April Fool: FCC finally bothers with Puerto Rico as chairman visits The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has finally decided to address the months-long lack of telecoms service in Puerto Rico, one day before its chair visits the storm-ravaged island. It has been over five months since the US territory was struck by Hurricane Maria and yet, according to the FCC's own figures, 4.3 per …
Pai is Trump's creature. Expect to see many more like him, if your fellow citizens are fool enough to allow this administration to outlive the next election.
But on this story, I have some sympathy. To me, "4.3%" sounds - pretty low, actually. Disaster recovery always has a long tail of sites that are just frickin' hard to fix, for one reason or another. I suspect that if Pai weren't, independently of this story, one of the most hated people in America - we wouldn't be hearing about it at all.
>>4.3%" sounds - pretty low, actually.
>Try: nearly 1 on 20 of people in your country can't phone for fire / police / ambulance
is it population coverage or land-mass coverage? And what was the coverage before the storm? For example EE claims 75% geographical coverage for 4G, 99% for population
Not that I'm excusing it - the graph looks pretty poor, as is Pai's position on a lot of things.
I can't help but think that this hurricane + associated fallout was an obvious FALSE FLAG distraction by Mother Nature (a registered DUMBOCRAT and climate change campaigner) to deflect from KILLARY CLINTON'S email server. In fact I'd bet the hurricane helped wipe away EVIDENCE of her wrongdoing from the server rooms of Puerto Rico. WHAT'S NEXT? A tornado in Hawaii sweeping away OBAKA's fake birth certificate$?
I was going to say the same thing about Canada where the number is probably actually reverse. However, not many people live in that other percentage area. (That's another discussion.) However, the article is just not clear. I believe they're talking about recovery, in other words, 4.3% of what got broken.
"I believe they're talking about recovery, in other words, 4.3% of what got broken."
Indeed. I was also going to comment that lacking 4.3% coverage probably makes them better than the UK, but the graph in the article makes it clear that it actually means 4.3% of existing equipment has not yet been repaired and/or replaced. I don't know what their actual coverage is, but the point is that it's currently significantly worse than it was a year ago.
From a politicians point of view he's probably doing a great job. Being seen saying the right things without actually committing to do or spend anything. Meanwhile he can continue the work of his corporate peers back at home.
Excellent work really, next stop congress. I'm sure he'll get plenty of corporate sponsorship.
Amazing how stupid politics can make people. I am used to it from the article's author – his name notwithstanding, McCarthy regards everything to the right of Stalin as deeply suspect – but what's with the commnenters? The Reg usually attracts smarter readers, or so I thought:
For one, the FCC does not manage telecommunications on the island of PR. No, they have their own board ("Junta Reglementadora de Telecomunicaciones", Telecommunications Regulatory Board) controlled by the Gobierno de Puerto Rico. Said government is happy to explain this in its FCC filings:
"The Telecommunications Regulatory Board of Puerto Rico (TRB) is the Government agency created by virtue of Act 213 of September 12, 1996, known as the Telecommunications Act of Puerto Rico of 1996, to regulate the telecommunications and Cable TV markets. At present, it has jurisdiction over intra-island services provided by the telecommunications companies, and is the franchising entity for Cable TV companies doing business in Puerto Rico.
The TRB is also in charge of the administration of the Universal Service Fund of Puerto Rico (PRUSF) and the certification of eligibility to receive funds from both the U.S. and the PRUSF. […]"
Of course, they drove everthing associated with it into the ground, just like they did with the government-controlled electricity monopoly, the territory's finances and its entire economy. The only economic activity that seems in full bloom is corruption.
And finally, the "4.3 %" number is the amount of the island without cell phone service. Mr McCarthy neglected to tell us whether that was by area, by number of cell towerd, by population or perhaps using average summer temperatures as the proxy variable. I am willing to bet that the number is based on island area = 100%, and the 4.3% of the island have about five inhabitants.
"the FCC does not manage telecommunications on the island of PR"
Okay, lets admit that. If that is the case, then why the big show and tell about some nonexistent money ?
If Pai has nothing to do with the problem, he has no reason to fund its resolution.
I think you need to recheck your facts.
That post is absurd on the face of it. If it's not the FCC's responsibility, as you claim to believe - why are they pretending to put money on the table to fix it, instead of pointing to the right persons?
But of course you're wrong, and a cursory check shows it. The FCC has the same status in Puerto Rico as anywhere else in the US:
"The Federal Communications Commission regulates interstate and international communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and U.S. territories."
https://www.fcc.gov/about/overview
I can quite believe that the extra money form the FCC is just smoke and mirrors for political effect but the main thrust of this article and the previous one is that reducing the reporting interval from 1 day to 3 days and a week has substantially increased the time to make repairs. This is nonsense a 1 day reporting period is micromanagement and difficult to see how it makes a difference except perhaps slowing down repairs with the effort and change of focus to creating and presenting daily reports. the graphs given in evidence are linear for the bulk of the repairs and then in the last 25% average repair times becoming longer and longer exactly as would be expected from Paereto or any real world experience.
The idea that changing the reporting interval from 1 day to 1 week makes more than a marginal difference suggest someone with no real world experience or judgement.
"This is nonsense a 1 day reporting period is micromanagement and difficult to see how it makes a difference except perhaps slowing down repairs with the effort and change of focus to creating and presenting daily reports. "
Except the slowing down happened *after* the reporting period was increased. So, Real World data disagrees with you at least in this case.
It would be ridiculous if the ACTUAL DATA didn't prove it to be true.
It's not even close to being a coincidence. And it happened no less than three times.
We can debate about why more frequent reporting resulted in faster recovery - my pet theory is that there are some very good folks at the FCC who use data to provide pressure - but not that it didn't happen. It did.
It's a private telecom system, why is tax money involved? Make the carriers repair the telecom systems or have the operating licenses revoked?
The heart of the matter seems to be a land grab. By making Puerto Rico less livable people are moving and selling out cheap. The telecom system will be repaired (with what appears to be a big subsidy for the rich) when new wealthy enclave development starts.
Republicans love to spend on welfare for the rich.
Picture a island wide F3+ tornado going across PR - that will give you an idea of the destruction caused to above ground anything. And unlike Texas and Florida, the island is 1000+ miles from all the hardware and most of the technical support that mainland US states have.
Having said this, the fact that 3 million plus US Citizens, statehood or not, are being so poorly served by their national government (and their local government too) is a disgrace to all Americans, unless you are a red hat that still doesn't realize the US took PR from Spain in a war started by the Fox news of its time, the Hearst newspapers. I can only hope that in 2020 we will be singing "Bye, Bye American Pai, et al".
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