Now for some straight talk. Clinton II is over. Gore I may never come to pass. And the Gingrich GOP revolution has gone down in flames. So what. Big deal. Let ’em go. Who needs them, anyway. Good riddance.
The real revolution is the spring-time rising of a new democracy that evolves after the government self destructs.
Maybe like a forest that renews itself after burning to the ground from a lightening strike or a careless camper, the American political system will have to hit rock bottom before it can reinvent itself into something that works and that means something to hard-working citizens.
In the meantime, there are a lot of acute problems that need addressing. And real people whose lives need saving. Like cops in the District of Columbia, my birthplace, and those in your home town. They’re getting killed. So are kids, teenagers and adults. Just like kids, teenagers and adults in your home town.
Some cops on the beat here don’t have two-way radios. And even those that do, aren’t necessarily able to communicate with cops in suburban Virginia and Maryland.
Why?
Public safety is short on spectrum in big cities, including those with high crime rates. The spectrum that is there is located in this band and that band-all over the place-further complicating life and death communications.
True, the police radio problem in D.C. is a symptom of a far bigger problem: the District of Columbia, the city government, a patronizing Congress, and it’s-not-my problem neighbors from Virginia and Maryland, who make their living in D.C., but find the idea of a commuter tax abhorrent.
God knows whether Congress and the administration will get anything done anytime soon, what with large wads of money jamming the gears of government.
But if anyone in Congress, the Clinton administration or the FCC is listening and wants to salvage something good in our dysfunctional government, pass- ASAP-legislation backed by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), President Clinton, FCC Chairman Reed Hundt and the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials-International.
Give public safety as much spectrum as it needs, and more for future use, and help local and state governments defray the cost of new radio systems with auction revenues. What higher calling could telecom policymakers in Congress, the FCC and White House have? If not now, when?
Just Do It.
