RadioBanter - View Single Post - You'll probably never have to use CW to save a life.

Dave Heil · September 5th 06, 01:10 AM posted to rec.radio.amateur.policy

wrote:
From: on Sun, Sep 3 2006 1:49 pm

[Mother Superior strides out of the cloister, knuckle-spank
ruler carried like a baton, the Book of Common Maxims
under her arm...]

What are you smokin', Pops?

wrote:

From: an old friend on Sun, Sep 3 2006 10:09 am

the CW has seen the light that being they betrayed the ARS by listening
to the ARRL what 50 years ago

I don't think the ARRL "betrayed the ARS". I believe that they
sincerely thought that morsemanship was THEN a topmost skill
of US radio amtaeurs.

The FCC thought so too - well into the 1970s.

Pure and simple bull****, Mother. Prior to the
1990s the FCC was pressured constantly by just one
amateur organization - the ARRL.

Show us. Prove it. Provide facts.

Since amateur radio
has NOT been a priority item on the FCC's tasks, the
FCC just let the ARRL have what the ARRL wanted.

Show us. Prove it. Provide facts.

After all, the ARRL claimed it "spoke for the
amateur" even though their membership was a minority
of never more than a quarter of all licensees.

Show us one U.S. amateur radio organization with even 20% of the ARRL's
membership.

Fifty years ago would be 1956 and not
long after the passing of ARRL co-founder (and president-for-
life) Hiram Percy Maxim.

Maxim died in 1936. 1956 was twenty years later.

Twenty years is a "long time" to you? Poor baby.

Twenty years is a long time to anyone, Len. Are you wearing the same
socks you wore twenty years ago?

Is this more Ruler-Spank, Mother?

Well, you certainly were spanked.

"T.O.M." used his editorial pages
to promote morsemanship in the 1920s and 1930s.

He also promoted many other things on those pages, such as technical
progress, operating skills, public service, and the observance of
government regulations.

Was he a Saint to you, Mother Superior?

Your lack of comment to Jim's response is noted. Jim's statement was is
correct. Yours was manipulated.

The original core group of the ARRL were go-getters and smart
enough to realize that, to make enough money as an organization
that came out on top, PUBLICATIONS were the key to survival.

Publications were one way to support the organization.

The ONLY way to support so many services that non-
members could do themselves.

Why does it bother you that members see a perceived benefit and that
they avail themselves of it? Why would it bother you that the ARRL
produces publications and sells them?

Three years ago the reported
profit of the ARRL to the IRS was 12 MILLION dollars. That
kind of cash inflow does NOT come solely from membership.

In this day and age, 12 million dollars isn't a great sum for an
organization the size of the ARRL. How much money does come from
membership, Len? Would it be fair to say that membership dues make up
40% of the total? The League charges for things like DXCC applications,
subsequent QSL card submissions, credits from LOTW and the like. These
services are used by non-members as well as members. Do you believe the
League should provide free services to non-members? What's your beef?
You aren't a member and aren't likely to be a member of the ARRL.

ARRL was first a very small group of local New Englanders,
formed 5 years after the first (and still surviving) national
organization, the Radio Club of America.

But it didn't stay that way for long. By the time of the 1917 shutdown
- just three years after ARRL was founded - it was a national
organization.

You are in error, Mother, but further argument on that is
useless. The League is your shepherd, you shall not want.

Tell us where the error is, Len. What erroneous statement was made by Jim?

There were lots of
"national club" competitors in the 1920s but those eventually
dropped out.

Name some.

Go read Thomas H. White's online Radio History from the
beginning to about 1927. White is a much better historian
than yourself.

You made the claim. I'd have guessed that you wouldn't have minded
backing it up. Perhaps you're feeling less confident about your statement.

RCA still exists but is not much concerned with
amateur radio.

It is a very small organization whose main activities seem to be
honorary and historical.

In other words, you aren't a member!

BWAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The ARRL--you aren't a member!!!!!!!!!!
Amateur Radio--you aren't a participant!!!!!!!!

BWAAAAAHAHAHAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!

Prior to the Internet going public in 1991, the only major
presence for US amateur radio in DC was the legal firm on
retainer from the ARRL.

There was nothing to stop others from doing the same thing. Nor from
contacting FCC directly.

Do YOU have a legal firm on retainer, Mother? Or do you
have a dental retainer, hoping to "take a bite" out of
your perceived anti-morse "crime?"

It's alright if you couldn't think of anything with which to respond to
Jim, Leonard.

ARRL kept promoting themselves as
"representative" allegedly for the amateur to the FCC but
suspiciously more like a "filter" of amateurs' opinions.

Why are you suspicious, Len?

