[Boatanchors] FCC and Inevitable Declines

[David Stinson]

I would never support any "private enforcement" orgainization, period.
We don't need a volunteer Gestopo, thanks.
Such things inevitably become corrupt and a bunch of 
"good ol'boys" go around being little tin gods.  I'd rather
the whole hobby go to Channel 19 than have a goon-squad 
of 80-year-old OO-Nazis lording-over others who 
"ain't one of our kind, Clem..."
There is no need for that. The population of
"bad actors" is quite small when viewed in "the big picture."
Swatting flies with a cannon blows the whole village up.

Moreover-  A few months ago, I had a discussion of some of the 
bad-actors on ham radio with a federal employee of a federal 
agency who should know, and whom I shall not name.
We discussed the problem of building any kind of enforcement
case on the basis of "he said she said," half-baked billy-bob evidence,
the expense of sending field agents to collect quality evidence 
and to litigate, the small amount of money recoverable in fines 
from some poor retired guy in a trailer, etc.
His take on the FCC's position in this was eye-opening:

   "Look, Dave.... How many people actually hear these 
   bad guys on 20 meters?  A few dozen maybe?  And
   they can just as easy spin the big knob.   But no, they 
   want to waste our time and money crying about it.
   We have networks with millions of viewers and we can't
   even get a small fine on them for foul mouths to stick.
   You're asking us to spend a lot of agent time 
   and taxpayer money we don't have 
   worrying about a few dying old men
   in a dying old hobby about a dead technology...."

    OUCH.....

That's OK.  I don't want Uncle involved either.
There are ways for us to take care of our own problems
without building some "secret police" outfit.

Back to work for me.