There was a time, Marlon, when I would
have agreed with you. Except that I've been paying
attention for a quite a few years... "compromise" is what
got us to this. Not galloping, leaps and bounds, unhindered
statism, but the exact compromise you are talking about - it
ALWAYS goes in one direction. The only "compromise" has
been how far and how much. It's the ratchet effect.
Sometimes not moving, but NEVER going in the right
direction. It has found its way into every detail of every
thing. So, no, no more compromising. I'm done. It's now
REVERSE. Not compromise on "not as much more" but, NO MORE,
and NOW LESS. And if you're (WISPA) not actively acting to
accomplish that, then it's actively hindering that action.
It's on the wrong side. It's like travelling a road.
You're going to go one way... Or the other. There isn't a
compromise, if you're not going north, you're going south,
if you're not going east, you're going west, and there is no
such thing as standing still without being pointed in some
direction.
You say that you alone can't do
anything. That I can't. I agree. But it has to
start...somewhere. If Uncle Sam came running, handing me
"free money" I would not take it - and I, personally, have
never been personally in as precarious financially as I am
now, with no assurance I'll even have a home from one week
to the next. It's called "principle", Marlon. I have no
right to what other people have worked for, or will work for
in the next 50 years ( paying interest on our ocean of
debt), and I will not take it. In fact, it has to start
with EVERY ONE OF US, not just how we vote, but how we act,
how we talk to our neighbors, how we make our decisions, and
what ideas we promote. I can't say "I'm for this" and then
not live it.
It's pure hypocrisy to say "you gotta live with the
system". No, you don't. You have the freedom to still say
"no". You have the freedom to NOT take CRP or RUS loans,
or look for ways to get USF funding, for instance. But, if
you're willing to sell the use of your land for the pittance
they give you, then you have no claim to saying you're 'with
me', because you're not - you're completely willing to agree
with, and take money from a program that robs one set of
citizens to give money to another, plain and simple. And
look how widespread acceptance is among people who would
otherwise claim to be small government conservatives. I'm
grateful you're now telling them to end USF and other stuff,
but you know it's not going away until the Congress makes it
go away.
But Congress (and whoever is
president) isn't going to make it go away until a very large
majority of us, the people, demand it. And no such demands
are going to happen until we (you, me, and every single
other person) have made the case for free markets, economic
freedom, freedom to be in business, freedom of innovation,
and freedom from political burdens with no redeeming value
whatsoever. But we're not there. You're as helpful to the
cause as the current president, because you're (and maybe
not you, personally, Marlon, this has NEVER been about you
in a personal way... My conversations referenced before...
were not with you. I've have conversations you don't know
about) still willing to take money in opposition to what you
claim to think. Until we're not, Marlon, then we're not
really believing what we're saying ,and of course, if we're
not, we're never going to convince the country it has to
change, or face a crisis beyond those of recorded history.
Is WISPA making the case, not to just DC, but to the members
as well, industry wide, that free markets solve problems?
Does the organization actively promote unfettered
competition, by its members? Does it make the case that "no
subsidies" is, in fact, the only truly viable business and
national strategy? If not, then WISPA is still in
diametric opposition to me. Does WISPA leadership
routinely offer workshops on how individual WISP's can find
opportunity to be those free market powerhouses? And why
and how you should stand on your own and why you should not
get tangled up in trying to get a few dollars in exchange
for a lack of autonomy?
Going back to CRP, the people who
signed up didn't see it in the terms I've posted. Because
we're conditioned to not think about it. Because so many of
us just see the dollars and don't apply forgotten principles
that matter. Look how many millions of people went and
borrowed money on a loan guaranteed by our federal
government - many of which I'm sure, still claim to be for
freedom, for limited government, and so on. Look how it
has corrupted us as a people, that we'll now give up almost
anything we believe in for a few dollars or other material
or monetary benefit. Nothing will change, until we're
ready to live by what we think, and start doing so, and that
includes our businesses, our financial lives, and every vote
we make, and really, truly, stop compromising.
You talk about joining and getting elected to leadership.
One thing about leadership, is that if those you're leading
don't want to go where you're going, you're not leading,
you're just exploring space on your own. I stated as
clearly as I could, that the issue here, is that the
membership is NOT in agreement with me, save for probably a
few. And to what end, other than acrimony, would trying to
be a strident voice for certain principled things?
I said in my previous post, that this isn't nearly as
political as some want it to be made out to be. It's more
about the realities of business, economics, and management
of our own enterprises. We as a nation are incredibly
ignorant about how to be the businessmen we want to be (and
I put myself in that statement) , and if we learned what we
should, whatever political aspects of our lives are
impacted, would take care of themselves. I, too, live in a
very rural area, and watch the people decry the price
supports, controls, subsidies, and then engage in them,
because they believe they cannot compete or succeed without
them.
I read two stories recently, one was of a sizeable
business (assets in the billions) that was slowly going
bankrupt, which was offered a loan by the federal
government. But the CEO turned it down, and instead,
announced impending bankruptcy. He chose to own it as
failure, rather than throw good money after bad. That's
integrity. Another was in the process of borrowing money
from the DOE, cash that would be immensely helpful to his
company. He cancelled it and announced they'll just
struggle through on their own. We CAN live without being
bribed, we can say "no". And it's going to take millions
of us saying "no", but we can do it and we can turn our
industries.. .and country... around it. And it's all about
individuals, decisions, and principled choices - not about
politics, but about rational choices about the present and
future.
