Hundreds of Frustrated Buyers Grill Amazon Exec., Jeff Bezos, Over Inferior Products from China.

to me Amazon is the online equivalent of shopping at Walmart. (beating up vendors to keep prices low)

we hate it, we do it, we hate to admit we do it. i always read the Amazon reviews, the worst ones first and perhaps this goes a long ways to explain why some things just don't work and why customer service won't talk to you. the product is a cheap knockoff, which brings up the advantage of going to a retail outlet, you can always return the article, despite the warnings in the manufacturers boilerplate. DO NOT RETURN THIS TO THE STORE, yeah right. box stores cannot afford that kind of PR, and if you paid on your CC you dispute the charge.

some big boxes like Home Depot do free shipping also, so Amazon is not the only online shipper offering deals. 

i have tried Amazon Prime twice, once inadvertently through deceptive checkout screen prompts they nailed me, i quickly cancelled and they refunded the charge immediately. the hook for Prime is their entertainment channel, which is a gateway to more pay for view services. streaming media entertainment has become a house of babble, Prime will get you to more and better content, but you better have your wallet with you. 

Primes 2-Day shipping is a ruse, since most of the standard shipping dates are inflated.  If they say ten days, that usually means three. in a world of instant gratification geared toward the consumers lizard brain this appeal works.

USPS does it all the time. Learn to say PARCEL, thank you. Which brings up Amazon's cozy deal with USPS, and why your postal carrier drives up your street three times a day and never has any mail for you, or the wrong mail.  But surprise, the guys and gals in blue and gray work Sundays too, delivering PRIME. Bezos is beginning to question that agreement, which might take some luster off of Prime shipping. I question it from the government side, the PO should stick to its knitting and you might all consider mailing your REP to complain.

Now . . . about drop shipping from China: it has been the dream all along.  China is a police state.  No terror weapons are likely to be in the package flying directly from Shanghai to Des Moines. 

I just bought a shower curtain drop shipped from China although drop shipping is not an option, yet. Bad enough you aren't sure what that white powder is, you get a box full of Chinese smog to breath. 

Save a $100.  Shop around. And for entertainment, get yourself an antenna.  

The FCC mandates that there be available programming in HD.  And here.  I have a SmartTV, and the antenna with live news. No cable bill, but I am mostly on the antenna, because when I watch TV I want to relax.