yes, it’s not technically a visa and there’s a visa waiver program that’s still in place - but the EU wants to know who US passport holders are before they show up

I mean, sure, but don’t most buyers have an idea of a few makes/models they want before trying to find a vehicle? A Toyota Avalon and a Ford Fiesta both have five seats, but that’s different than them “seating five.”

Totally concur. Navy Pier was intentionally (re-)designed as a tourist trap, and that’s all it is. It’s not that there’s nothing there that’s worthwhile (the Chicago Shakespeare Theatre is great, but, c’mon, you accidentally walk in to The Tempest from the Bubba Gump Shrimp Co.), just that, as a destination with no…

That’s probably true most of the time, but I can see there being say, a game or a movie where there’s important content that goes right where the hole is - in that case, you’d want to “shrink” the screen past the hole punch so you can use it.

Point taken, but the downside is you have less space for things where the bezel used to be. Apple had to remove the home button, Samsung had to take out the iris scanner (not a huge loss to me) and the notification LED (seriously, there’s a cult of people on Android forums who are assembling pitchforks and torches…

There’s a really perverse logic to this. Conversations like this - “locker room talk,” just to banalize what’s actually going on - are structured this way to remove culpability from those involved:

I totally agree with you, and from the time that Trump’s candidacy started gaining steam, I kept having flashbacks to the things I’d heard about Erdogan from people in Istanbul, in particular, the secular ones associated with universities that I spent the most time with.

Yeah, I think that’s actually pretty likely, even if not “officially” sanctioned from Ankara, given that there’s some pretty long-standing ties between various parts of the US government and the Turkish government. Even though post-coup attempt Erdogan has removed a lot of the old guard, it isn’t feasible to do so…

That’s certainly true to a degree, but I think Erdogan is certainly playing to the crowds somewhat with some of these things.

Well, in some areas, there’s actually fairly good logic behind that thinking - the process behind bank repossession of homes is neither fast nor cheap, and it’s an even longer time before the bank can get its money back, which gives borrowers some leeway to get caught up if it’s a short-term issue.

There’s a few sides to this argument. First, yes, many people have a false sense of economic entitlement - they think being willing to “show up and work” should get entitle you to a middle-class lifestyle, even if you didn’t do anything (develop skills/education) beforehand, and that’s nuts.

This shoots down my theory, which was that the Turkey purchase was a kind of reverse Trojan horse: Turkey huffs and puffs a lot about NATO in public, some of which is real, some of which is for show, buys the S-400, which then lets engineers from NATO countries examine the whole system top to bottom. The S-400 stays…

No, but it shows that the plane is highly maneuverable, which is useful. It’s sort of like videos of cars stopping from 120mph or a pickup hauling the Space Shuttle - likely not something that will ever happen in real life, but its got the chops to handle more mundane work.

True! Though the total level of that families own probably puts us in a historically weak position to handle even small economic shocks- if say, there’s a minor downturn, one of the 1st things that happens is some hourly employees get a few less hours. If you’re barely making ends meet to pay off debt (mortgage or…

That’s a fair enough assessment, but it’s very different than unsecured debt - like credit card debt, where the ultimate recovery is typically 20 cents or less.

THIS. A lot of people really don’t know that they’ll put the best loan you qualify for in front of you. Dealers can also often dangle manufacturer incentives in front of you (“CASH BACK!” or whatever), and then choose a rate so that you save a tinnyyyyy bit of money compared to the rate that your bank or credit union…

While I get your point, car loans are kind of the opposite of “unsecured.” You’re talking about a piece of property that, unlike a house, is literally on wheels and left in plain view much of the time.  Sure, there’s repo procedures to follow, but it’s not like you’re asking for a personal loan secured by nothing more…

Do people really need new cars that often? Outside of performance cars and some other niche cases, most new cars are WAY more reliable than they were a generation ago. There’s really no reason - other than showing off - that you really need a new car every 3-5 years unless your life situation changes (the 3 door hot…

Not sure what options, etc., he had, but just checking TrueCar around here (Chicago metro) that’s about right by the time you factor in taxes, etc.

There’s a lot not to like about Dodge, but I’ve been in a fair number of Dodge Journeys as Ubers/Lyfts, and while they’re certainly not nice cars, they’re actually pretty amazing considering what people end up paying. On a longer ride, I talked to the driver about it - he said he paid almost $20k on the nose, which is…