Maybe I am asking to too much. What little optimism I
have left says... I am not. But my time and energy probably
best employed elsewhere.
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Sent: Wednesday, May 02, 2012 12:07 PM
Subject: Re: [WISPA] It's been a ride... Some
up, some down.
Since you are talking about me
Mark I'll chime in here a bit too.
As I've said before. You and I
mostly agree. Government is, with precious few
exceptions, the enemy of the people. Government and far to
many that work in it are just plain evil. Or maybe arrogant
but in the end that causes them to do evil things to the
regular folk of the country.
WISPA is an association of or
membership. The members are encouraged to run for
leadership positions every year (half the board is up for
election every year). There is no restriction on who can
run for the board other than they have to be a member in
good standing. There are a few other things that we ask of
our candidates but they don't generally apply to the people
here (no one I know of is sitting in jail right now :-).
WISPA was formed to help
protect our industry. Mostly from the government. That's
why we are so focused and spend most of our money on FCC and
legislative issues. We've actually been pretty successful
here. We've had good success on favorable rules changes,
gotten additional spectrum and we've stopped quite a few bad
ideas from coming to fruition.
I remember getting into it with
you on the idea of reporting on the 477. You called me a
traitor. Perhaps that fits but I think of myself as more of
a realist. The 477 is there. We can't make it go away. In
fact, much to my chagrin, it's work with the stupid
broadband map.
Tell you what though. They ARE
there. They DO exist. And your competition is going to be
government funded, or not, based at least in part on what
the map shows. If you refuse to place yourself on the map,
that's your choice. A foolish choice that's bad for you AND
the rest of the industry, but your choice to make none the
less.
I live in farm country.
Everyone out here gets government money for something. Crop
failures, CRP programs, price supports etc. It sucks.
Government money is poison. But so is NO money. It's like
salt in many ways. Too much will kill you just as dead as
too little. Here's a current example. We have bought out
some of the CRP my family has. We run off road motorbike
races on the ground. Now it's up for renewal. But the Fish
and Wildlife department is refusing to allow the renewal
because we need a buffer zone around the track. One that's
probably bigger than the 49 acres of crp will support.
Dad's still looking into it. Dad's PISSED off though. He
didn't enter into any contracts with Fish and Game, why are
they involved with this issue at all???? It's ALL private
property. But, since it's rented to the government we have
to live by it's rules.
The bike races bring 10s of
thousands or dollars into our local economy. Probably
closer to 100k. But that doesn't matter to the dickheads at
Fish and Game. They are more worried about the fish that
don't exist in the middle of a field and the game birds that
might be harmed in some way. I guess birds and deer can't
hear a dirt bike coming soon enough to get out of the way.
Wanna know the funniest part of
all this? Dad plants habitat and birds because he loves
that kind of stuff. That doesn't matter to Fish and Game
though. They still want the races stopped. Or he has to
give up over $2500 per year in revenue from the CRP payments
on that ground. More than he'd make farming it (that's the
reason for CRP in the first place).
So a guy is stuck. The
government controls (in one way or another) the prices
farmers can charge for their crops, chemical use etc. and
therefore the revenue that a farmer can generate. They then
offer a program that will pay the farmer more money for the
use of his poor ground and set the rules for it's use
(basically nothing). Then they change the rules as time
goes on, making them more and more restrictive. Eventually
out here people tend to eventually give up and sell the
ground to the government. MOST of the water ways are now
owned by the state.
I could go on, but everyone
here has a similar story to tell. Look at the recent thread
about the idiotic OSHA rules. Who's going to let anyone put
a fall restraint system on their home? If you have a habit
of falling off roofs, go get a desk job!
In the end though. You and I,
alone, can't fix any of this. We can't control anything.
We have to band together into groups. And those groups have
to compromise. Those groups also have to deal with reality
as it exists while they try to enact their ultimate goals.
WISPA did tell the FCC to
eliminate USF, CAF or any other subsidies. We told them to
just let the market deal with the issues. We knew ahead of
time that they'd reject that stance though. So we also
suggested alternative plans and mechanisms that would do the
least harm to our industry, communities and country.
Your problem Mark is that you
don't understand the compromise part. It's funny though, we
all do it every day. We walk on different sides of the
hall. We use different urinals. We turn our music down in
at night. Life is always a compromise. Many of them well
and truly suck. But they are what they are. A person can
sit there and refuse to move when he's in the crosswalk.
It's his right to be there. But when that truck and trailer
blows through the intersection at 60mph you'll still be dead
as a doornail. Sometimes it's a good idea to have a plan B.
Yeah, sometimes plan B is
getting shot in the foot. But that's better than plan A
(getting shot in the head). When the bag guy tells you he's
going to shoot you no matter what telling him to pound sand
isn't going to be very effective. At least if you get shot
in the foot eventually you can try to go after the SOB!!!!
I hope that someday you'll
understand what reality is Mark. There's the perfect world
then there's the one we're stuck with. I wish you'd climb
off of your high horse and volunteer to go to DC and meet
the people back there. They aren't all bad, but often their
hands are tied too. Whining to us, or worse sticking your
head firmly in the sand, is no substitute for working to
make it better. Join the committees, run for the board
etc. Talk is talk, but it takes action to fix things.
Laters,
marlon
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