If you find a law that's been on the books for a long time "bizarre" show some restraint. There is likely a very good set of reasons for its existence. Go and research those and see if you agree with them or not. But these "I'm totally bewildered how could this possibly be?!" comments add very little.
If instead of brushing it off you could explain what those reasons are, it could be more helpful. Thus my question. If you don't know them and assume they exist - I'm not convinced. There are bad laws which are pushed in by various lobbies (like DMCA). The fact that they can exist long is not a proof of the sanity of such laws.
I listened to the podcast. So it boils down to the fact that in the past manufacturers had really rough relations with dealers, and the later passed tons of protection laws which gave them essentially a solid monopoly. And most of those reasons have no meaning today.
Though I didn't get the part that fighting that now is futile (there were not enough details in the story). If enough people will be against these laws - they'll be cancelled, no matter how much power these dealers wield.
You can find all the people you want to oppose these kinds of laws but, as they say, money talks.
In a lot of political districts, the local auto dealer contributes more in taxes to the state/district/municipality than any group of citizens does. When these dealers call their congressman, the call gets answered.
So, it's a legal monopoly which results in poor customer service and overpriced products? Some really weird legal / economical quirk. Fighting unhealthy monopoly can be successful, even if they have tons of money.