ARRL is NOT a government body.

Who said it was a government body and why would it be a government body?

They are a private
organization accountable to no one but themselves,

"It", Len. It is a private organization, accountable only to its members.

yet they ACT like they are some exhaulted "representative"
of ALL radio amateurs.

"It", Len. "Exalted", Len.

[ARRL membership hasn't gotten
more than a quarter of all amateur radio licensees in
a long time...if ever]

And?

ARRL represents ONLY the membership and that mambership
is a MINORITY of all amateur radio licensees in the USA.

That MINORITY is made up of about 130,000 radio amateurs.

Anyone could petition the FCC directly,
and many did, long before the Internet and ECFS.

"Anyone" could but extremely few did. Spend some
time in the Reading Room in DC and come back with
your results.

Are you giving orders again, Len?

Back in the 1960s, when the changes known as "incentive licensing" were
being debated, FCC received over 6000 comments from individuals and
groups. There were at least 10 proposals besides the ARRL's. Those
other proposals were taken seriously enough by FCC to get RM numbers.

Did you actually count all those yourself? :-)

He provided you figures, Len. Those figures make your earlier statement
an incorrect one.

Tsk, that was before your time, Mother, before you
were Sister Nun of the Above. You are just
paraphrasing another on that. Don't get your habit
in a bind "reporting things" you weren't a part of.

Remember your statement when it comes time to defend your claims about
the ARRL and H. P. Maxim.

In ARRL's petition to FCC, they proposed eliminating the Morse Code
test for General but retaining it for Extra.

Mother, the ARRL's "Petition" (a rather rambling document)
is public view. Do NOT tell me what it "was about."

Rather than read it online, why not follow your own advice and visit the
reading room in Washington, Len?

Anyone can read it and judge for themselves. You are
NOT needed as some "interpreter."

Remember your statement when making your claims about the ARRL, Len.

The majority of individuals commenting on the NPRM wanted the test
eliminated for General.

The majority of individuals commenting on the NPRM wanted the test
retained for Extra.

You read each and every one of them, Mother? I don't think
so. For your sins say 5000 Hail Hirams.

The two majorities are not composed of all the same individuals, but
they *are* majorities.

ARRL is a MINORITY "representative." Face the cold, hard fact.

You didn't address Jim's statement, Len. Couldn't you counter it?

That was VERY important to the controlling
coterie of the League, folks who wanted to be "better" than
others...in a hobby activity.

Nope. That's not what it was about at all, Len.

Bull****. It is CLEAR to anyone NOT a Believer
in the sanctity and nobility of the ARRL.

You don't have to believe anything about the ARRL, Len. You aren't a
member and you aren't a radio amateur. Be satisfied to be as you are.

Do try to get your history straight.

It is MUCH "straighter" than yours, Mother. I have MORE of
history of ALL radio than you after you've been spoon-fed
information dribbled out to you by the League.

Prove it. Your previous statement would lead one to believe that there
are large gaps in your knowledge base.

The fact is that the "incentive licensing" changes were an attempt to
*return* to a system something like that which existed before February
1953. The complexity of the final result was due in large part to it
being pieced together from the numerous non-ARRL proposals mentioned
earlier.

If that is true (and it is not) then there were FIVE classes
of amateur radio licenses prior to "incentive licensing." :-)

Can you say "Novice", "Technician", "Conditional", "General", "Amateur
Extra"? Do you know that there were holdovers from another class of
license in addition? Doesn't Thomas White's history have any of this info?

Are you taking stage magician lessons? You've FAILED.

Wipe the egg off your mug, Leonard.

btw, the 1951 restructuring that gave us the license classes with names
rather than letters was not primarily driven by ARRL.

Sweetums, do NOT go into your smokescreening by diversion
routine again. That's SO transparent.

He gave you facts again, Len. They whizzed right by you.

What "incentive licensing" DID create was just the opposite of
"good fellowship" among amateurs, that of CLASS DISTINCTION
and a "pecking order" based largely on morsemanship.

How so?

What part of my paragraph is unclear to you? Do you need
it translated to Latin? What?

He asked legit questions, Len. You provided no answer.

How many other radio services used Morse Code in 1966, Len?

You tell us. That's not part of the thread but one of
your attempts at diversion into another subject. Tsk.

Was there a shortage of trained radiotelegraphers during the Vietnam
War?

Oh, oh, Mother Superior strips off her habit to
reveal - ta-da! - JIMMY NOSERVE, expert on military
anything because he READ about it yet never served his
country in the military!

This "Mother Superior", "Nun of the Above", "Jimmy Noserve" stuff--would
that be considered your shouting of denigrations, Len?

Dave K8MN