This development could not have
come at a worse time! I had just embarked on a campaign to find
additional transmitter sites in downtown areas of the Nashoba Valley
and North Central Massachusetts, having sent proposals to building
owners in Concord, West Concord, and Fitchburg, plus a contact in Ayer,
with letters of inquiry to Groton and Pepperell waiting in the wings,
when all of I sudden at work I discover a new signal on the car radio
at 1700 kHz, just after sundown, coming in loud and clear. I knew
instantly it was bad news. Here is my commentary about it posted on part15.us.
For
the past 10 years, the last thing most of us Part 15 broadcasters using
the expanded AM band worried about was new, full powered, licensed
stations from within our own national borders coming on our frequencies
and blowing us away. Only the occasional new station authorized by the
CRTC in Canada was of any concern. The FCC stopped approving of both
moves into the expanded band and new stations coming on there many
years ago now. So this move of WRCR, formerly a 500 watt station on
1300 kHz with a deteriorating transmitting infrastructure, is totally
unprecedented on the part of the FCC and has grave implications for the
future and stability of Part 15 broadcasting in the expanded AM band.
In
the hours and days ahead, there may be a few interruptions in both
Troubadour 1700's AM and FM signals as I work through a few issues
spawned by this development. Although Part 15 transmitters have come a
long way in recent years, a $225 transmitter still cannot match a
$20,000 transmitter's accuracy and stability. I am going to try to
lessen the "motor boating" effect that occurs when the two signals
collide, which my SSTran AMT-5000 transmitters enable me to do. Also,
the FM antenna has still not been precisely trimmed for 97.9 mHz. It's
a job I have put off for more than two years. (It is still trimmed for
89.3.) With no AM reception at night beyond a thousand feet, it is
imperative that the FM's signal is maximized. This will require the FM
to go off air for several hours.
As a postscript, night time
reception of Troubadour 1700 AM in the mid-Horsepond Road and North
Shirley/Bull Run Restaurant neighborhoods, where the signals from WRCR
and Troubadour 1700 arrive at a near 90 degree angle from each other,
may still be possible on home radios and portables with internal loop
antennas. Turn the radio to see if we are still heard in the null of
WRCR.
Wednesday, July 15, 2015
Saturday, June 6, 2015
Super Town Meeting, Monday June 8th
Super Town Meeting
on Monday, June 8th in Shirley, Ayer, Harvard and Devens to
decide four proposed zoning changes in Devens.
Vote YES for proposed healthcare use for Shirley Village Growth District.
Vote YES to protect Rogers Field, restore Willow Brook, and allow expansion of Adams Circle Zero-Net-Energy neighborhood.
Vote NO to prevent more biotech firms, defense contractors and other alledged "businesses" from occupying the south end of Grant Road.
We need to enable more poor people, working class people, and middle class people to own businesses in Devens, not give more land to psychopaths! Here are my comments on Courbanize, a site MassDevelopement is using to promote the changes:
All good except...
The last thing we need is more biotech, pharmaceutical, and private military contractors locating in Devens. In my opinion, these corporations are either destroying our planet, destroying our physical and mental health, engaging in mass deception, or profiting from war. Instead, we should be helping our own struggling local poor and middle class establish small businesses in Devens. We should set aside the residential area of Grant Road as an "artist colony" type of intentional community. It should feature dirt cheap affordable housing and be populated by creative people (artists, musicians, peaceful inventors, writers, investigative journalists, media creators, antique restorers, etc.) who, more than anything, want to practice their craft and want "out" of the rat race and the spiraling cost of living. Only a community such as this can begin to undo the horrible legacy of Deven's destructive military past.
6/6/15 Minimum
Wage Media endorses the following votes:
Vote YES
for proposed change to Shirley Village Growth District.Vote YES for proposed healthcare use for Shirley Village Growth District.
Vote YES to protect Rogers Field, restore Willow Brook, and allow expansion of Adams Circle Zero-Net-Energy neighborhood.
Vote NO to prevent more biotech firms, defense contractors and other alledged "businesses" from occupying the south end of Grant Road.
We need to enable more poor people, working class people, and middle class people to own businesses in Devens, not give more land to psychopaths! Here are my comments on Courbanize, a site MassDevelopement is using to promote the changes:
All good except...
