Alan Bosch wrote:
Hello there, Patrick, Eric, et al.:Al, I'm a fan of the IOU's, the investor-owned utilities. That said, yes TVA is socialism, and by the textbook definition. But I can see from history that if folks from that area wanted electricity, they'd wait a while more because the IOUs had a number of reasons for avoiding wiring the rural areas. In retrospect, the reasons weren't valid, but the IOUs still didn't see their reasons were invalid. Nowadays, in doing the job for the first time, they'd do it better than TVA. First time around, IOUs refused and so TVA along with the RECs, the "Co-ops," were legislated. If I were around then, I'd try to admit that my company was wrong and the situation had forced "socialism." But I'd have a mighty sore spot there and dasn't speak up for fear of going off like a cannon and making the usual fool of myself. BUT REMEMBER, caged there is the proviso, very important, that if my IOUs had been willing to do the job the first time around, they'd done it better. Often times, free enterprise doesn't want to do it because they don't see profit; but in instances they're wrong. I served 32 years inside the bowels of the federal government, last 16 at Voice of America. At least at the transmission end of the chain of broadcast, the US government has been very inefficient and wasteful of money. The old continental US VOA plants were owned and staffed by Crosley (WLWO, Bethany) and CBS (KCBR, Delano) and some others. Coming into VOA long after the privately-owned transmitter plants were federalized, I'd have to say they did the job efficiently and with the proper increase in contract cost to make a profit, still would have beat the government at doing it well. The lore of the old KCBR still figures big around the Delano Transmitting Station in terms of photos of that era, and in records kept, and stories told of the personnel (all the original personnel were "federalized" and also have passed away or retired). As an alumnus of Greenville Transmitting Station who served out at Delano for two years, I cannot possibly deny that the old networks did the job much more efficiently than the Federal government. Please forgive the typos and errors above. I'm trying to come up to Eric Bueneman N0UIH's standards for spelling, grammar and lack of errors. Charles I don't think so. --
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Charles A & Leonor L Taylor
Greenville, North Carolina
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