Todd: Like you, I shunned the ARRL for many years. I was disenchanted with QST and the views of my peers who represented Amateur Radio to official circles. Now that I am older I look back and see many mistakes made by the orgainzation like the position of eliminating AM. While I am a bit ambevilent about CW, it has more numerous proponents than AM and they have valid points concerning the mode. I also see my mistakes of not contacting my ARRL representatives and making my views known.
One thing that has surfaced in recent years is the advocacy and vocal support of AM on this and other reflectors. Recently the election of directors in the eastern part of the United States had the support of the AM mode included as an issue, pushed by members of this very reflector. So, in my view, the ARRL can be changed or at least acknowledge our wishes (a proponent and operator of AM was elected). It has been pointed out here that economic interests are constantly attacking our bandwidth for monetary benefit. I live in a state that our representative in on the Telecommunications Committee in the house. Recently the representative wrote a letter to the Chairman of the FCC advocating the position of SAVI who wishes to develop and implement a system they claim will help in the war against terrorism. It will be a broad banded device that will harm the spectrum outside its operational frequencies, with dubious benefit, in my view, and they want to take a ham band for its final operating frequencies. The ARRL contacted the representative opposing the device, but she advocated it anyway. So, seeing that, I have decided to support the ARRL. While far from perfect, they do take positions that support Amateur Radio, no matter what the frequency or mode. It is up to us to guard our chosen mode of operation and I do that when possible. I have written our repersentative three times concerning issues on CC&Rs and SAVI techonology. I have yet to receive an answer as a constitutant but the ARRL has. If you belong to any club, I suggest you invite the ARRL district representative to a meeting to hold a forum so the issues you are concerned about may be discussed. Most of the ARRL repersentatives will attend such a meeting if at all possible and if they see formitable opposition to any position, surely, they will take it into account. If they don't, join and challenge their re-election. While I believe the ARRL is on the road to creating two classes of hams by their certification program, what can be done? The ranks are full of people who do not know the correct operating procedure for passing traffic in emergencies. In years past most hams (and I empasize MOST), through either the ARRL or MARS, were trained for this very task. Amateurs were in the forefront of experimentation (now in commercial labs) and emergency traffic handling. Now that we have almost two generations of hams that have never passed an emergency message, those skills are regulated to the dust bin but they can dial a cheap cell phone. Since we no longer lead the way in experimentation, I think the ARRL has chosen to highlight our one remaining functional possibility to justify our existance, emergency message handling. The recent porposal for the 60 meter band by the ARRL was justified in their pleadings for propogation reasons to enable hams to communicate over intermediate distances for "Emergency situations". Forty meters was too long and 75/80 too short during certain hours. When not in use for emergencies, we could use the band for our hobby (including the AM mode). I find that support, especially, since they proposed full allowable power and no mode restrictions that some wanted (a CW proponent directly petitioned the FCC to make the band CW only). While our gains as AM operators are small, we can still operate our chosen mode thanks, in part, to the ARRL who did oppose the banning of the mode in the 70s. I urge everyone to look at this issue with a broad view and not be myopic about their chosen modes and operating habits. Reasses our failure to contact our representatives of the ARRL and government whether we are members or not. If you are a member, the director will be more likely to take your views more seriously, but I think they will listen anyway. No I don't like everything the ARRL does, but they have to support themselves in todays expensive world. Costs of that support have to come from somewhere and if they make those bucks in QST, that is less the membership has to put up in dues and donations, considering how many hams don't belong and pay dues or donate. This is long in the tooth so I won't give my views on the money position. But, again with certain reservations, I do support them. I urge everyone to step back from the issue and view the picture from different prospectives. You might be suprised. By the way, have you noticed the Yaecomwood now put a button on their equipment for AM, wonder why? 73 Jim de W5JO ----- Original Message ----- From: "Todd Bigelow - PS" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Thursday, November 21, 2002 7:53 AM Subject: Re: [AMRadio] In Defense Of The ARRL > Nah, I don't buy it, Don - > > The difference is this: with politics, you have some choice in party, candidate, write-in, etc. With the Amateur Radio Retail Lobby, you have no voice but theirs and a deck stacked against you by their changes to the rules in the last 15 or so years. It's more akin to an unpopular > dictatorship, really. Our democracy supports minority rights, even to the extreme. The ARRL versions supports what best suits their needs as they see it, regardless of whoever else in overlooked or excluded as a result. What you basically seem to be saying is that we should support a corrupt > dictatorship because we have no choice - it's either that or nothing. I disagree. I have a choice, and I've exercised it.