The last thing we need is more biotech, pharmaceutical, and private military contractors locating in Devens. In my opinion, these corporations are either destroying our planet, destroying our physical and mental health, engaging in mass deception, or profiting from war. Instead, we should be helping our own struggling local poor and middle class establish small businesses in Devens. We should set aside the residential area of Grant Road as an "artist colony" type of intentional community. It should feature dirt cheap affordable housing and be populated by creative people (artists, musicians, peaceful inventors, writers, investigative journalists, media creators, antique restorers, etc.) who, more than anything, want to practice their craft and want "out" of the rat race and the spiraling cost of living. Only a community such as this can begin to undo the horrible legacy of Deven's destructive military past.
"... Homeland Security put it there."
Newtown,
Corrupticut First Selectman Patricia Llodra, testifying under oath at
the Sandy Hook FOIA Hearing #2 in Hartford on June 3, 2015:
"I believe that Homeland Security put it there."
[ ...referring to the illuminated sign near the Sandy Hook Fire House that was present for at least the entire day on December 14th, 2012, as depicted in the photo below.]
Here is the video of the entire hearing:
“We’ll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American people believe is false.”
-William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
“Our job is to give people not what they want, but what we decide they ought to have.”
-Richard Salant, Former President of CBS News
"I believe that Homeland Security put it there."
[ ...referring to the illuminated sign near the Sandy Hook Fire House that was present for at least the entire day on December 14th, 2012, as depicted in the photo below.]
Here is the video of the entire hearing:
“We’ll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American people believe is false.”
-William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
“Our job is to give people not what they want, but what we decide they ought to have.”
-Richard Salant, Former President of CBS News
Monday, June 1, 2015
Enact a Basic Income for All Americans
Implementing a guaranteed Basic Income ("Social Security for All") would end poverty in the United States and provide a 21st-century social safety net to deal with looming widespread unemployment caused by advancing technology and trade policies that benefit only the top 1/10th of 1 percent. Income inequality in the United States has risen sharply in recent years and continues to get worse. Without serious intervention, we WILL face massive increases in poverty and civil unrest in the years ahead.
A guaranteed Basic Income, which will directly provide all Americans with just enough money each month to pay for food, housing, and essential bills, will shift our economy to one that doesn't require full employment in order to be healthy. It will also eliminate a huge layer of state and federal government bureaucracy whose sole purpose is to determine eligibility for current public assistance programs.
A Basic Income for all Americans would relieve most of us from the greatest source of stress, confinement, and unhappiness in our lives, namely the prospect of losing everything we have due to a termination of employment or other source of essential income. It would free up inventors, artists, and entrepreneurs to follow their dreams with abandon, unencumbered by persistent worries of how they will support themselves during the months and years it often takes for their efforts to produce a monetary return (if a monetary return will even manifest in some cases).
It would revolutionize the workplace, because in every sort of business or institution, the staff would be there because they WANT to be there or have CHOSEN the occupation, not because they HAVE to be there in order to avoid homelessness, hunger, or bankruptcy. A Basic Income would finally free all of us to live AUTHENTIC LIVES.
Also, there have always been those among us who do not flourish well in employment situations. These individuals either lack organized thinking, or attention to detail, or they don't hold up well under the social, physical, or top-down management structures that most jobs force upon us. For them, the risks involved in employment are very high. A Basic Income for such individuals will spare them the pain and stigma of multiple firings, along with inevitable poverty and hopelessness, while they either explore self-employment options or find ways to be useful to society outside of employment.
Recent studies have indicated that poverty reduces brain power. Poor people and others with financial problems do poorly on cognitive and logic tests. Poverty also results in diminished social opportunities, which reinforces diminished brain capacity and inspiration. Do you find yourself often complaining about how hard it is to function in a "dumbed down" America? A Basic Income would go a long way in reversing it.
The management of Minimum Wage Media wholeheartedly endorses the concept of an unconditional Basic Income for all.
We urge our listeners to support this petition.
Monday, April 20, 2015
Welcome Mutual Radio News
Today Minimum Wage Media welcomes Mutual Radio News to our airwaves on their maiden voyage. Obviously, founder Leo Ashcraft was inspired by 20th Century memories of the old Mutual Broadcasting System
and their cooperative structure with affiliates. Troubadour 1700 will
be carrying either the 1 minute or 3 minute newscasts during most hours
and Liberty & Justice 1640 will air the 5 minute newscast during
many hours of the day. CBC News will continue to be heard at various
times each day on both stations, so we will still be hearing the
Canadian perspective on current headlines.
