Do you understand what holding pattern is? If 370 had tried to get back to it's own airport, then that's where it would've crashed. It wouldn't have flown all the way to the Indian Ocean.
And do you understand that the pilots might have lost conciousness while trying to get to the nearest airport? If they did not manage to get the last sets of co-ordinates input into the computer?
If it had caught on fire near Malaysia, it wouldn't have stayed in the air until it reached the Indian Ocean.
Fire needs oxygen, and can be put out.. but the damage remains. Unconscious crew and passengers, damaged plane.... you do the math.
We know there were pings coming off the plane from an automated satellite system. Probably wouldn't have happened if there had been an electronic failure.
It does not have to be a full electronic failure, after all it looks like the auto-pilot kept the plane on the last heading. And the system that pings does not have to be connected to the overall electronic system. There are many technical possibilities that we have no information about at this time.
First off, the transponder on a Boeing is a button, it's a switch that you can move to different positions if you want to change it. Second, these aren't blind idiots we're talking about. These are trained pilots who wouldn't have just blindly smashed every button, switch, and dial in hopes of something fixing whatever problem they were having.
First off, when there is decompression there is massive disorientation even for trained pilots. There is loud noises, alarms and mist/fog generation in the cabin/cockpit (according to all the pilots and experts I have seen).
On top of that they have 30 seconds to get everything right or else they loose conciousness.
So no it is not as simple as you think it is. Plus as I stated, the transponder could have been damaged also... there are so many possibilities. All we know is that it was "shut off" or stopped functioning at a specific time. Why or how this happened we are in the dark about, but it is far more logical that it is a technical problem than some terrorist/suicide pact thing that has been floated by most of the Newscorp media the last 3 weeks.
Dont be so naive. Boeing is a major American industry and has a piss-poor few years when it comes to safety and faulty equipment. It amazes me that there was more talk about terror and UFO's than mechanical failure... and even now they refuse to dwell too much on the possibility and are still pushing the suicide or terrorist angel, despite it being far more logical that something went wrong on the plane... mechanically/electronically. The so called anonymous sources coming out of the US have been pushing the terror angle from day one and are still doing so, despite the facts pointing to a massive mechanical/electronical failure happening on the plane.
Face it, if this is another technical fault on a Boeing plane, then it can seriously hurt the Boeing stock and brand considering the crap that has been happening to them over the last 2 years with the new planes, fires in batteries and so on.