep your hands to yourself.
That would assume that one would reject “collectivist labeling” and judge on individual merit, as all libertarian thought is based on the individual.
Sadly, two things have happened that have shaken that belief to it’s core.
One, is coming to the realization that, contrary to what I used to think, or what you stated, or what Ron Paul has said numerous times, freedom is NOT popular. Not only is it not popular, it is hated and fought against and actively crushed.
The other, is coming to the realization that, as much as I would like to judge and function as an individual, in an individualist society, the fact of the matter is, we do not live in such a society anymore.
Identity politics are the rule now, and, after watching the Bolshevik left for the last year or two pretty much coming out and openly calling for my (and my family’s) extermination, I’m left with no choice but to “choose sides”.
It’s been stated many times, by many of us, that we live in an “open air prison” here in good ol’ AmeriKa.
I believe this to be true.
And one of the first rules of survival in a prison environment is to “choose a side”.
I wish like hell it wasn’t that way, and I do everything I can to try and stop it from being that way, but I’m pissing in the wind for the most part, selling something people do not want: peace, freedom, liberty, property and prosperity.
Anti-Fed, we are indeed living in an open air prison. This will not change until the power system – the prison of false authority – is destroyed. And it will collapse, Justice demands it. The only question is how bloody it will be.
The important thing for us Liberty minded folks is to not support this horrid system but to survive its inevitable collapse. And you are correct – race will be a major factor.
Eric,
When I was a volunteer for the CLP, we ran an Operation Politically Homeless program in our booth at the Peoples Fair in Denver. Even we were surprised to find that the vast majority of those who took the World’s Smallest Political Quiz and had their score placed on the Diamond Chart poster placed in the upper half of the top quarter, which libertarian resides at the top of. I don’t think it is a deliberate matter of most people to disregard the libertarian position. It is probably more a matter that they self-identify with the philosophy, even when they don’t know it exists, than that they actively and consciously live by it. What we need to do is to publicize it enough to produce a durable meme instead of being driven into hiding by our lessors.
If an actor does anything, there’s a 75+% chance he’s a jew.
Which of the cited groups are you a member of?
“If a bridge falls down, racists and sexists will say that the bridge fell down because Cuban girls designed it,”
Well..as a defensive racist and realistic sexist, I say that the bridge fell because affirmative action. racial quotas, and anti-White, anti-male agendas shoved in our faces by big gov, big corp, and Jewish media enabled lesser or outright unqualified engineers and project managers to rise way above above their merited level. The diversity gals were hired over others, not because they were better, but precisely because they were gals and were non-White.
It is foolish and unfair to all parties affected to intentionally deny the reality of racial and sexual genetic differences. If we honestly desire to preserve distinct cultures which run downstream from distinct races – and I am one who does – then the last thing we should be doing is to jam radically different races and ethnicities into unnatural proximity where fundamental values, customs, and beliefs conflict and deeply seeded hostilities are aggravated. This is insane. Whites are denied their right of freedom of association.
Every race needs its own homeland. White people who want only to live and work among their own kind – just as all other ethno-racial groups prefer to do – are mocked, shamed, vilified, doxxed, attacked, economically and politically margnalized, and otherwise treated as scum in their own country. We are illogically called “supremacists” even though we want benign separation from, not rulership over other races. We are called xenophobes, even though we do not fear other races, but want the best for all races each pursuing its own unique destiny free to succeed or fail on its own efforts and ability to adapt. We are called misogynist, even though we are attracted to pretty, feminine, sweet-tempered women, rather than stridently competitive, go-girl, antagonistic harridans who would rather spend their prime fertile years as childless third-rate substitutes in careers for which men are innately better suited, rather than as first-rate wives and mothers.
My 2 bits.
Mack, those are good 2 bits!
Us White racial realists have no desire to rule over any POC. Blacks have a right to self rule and they should be given it. All we are asking for is the same right.
As for women, I am old enough to remember when women were worthy of being put on a pedestal. Women today?! Not even worth putting on a stripper pole.
I’m starting the build process for an F100, depending on what I can find, but most certainly pre-1971, with VIN number that requires no fedcoat emissions mandates or safety mandates.
Will probably be the last truck I own, until I die, or am forced off the road by regulatory mandates.
F-100 http://twonails.com/owncloud/index.php/s/47mndgJcnnaiO12
Restomod: I put a 1990 dodge 318 in this bad boy. Automatic tranny, AC, power steering – I’ll never buy a post 2000 car again. Same reason I won’t ever buy a Harley built after 1995 again.
Hello JOhnny DOH, I would like to learn the reasons you modified that truck this way, and what all was involved. I really like what you have done.
Had to rework the motor mounts a bit. Pulled EVERYTHING out of a 1990 dodge ramcharger, wiring harness, computer, dashboard, and put it all in the ford. Why not a 327 or 360 / 390? Because the Dodge was $300 lol.
The folks had a 1993 Olds Cutlass convertible that had an annoying lock the doors in gear too, so that one has been around quite a while. And it couldn’t be turned off either.
It did save me a lot of trouble exactly ONE time. When someone tried to carjack me, the doors were locked, keeping the guy out, most of the time when I drove other cars, the doors were rarely locked. Otherwise that locking “feature” is rather annoying, and is on almost all cars now.
“But if it saves one life…”
I think society has become way too empathetic. Instead of reporting news we have to get the tear-filled emotional reaction of every mother/wife/daughter of every so-called victim everywhere. The people who don’t appear on camera are forgotten. The people who show some restraint and stoicism end up on the cutting room floor. And if you don’t care that someone’s water-head kid died you’re a monster.
