Let's make quality the norm again

Yes I know the Democrats take tons of corporate money and outspend any outsider. So do Republicans (including Trump). Thats the fundamental problem. My efforts to push back against this seemed to have gone over your head. Reread my paragraph about progressives.

Regardless of what the fundamental issues are, its pointless to discuss with you.

You have nothing but a default dismissal of anything that does not conform to your imprinted beliefs. In your original message and followups you have not even given any possible reasoning as to why you believe just as all the other people that think exactly like you do.

I guess this is something I should be thankful to Elon for: He exposed how surface level the thinking is on the right when he opened Twitter up to the masses, how easy they are to grift off of. Once can argue its even become pop culture at this point: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/xoim0K4WPMI

I'm still grappling with how to respond to people that are so solidified in their propagandized thinking. Like I mentioned in my post, its likely best to just let you experience the maximum amount of pain from your dumb decisions.

>Why do you discount their experience with universal healthcare? Have you ever experienced it?

YES! Actually I attribute my blessed fortune of being wealthy enough to quit a bad job early on in my tech career and take almost an entire year traveling the world. I lived in Europe in various countries and learned hands on how different people think and how different fundamental level things are including healthcare.

Coming back to the US you realize how people are stuck in this collective trauma of the current system. I mentioned in my post that 50% of the country does not have a passport. For some perspective, the US is only 5% of the world population. There are so many ways of thinking out there that people just have never had exposure to. I'd argue its a life half lived.

What they're describing is that TVs had consumable items in the circuitry. It isn't possible to have had a TV without tubes. Tubes were basically really fancy lightbulbs and had a finite life. No amount of quality could make consumables not necessary. TVs needed maintenance and manual back then. They sucked. It's like saying that buying a higher quality car means you don't need to buy tires.

The broader point is that we think that things lasted longer back then because of survivorship bias, but on the whole they really didn't. The incredible old fridge in grandpas garage is incredible because it was an exception. 100k miles used to be a car that was ready for the wrecker. You used to have to get tune-ups several times per year where points, timing, carburetors, spark plugs, and other things needed replacing or adjusting. That's why every gas station had a mechanic. Now, half those things have been replaced by more reliable longer lasting mechanisms that adjust themselves, and the stuff that still exists like spark plugs last for years instead of months.

The highest quality stuff from back then doesn't really stack up to many modern things, especially if you pay the same inflation adjusted price.

From your list:

clothes: higher quality, several times more expensive (inflation adjusted. Levis 501 were $90 adjusted in 1975, Amazon has them for $45)

furniture: cheap shit and expensive stuff was available, just like now

power tools: almost universally, I would trade old corded, brushed tools for new cordless brushless. Old machine tools are the exception where old is as good as new.

phones: you didn't have a choice, the phone company gave you whatever they had in stock and charged you a monthly fee for the privilege.

spices: less variety and freshness. Good luck getting spices that weren't part of your local cuisine.

perfume: no idea

refrigerators: incredibly inefficient, harmful chemicals, and today you can still buy a VERY nice fridge if you are willing to pay what a shitty fridge from 1975 would have cost ($2,200 inflation adjusted for the cheapest one from sears).

light fixtures: same as furniture, you get what you pay for then and now

record players: see furniture

guitars: see furniture

lawn mower: see furniture

The enshitiffication of known brands is a real problem today, but that doesn't mean that everything was perfect and known back then.

>They both moved to America to get away from socialism.

Yes and they brought their trauma to the US so when the fundamental system desperately needs reform due to underlying conditions changing their trauma serves as a liability to the continued improvement of the country. Instead they buckle down and demand no changes as conditions continue to deteriorate. Fortunately a lot of the second generation did not internalize that trauma and have different plans. I only lament that its going to take a long time for these liabilities to die off and finally free the country to make fundamental changes to move forward. The people who care enough about this country not to just leave and not waste their one life trying to fix this mess are all trapped until then.

>As for loyalty, I am a true blue American and vote in the country's best interests.

I don't know what "true blue American" means. Is that another dumb slogan pushed by one of the major propaganda outlets? If you are referring to being a Democrat, then what kind of Democrat are you? Regardless it does not matter as its not the point. The right had at least one amazing honest candidate this year who eschewed corporate corruption and tried to stick his neck out to do the right things for the country only to be rewarded by his voters voting for a last minute plant just because Trump told them to vote for the outsider. That was definite proof that the right is just gone. The party as it stands has no long term future. Its just how much pain are we all going to collectively endure until it finally does.

Forget about voting, you should start by looking at all the issues in a more objective lens and try to understand underlying causes. Then understand how many of these problems occurred elsewhere and how others successfully solved the problems. Are other places perfect? No, but fundamental lessons are always better to be learned rather than mistakes repeated.

People are buying EVERYTHING indiscriminately, accelerating enshittification. Just make anything, advertise with influencers, meta ads, etc and sell stuff is the mantra. If people learn to value their money, only pay for the best and let the bad products die, things will change.

Depends- i care about the quality of power tool I buy. There’s plenty of competition, but most of it I won’t touch because it’s some “Zissbou” brand off of Amazon.

The competition on the high end is great! Makita, Milwaukee, and others battling it out. Better materials, batteries, designs. But I’ll only pay for actual performance, so there’s no where for bad actors to hide.