RadioBanter - View Single Post - What is the ARRL's thought on having good amateurs?

[email protected] · November 2nd 06, 02:27 AM posted to rec.radio.amateur.policy

wrote:
From: on Tues, Oct 31 2006 6:07 pm

Dave Heil wrote:
wrote:
Dave Heil wrote:
wrote:
Dee Flint wrote:
wrote in message
wrote:

Must you put on your stupid face? Can't you take a typo?

Brian, it's the usual PCTA "answer" in debate. :-)

Dipschitt trips all over a typo and can't punctuate his way out of a
wet paper bag.

Lacking any valid response, they resort to misdirective
attempts at personal humiliation about minutae that
have NO direct bearing on the SUBJECT.

They must be very, very clever.

Since Heil is bound and determined to find typos and
misspellings, all we have to do is scrutinize HIS
epic prose in here and make him wallow in his own
typographical errors...forever and ever... :-)

I'll point out his punctuation errors a few times and let it go. What
Heil is never going to forget is working out of band Frenchmen on 6
Meters. Perhaps when he passes, I start an amateur club memorializes
his DX expertise and Operating prowess. It may not be in the same
League as the Barry Goldwater station, but it'll be a start.

Our military isn't perfect. Many of those who enlist aren't all that
sharp. Most are shoved into a career field in which they have no
interest. Most aren't going to make the military a career.

You must be remembering the draft years when, even though the Air Force
didn't use the draft, the draft generated a significant interest in Air
Force service.

That and the USN. The USAF and USN weren't considered
as direct combat military branches by draftees worried
silly about harm to their precious bodies. Back in the
Vietnam War era 33 to 50 years ago, that is.

Has Jim approved your use of 1973 as the end of the war, or was he
still tucking tail as late as 1975?

Some are
lucky enough to have skills obtained prior to military service. Some of
those are fortunate enough to serve in a field in which they have some
expertise or interest.

Some with grave disappointment that they couldn't be hams in particular
combat zones.

Funny thing, but the military doesn't consider amateur
radio "contesting" as a useful skill in maintaining
communications 24/7. Military personnel placement types
MIGHT give such recruits a nod in the direction of some
communications IF (and only IF) there is a directive they
have for a communications specialty.

Mmmmm. I would worry about someone not receiving standardized
training. Could you ever be sure they were getting the job done
unsupervised?

When I enlisted in the Army, I was assigned to Signal Corps
and Signal Basic Training WITHOUT being a licensed amateur
and hitting only the medium percentile in the morse code
aptitude test! Sunnuvagun! :-)

Yeh, I was trained in meteorology which was in the "General" category,
my worst area. Somehow I managed dinstinguished grad in both the 3
level and mandatory 7 level schools.

Oh, yeah, in March 1952 there was a definite WAR going on,
but in northeast Asia, not southeast Asia. The Army had
definite needs for infantry, artillery, and armor
personnel replacements but I was picked for signal. My
only license then was an Illinois driver license. :-)

Army needs...

What we got there in Heil's (altered?) version of his
personal biographic factoids is strangely similar to
the undetailed, grandiose CLAIMS of the former "war
hero of the USMC," Major Dud (Robeson). :-)

Other than being in country, Heil has made no claims of direct action
or heroism.

No problem on proof for me. I've got my records and some
of them are digitized (PDF for universality in viewing)
from their original form. The official archives in
St. Louis (NARA Military Personnel Records Center) has
them for proof by anyone with access.

I'm good with what Heil has presented.

Why aren't the communications billets merely a direct duty assignment
after basic training?

They can be. That's how I did it. I never set foot in an Air Force
technical school. Of course I'd already been a radio amateur for seven
years when I joined the military. I was awarded my 3-level right out of
basic training. I went directed duty to Barksdale AFB after ten days of
leave after Amarillo.

Lackland. San Antonio.

Yes, Lackland AFB is in San Antonio. Amarillo AFB was in Amarillo.
That's where I went through basic training. Amarillo. Amarillo.

I see. Wikipedia confirms Amarillo AFB as an inprocessing base.

Did you catch what Robesin's got?

I have no idea of what you mean, Brian.

Stories about the military.

Oh, my, here comes Major Dud Robeson the II. :-)

Naw. He's playing tag with Mark.

Since 54 years ago I've been acquainted with (perhaps) hundreds
of military personnel both as one myself and (much longer) as
a civilian. I don't know of ANY military personnel who "DIDN'T"
receive any specialty training after their Basic Training (or
Boot Camp for USN and USMC and USCG).

