Not good enough... we also traded in the minivan when the kids were a bit older, but our small SUVs only get around 23MPG... I'd traded in my 93 Civic that routinely got over 35MPG, now you don't even get that in a Civic or other small car without it being a hybrid or something... with very few exceptions. I may get a Mazda 3 or 6, though. They get upwards of 35.
I will say this, though, to actually contribute to the conversation about minivans... I had no problem driving one, and felt no stigma about it. All the people buying giant SUVs and justifying it because hey, once or twice a year they may buy a big box item and save on delivery! Or they need to carry a lot of passengers... Our Honda Odyssey carried 7 people a lot more comfortably than any SUV I've been in, and when you needed cargo space it was right up there with the big boys when you folded the rear seat down... even more than a lot of big SUVs; add decent towing capacity and overall better mileage, and the only reason for most people not to get one was the "stigma." Unless you're towing a yacht, or need to go off roading, a good (200hp+) minivan is a much more logical choice.
Have you seen the new spate of commercials? Where they're promoting customer satisfaction "guarantee?" I made the mistake last year of trying to save money by dropping satellite TV and going with Comcast, since I already got internet through them. It was a f#!king nightmare. I did have the forethought to set a cancel date for satellite far enough in the future (several weeks) to ensure some overlap... and was able to cancel the cancellation in time. For two missed appointments, hours on hold (unceremoniously being dropped after waiting 90 minutes at one point), and a multitude of unkept promises... for my "gaurantee" I got $20 credit.
I bend over and keep getting comcast for internet because there's no viable alternative where I am... nothing fast enough to allow me to work from home, but I won't give them the chance again for anything else, and I'm biding my time for when I can dump them entirely.
A license can clearly be written such that the law interprets it as the right to view content on a particular medium/format for as long as that is practical.
It can be, but often isn't, and wasn't if we go back in history looking at VHS and DVDs (when they first came out). And I don't hand over the money anymore... I actually buy very little content anymore because of it.
This isn't something important like Health Care or Jobs.
I agree... I wasn't justifying anything illegal. That people violate IP laws because they don't want to pay for their entertainment actually really irks me, and I complain about it all the time. At the same time, it also pisses me off that the honest consumers are the ones that get the most limited flexibility, that get saddled with DRM, and also the "privilege" of paying for it - after all, they are passing the costs of the technology - including licensing the DRM technology - onto us.
Right... I'm actually against IP infringement of any kind - it's all just entertainment, nobody "owes" you a damn thing, while at the same time I have no patience for the exaggerated claims of the industry, or the fact that only the honest paying customers (like me) are the ones saddled with DRM (and I do circumvent it in some cases, so that I can watch what I've legally purchased on my tablet)
However, the problem you describe is that there's a group of people with X amount of entertainment dollars, they spend it on one thing... then think they're entitled to the other things, also. I have a serious problem with people that think that mentality is somehow justified. None of us are entitled to games or songs or movies for free. If you do don't want to pay what's being asked, don't watch.
"Ninety percent of baseball is half mental." -- Yogi Berra