Sunday, February 8, 2015
Ayer and Shirley: America's Newest Food Desert
The following is the text of a commentary airing mostly on Liberty & Justice 1640:
Hannaford Supermarket in Ayer is now gone. Hannaford management wanted to bring the store up to 21st century standards. The local land owner said "no."
The Ayer Farmers Market is no longer operating on Saturdays during the Summer and Fall. Why? The local land owner said "no." He also said "no" to rail commuters who need access through "his" land to reach the few job pools in the region still able to sustain middle class life. He also said "no" to the parking needs of nearby small businesses. After all, he is *The Land Owner.* If he unrealistically expects his slice of downtown to remain as pristine as an acre of remote northern Maine woods, that's his prerogative under capitalism, isn't it?
And finally, lest we forget, we do (or did) have a local farm stand in Ayer. But it's only open from July to Labor Day and only during years when the owner feels like opening it.
Welcome to Ayer and Shirley, where narcissism and eccentricity have produced America's newest food desert.
To anyone even casually familiar with the recent departure of Hannaford Supermarket from Ayer, as well as the small seasonal venues for fresh vegetables that either no longer exist or are no longer reliable, it should be obvious which groups are almost entirely responsible for their demise: selfish land owners, greedy real estate developers, and dysfunctional town zoning boards.
Food that is nourishing enough to sustain health is essential to human life. Maintaining local retail sources of food should be of such importance that it warrants intervention by town governments, even to the point of exercising eminent domain, when private land owners repeatedly demonstrate self-centered, pathological behavior with no sense whatsoever of the greater public good. Yet, this behavior should be no surprise. Just look what the local real estate developers and land owners have given Ayer and Shirley over the past 15 years. They have destroyed nearly all of our remaining viable agricultural land and filled it with cookie-cutter, energy wasting McMansions that fewer and fewer people can afford. What, you want new organic small farms? That's for those hippies out in western Mass. and New York state. What, you want zero net energy homes? That's for those hippies on Devens... or something like that. And for all you working poor people who make up the bulk of the population of these two towns, don't you just love those rents which have more than doubled over the past 15 years? Don't you love how easy it has become to pay your bills and stay out of debt, thanks to the local land owners?
"Hey, get me to the money with as little effort or thought as possible! And those poor people, they deserve what they get."
Of course, it's easy to think that way if you have the time and money to climb into a $50,000 vehicle and go food shopping in Leominster, Lunenburg, or Acton, or better yet, have a servant or employee do it for you. But most low income working people in Ayer and Shirley do not have such options. Many do not own even an old, beat up vehicle. The local landlords and business interests have made sure that most are within a 10 minute walk from all the alcoholic beverages they could ever want to drown their sorrows. But a nice bunch of health sustaining, organic kale? You have to hitch a ride out of town for that one, boy!
If you think town governments will finally rise to the call and seize these vital, limited properties until truly appropriate buyers emerge who will end the food desert, don't hold your breath. In the early years of this century, a plan to expand Roux's Market to two stories and vastly increase their grocery offerings was shot down by the Shirley zoning board. But a year or two later, that same board had no problem allowing a chain franchise like Dunkin Donuts to come in by knocking down a classic, residential building in otherwise good condition.
As long as idiocy, eccentricity, narcissism, and greed continue to persist in the local real estate industry and in town governments, the Ayer-Shirley Food Desert may persist for many years to come. So, brace yourself. But for every month it continues, the more and more likely the two towns will become the laughing stock of the state, especially considering that most surrounding communities avoided such problems by exercising sanity, vision, and common sense.
Hannaford Supermarket in Ayer is now gone. Hannaford management wanted to bring the store up to 21st century standards. The local land owner said "no."
The Ayer Farmers Market is no longer operating on Saturdays during the Summer and Fall. Why? The local land owner said "no." He also said "no" to rail commuters who need access through "his" land to reach the few job pools in the region still able to sustain middle class life. He also said "no" to the parking needs of nearby small businesses. After all, he is *The Land Owner.* If he unrealistically expects his slice of downtown to remain as pristine as an acre of remote northern Maine woods, that's his prerogative under capitalism, isn't it?