There were a handful of billets that were DDA. Most of the unskilled
work was handled by folks getting kicked out for various
non-adaptability issues.

The USAF signals people have a long tradition of keeping comms
alive and well 24/7 just as the Army did it (USAF came out of
the Army in the later 1940s). "Getting the message through"
at any time of the day or night is the watchword for both USA
and USAF signals. They don't do it the "amateur way" as a
HOBBY.

I got to visit SAC's "Giant Talk" at Elkhorn, NE. That was so cool.
And the Navy broadcast stations on Guam. I used to receive their wx
rtty and fax transmissions when in the field with the 2nd ID/ROK. Fun
stuff. Later I had to rely on wx rtty only from Diego Garcia, and
WEFAX from the orbiters in Somalia.

There IS an exception: AFRS and (later) AFRTS. A Special
Services branch...entertainment (and, supposedly morale)
folks in uniform. Armed Forces Radio (and Television)
Service doesn't operate from combat zones, doesn't even
"fight" for ratings. It is show biz.

Yeh, I watched them once or twice in the ROK, probably once during each
tour. I did listen to the radio, and enjoyed the "shadow" and other
old-tyme boradcast stuff they would put on autopilot overnight (worked
a lot and worked a lot of night shifts).

MARS might be in the same category as AFRS-AFRTS. It was
never essential to military communications despite the
civilian hoopla attached to it.

Yeh, when I was a war planner, I used to hit up the message center
every morning about 6:30 AM, visit the control center, get an update on
wx data flowing from our deployed locations, problems, etc. I'd brief
the Colonel when he got in on the contingency locations, we'd go take
the wx briefing, then head into the CINCs briefing.

MARS had nothing to do with any comm we used.

From the 1990s onward,
MARS has taken on a communications role for most of the US
government...and doing good at that...using military MARS
personnel. With DSN connection to the Internet, the "boys
overseas" don't need to wait for surface mail or use
phone patches to talk direct to family and friends.

Or have some creep eavesdrop on husband/wife talk.

But...in Heil's case WE don't really know in DETAIL what
Heil actually did. He hasn't described it in anything but
vague generalities and intimations of work performed.

I don't even know if it was fixed or tactical, but that's alright.

To
use Major Dud Robeson's "description" Heil was "in one
hostile action" action. :-)

Coulda been. Don't know. He served and isn't claiming to be a hero.

Heil sounds off real big, smug and arrogant with "facts."
Thing is, he just doesn't apply those facts factually to
his own (33 to 40 year prior personal history) other than
the usual claims of having "expertise" in amateur radio.
[he sounds like a verbose Blowcode in drag... :-) ]

The smugness is a bit hard to take.

Whole government agencies gave up on code. Commercial businesses gave
up on code.

Oracle uses a lot of code.

Heil put on his stupid face again. :-( The "code" referred
to by you, by me, is COMPUTER (Instruction) "CODE."

Sigh...more MISDIRECTION into the general "code."

He needed an opening to show that he knows more than just amateur radio
and guitar.

Oracle is a business which didn't give up on code.

Bill Gates has an answer for your Oracle.

Very much so! :-) A few billion bucks here, a few billion
bucks there...might even add up to real money! (paraphrasing
Yogi Berra) [thanks to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
for all their many chartitable contributions worldwide!]
I just don't think Bill Gates (or Paul Allen) much give a
**** for morse "code." :-)

I think I'll send Bill an email and invite him to become an amateur.

I know and use a few high-level COMPUTER codes. I know and
use a few Assembler-level COMPUTER codes. Those just ain't
"morse code." :-) My little Apple ][+ can do a third of
a million "words per second." [based on the average number
of clock cycles per byte-word instruction Ain't NO morseman
that can come close to that. :-)

I'm surprised that Jim doesn't try to force Bill Gates to use morse
code as a programming language. Hell, it's digital, right???

My current computer box is one helluva lot FASTER than that
1980-era Apple ][+ and goes faster per second with 32-bit
words. My dial-up connection to the Internet (usually 50
KBPS) does about 50,000 "words per minute" just with the
3 KHz bandwidth telephone line. The new set-top cable TV
box we just had installed this morning (has a DVR built-in
plus more cable service channels, all on digital) has an
incredibly high data rate. [our Samsung 27 inch DTV accepts
DTV direct from the new digital service set-top box]

But...we must all "respect and honor" the mighty morse
expertise of the PCTA amateur extras because they think they
typify the "state of the art" in communications mode use.
Greater than 20 "words per minute!" Good grief...

1906 thinking in the year 2006. Ptui.

It will all be over with soon.