[Boatanchors] The ARRL's next move

[Rob Atkinson]

There really needs to be a separate radio service established for
people who just want a VHF rig, and repeater for emcomm stuff and 2
meter CB etc., so the current amateur radio service can focus on real
radio technology and other affairs that have been the traditional
basis for ham radio.  And licenses for that service can involve
testing for CW and radio theory and so on.  It won't happen for a
variety of reasons though, one being FCC doesn't want more burden,
only less.

CW test was eliminated by No Code International, a New Zealand group
of zealots who came out of nowhere and blind sided everyone with a
grass roots organizing of opposition that welled up in the IARU then
ITU, and suddenly there was no more international requirement for CW
testing, and FCC scrapped it.  Before that happened, a tiny minority
of Americans sued FCC claiming the CW test discriminated against them
because they had a disability of some sort that prevented them from
passing the CW test.  And before that happened the CW test had been
deskilled to where you only had to pass a multiple guess test about
what had been sent, instead of turning in a minute of solid copy.

So to bring back CW FCC would have to get around the ADA.  Never going
to happen.

Rob
K5UJ