And finally, lest we forget, we do (or did) have a local farm stand in Ayer. But it's only open from July to Labor Day and only during years when the owner feels like opening it.
Welcome to Ayer and Shirley, where narcissism and eccentricity have produced America's newest food desert.
To anyone even casually familiar with the recent departure of Hannaford Supermarket from Ayer, as well as the small seasonal venues for fresh vegetables that either no longer exist or are no longer reliable, it should be obvious which groups are almost entirely responsible for their demise: selfish land owners, greedy real estate developers, and dysfunctional town zoning boards.
Food that is nourishing enough to sustain health is essential to human life. Maintaining local retail sources of food should be of such importance that it warrants intervention by town governments, even to the point of exercising eminent domain, when private land owners repeatedly demonstrate self-centered, pathological behavior with no sense whatsoever of the greater public good. Yet, this behavior should be no surprise. Just look what the local real estate developers and land owners have given Ayer and Shirley over the past 15 years. They have destroyed nearly all of our remaining viable agricultural land and filled it with cookie-cutter, energy wasting McMansions that fewer and fewer people can afford. What, you want new organic small farms? That's for those hippies out in western Mass. and New York state. What, you want zero net energy homes? That's for those hippies on Devens... or something like that. And for all you working poor people who make up the bulk of the population of these two towns, don't you just love those rents which have more than doubled over the past 15 years? Don't you love how easy it has become to pay your bills and stay out of debt, thanks to the local land owners?
"Hey, get me to the money with as little effort or thought as possible! And those poor people, they deserve what they get."
Of course, it's easy to think that way if you have the time and money to climb into a $50,000 vehicle and go food shopping in Leominster, Lunenburg, or Acton, or better yet, have a servant or employee do it for you. But most low income working people in Ayer and Shirley do not have such options. Many do not own even an old, beat up vehicle. The local landlords and business interests have made sure that most are within a 10 minute walk from all the alcoholic beverages they could ever want to drown their sorrows. But a nice bunch of health sustaining, organic kale? You have to hitch a ride out of town for that one, boy!
If you think town governments will finally rise to the call and seize these vital, limited properties until truly appropriate buyers emerge who will end the food desert, don't hold your breath. In the early years of this century, a plan to expand Roux's Market to two stories and vastly increase their grocery offerings was shot down by the Shirley zoning board. But a year or two later, that same board had no problem allowing a chain franchise like Dunkin Donuts to come in by knocking down a classic, residential building in otherwise good condition.
As long as idiocy, eccentricity, narcissism, and greed continue to persist in the local real estate industry and in town governments, the Ayer-Shirley Food Desert may persist for many years to come. So, brace yourself. But for every month it continues, the more and more likely the two towns will become the laughing stock of the state, especially considering that most surrounding communities avoided such problems by exercising sanity, vision, and common sense.
Monday, December 22, 2014
Special programming on 95.1 The Voice of the Resistance through Christmas week
It
was the most censored video on YouTube from mid November to mid
December 2014. Lenny Pozner, alleged father of Noah Pozner, filed a
groundless copyright infringement complaint in an attempt to keep the
public from seeing it. But they couldn't suppress it forever. And now
we have it here. 95.1 FM has been reactivated to air "Let's Talk About
Sandy Hook," the documentary soundtrack in its entirety, playing
repeatedly though at least Sunday, December 28th. A live stream of the
broadcast is also available.
Regardless of your views on gun legislation, childhood mental health
screening, psychotropic drugs, or the pharmaceutical giants that push
them, give it a listen and decide for yourself where the truth lies.
Troubadour 1700 AM and 97.9 FM will begin airing continuous folk and instrumental Christmas music beginning Wednesday morning the 24th.We wish you a peaceful, rewarding holiday season and we look forward to 2015 where my goal will be to bring our micro transmitters to downtown areas in North Central Massachusetts, the Nashoba Valley, and possibly Metro West. Stay tuned.
Troubadour 1700 AM and 97.9 FM will begin airing continuous folk and instrumental Christmas music beginning Wednesday morning the 24th.We wish you a peaceful, rewarding holiday season and we look forward to 2015 where my goal will be to bring our micro transmitters to downtown areas in North Central Massachusetts, the Nashoba Valley, and possibly Metro West. Stay tuned.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)