Yes a kid dying in a stupid accident backing out of the driveway is a tragedy. So is a kid dying of cancer. At what point do we blame God or fate or the cosmos? It used to be that accepting fate was part of being human. But now that God is dead we have to assign blame to ourselves. Guess what? Sometimes bad things happen. We can’t possibly fix everything. The alternative is death. No one is injured after they’re in the grave.
Also remember that if you were behind the wheel when the tragedy occurred (and therefore the cause), you have to live with that. Of course taking personal responsibility isn’t chic these days, because that means maybe you aren’t a good person. Or because having a dark spot in your past is stressful. At least you won’t do it again and maybe your tale will be a warning to the rest of us.
RK, I get sick of these so called “victims” bleating about their loss, as if I give a fuck. Your life is no more important than any other life. And I am not ready to give up my freedom to prevent that one in a billion death. We all are going to die anyway. What matters how we go? Kids wouldn’t die in driveways if the drivers had been more attentive to their surroundings. And those gotdamm cameras won’t pick up a kid coming from the opposite side of the car and who you can’t see because of the high door sills on the cars. And there’s more but you get the point. These bleaters are one more reason to throw a brick at the telly.
Hi Joe,
Amen.
Another example: These endless marches, ostensibly about “gun violence.” Actually about disarming and making de facto criminals out of people who haven’t committed violence against anyone on account of someone else who did.
And, of course, “speeding” and all the rest of it. Some other person (or even a hypothetical person) could not control their car at “x” speed and therefore everyone is presumed incapable of controlling their car at that speed – and subject to ticketing on that account.
Everyone has to stay after class because of Billy’s bad behavior.
But no one is allowed to serve up schoolyard justice to Billy.
It is interesting to think that even schoolkids understand that bypassing due process is wrong.
I think that society has become more pathetic than empathetic.
Bill, your optimism always brightens my day
JOhnny, I think you are misidentifying my realism as optimism, which I have never been very good at. But, thanks for the flowers.
Yeah, your remember the 1985 Nissan Maxima? It had a voice module that would speak, “you door is ajar” and “your seat belt is unfastened”, using a woman’s voice, no less! You could cut off the “nanny” with a button in the center console, a button which sat in a depression in the console where every spilled coke or coffee puddled and dried like tree sap, permanently sticking the button in the “on” position, no less. As for any and all Saab owners, this is precisely the same idiotic location of the ignition switch and lock cylinder. Even as late as 2005, one of which I just serviced last week, and I can’t begin to tell you the agony and complications that causes, and the fixes are not cheap!
The worst American car feature, and yes, this was in the mid 1980’s, was the power door shoulder belt. Now, in all fairness, some Nissans and Toyotas had this crap, too. But they were a strangulation hazard to anyone servicing the vehicles in the garages. Most all of them had a release buckle and latch, most often located at the door track connection point, and within easy reach of anyone ensnared by the damn thing. The Ford Escort had none, and the only means of reversing the mechanism was to shut the door, which could not do when it wrapped the belt around your neck and dragged your head forward into the door jamb! If the car was rolling in or out of the shop bay at the time, well, just try and imagine operating, or stopping a car with your head lassoed down at your left knee, especially with a stick shift! These features were Evil Incarnate, and didn’t fade out of use until the proliferation of the currently sinister SRS Claymore Mine in the steering wheel, and everywhere else now. I swear, one day I will create a “torture chamber” for automotive “safety” engineers, and use nothing but the evil contraptions in cars from 1980 to the present, it would likely fill the entirety of my 5-bay auto shop!
The automatic belts were the first passive restraint mandate. Fedgov gave automakers the choice between automatic seat belts or airbags. Then it became only airbags.
I sold my pristine 1984 Dodge D250 5 years ago. That thing cost me next to nothing to keep around.
I guess I blame myself for not paying enough attention to things. Based on what I know now, there is no way I would have let it go.
As a “just a mechanic” I don’t believe I ever met a “pristine D50”, not a running one leastways, lol!
Oh, check that, you said D250, my bad. Still I’m glad I don’t have any more customers with a D-50, they were a torture pit!
HEY, you ought to see and drive mine. Its got the Mitsubishi 2.3 TBD and five speed. Runs like a Swiss watch, everything works perfectly except for the stuid automatic glow plug controller, which seems to have a bad relay on the circuit board. My solution? One SPDT MomOn toggle switch, each hot out” leg wired to trigger one of the two glow plug relays I’ve driven diesels long enough I don’t need an automatic timer. Click the relay on, wait that long, crank, BOOM. Plenty of power, SUPER wide torque band, and sips fuel like a little old lady sipping her spot of tea. Body is clean, straight, all one colour, no rust, worst complaint is it came with no power steering, so it’s a bit of a bear to drive at slow speed. Best part? I’ve got $350 in it as is, including the brobe to the state to be allowed to drive it on the roads I’ve already paid for with my taxes, and two new, two good used tyres.
It wouldn’t have cost me much either since I wouldn’t have used it. I test drove one. It was loud and crass and the particular one I drove somebody had sent with a nut or some such inside the little tube frame that was the seat(much like a school bus seat). Every corner you had to listen to this god-awful noise of the offending thing roll all the way to the other side. Somebody had to do this purposely. I returned it(and nobody showed up to give you an idea of how they valued it)and left. My old Silverado was sounding better all the time.