Bevin Doesn't Know What the Fuck He's Doing, Part 15

Yeah, government bringing basic modern utilities to every home lacking affordable access to that utility never works.  Everybody remembers the utter catastrophe of Rural Electrification. Millions of rural families brought into the 20th century and desperate communities getting a permanent economic boost. What a tragedy.  If only Governor Lying Coward had been there to turn the project over to his corporate buddies so only rich people could have electricity.  Because they earned it.

Bill Estep at the Herald:

Gov. Matt Bevin said Friday that he wants to scale back an ambitious plan to build a high-speed broadband network around the state to instead focus on Eastern Kentucky.

Bevin said the original idea behind what ultimately became the KentuckyWired project was to provide broadband to Eastern Kentucky, where counties that long relied on the coal industry have been slammed by a sharp drop in coal jobs.

Many leaders in the region see high-speed Internet service as a crucial need in creating opportunities for new jobs in technology, health care and other fields.

However, that idea “morphed” into a plan to install 3,400 miles of fiber-optic cable around the state, which made it “somewhat untenable,” Bevin said after a meeting of the board of the Shaping Our Appalachian Region initiative.

“There weren’t enough dollars nor was there an ability to do that as effectively as anyone would have liked,” Bevin said of the statewide project. “My intent is to see it come back more to its original intent, and let’s start there.”

More lies from the motherfucking liar.  There's plenty of money in Kentucky for public projects - money that has been stolen by rich people and corporations not paying their fair share in taxes and getting even more obscenely rich on state contracts that rip off the taxpayers. 

Bevin said it is his “absolute intention” to make sure broadband comes to Eastern Kentucky.

Yep, lots of very expensive broadband installed at huge public expensive by thieving corporations with state contracts.

Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article58768608.html#storylink=cpy

And poor people in Kentucky's rural areas will still be shut out.

Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article58768608.html#storylink=cpy

Repugs Hate Government Services Unless They Can Make A Profit on Them

The problem for them, of course, is that there is no public service that private companies can provide more effectively and more cheaply than government can. 

So for forty years, corporations and their repug knob-gobblers have been demonizing government and lying about what government does in order to grab fat sweetheart contracts that pay them billions to provide no services, thus pissing off taxpayers who blame government and allow more services to be privatized.

Even in the case of a service that private utilities have promised for more than 20 years to provide and failed spectacularly, the privatizers and their cheerleaders are fighting against public service.

Tom Eblen at the Herald:

A year after state officials created a nationally recognized public-private partnership to build America’s best statewide broadband network, opponents are trying to kill it.

Some telecom and cable companies that now provide Internet service around the state, along with several right-wing advocacy groups, are pushing legislators and Gov. Matt Bevin to rethink the project, called KentuckyWired.

KentuckyWired was created as part of the Shaping Our Appalachian Region initiative organized by former Gov. Steve Beshear, a Democrat, and U.S. Rep. Hal Rogers, a Republican from Somerset and chairman of the House Appropriations committee.

The high-speed, fiber-optic network is to be managed and ultimately paid for by private industry. But it will be owned by the public and offer open access to any Internet service provider.

KentuckyWired officials say this network and its innovative structure could be a boon for economic development, giving businesses and homes better service, more choice and more competitive prices.

Independent studies have given Kentucky low rankings nationally for broadband availability, service and cost.

But AT&T has filed a protest over the state’s process for awarding school Internet service contracts, many of which it now has. The Kentucky Telecom Association, which represents 15 rural Internet providers, thinks KentuckyWired should be reconsidered, claiming it would duplicate existing infrastructure and undermine existing businesses that need their state and school service contracts.

Yeah, that would be the same AT&T that put high-fiber line in my front yard 15 years ago but still claims they can't get DSL to my house.  The same AT&T you hear people cursing as they fail to get service on their smart phones.  The same AT&T that has people cancelling their Direct TV in droves since AT&T bought it.

Government-provided broadband would be state-of-the-art and affordable, words not in the vocabulary of AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, T-mobile or any other private corporation currently stealing money from customers and giving no service in return.

But don't worry, corporations: Our "libertarian" governor is probably cancelling KentuckyWired as I write.

Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/news/local/news-columns-blogs/tom-eblen/article56259250.html#storylink=cpy

If This Happens, I Will Eat Gov. Beshear's Hat

Total bullshit.  120-county broadband in three years my ass. Motherfucking phone company put fiber-optic lines on my road 14 years ago.  Still no DSL, no broadband, no fucking nothing.

Also: "fees charged to future customers." Everybody who thinks that will be a penny less than the arm and a leg currently charged by satellite and other wireless companies, stand on your head.

Garry Wollenhaupt at the Lane Report:

Imagine downloading an entire movie in just a few seconds, or a business sending massive 3D printing files around the world. That’s the kind of jumpstart Gov. Steve Beshear hopes to provide with the Next Generation Kentucky Information Highway, a plan to extend high-speed broadband service via fiber optic lines to all 120 counties by 2018.

In December 2014, Gov. Steve Beshear and U.S. Rep. Hal Rogers, the Somerset Republican who since the 1980 election has represented most of the commonwealth’s Appalachian region, announced a contract with Australia-based Macquarie Capital to bring high-speed Internet connectivity to the state. The project will include more than 3,000 miles of fiber in all 120 counties, and Eastern Kentucky will be the first priority area.

Rogers and Beshear have spearheaded the Shaping Our Appalachian Region (SOAR) initiative, aimed at improving economic development and public infrastructure in the Appalachian region. Having long endured fewer jobs, lower incomes and lagging infrastructure, Eastern Kentucky in the past few years has lost half the coal mining jobs that were among the best paying to residents there. SOAR’s aim is to move the economic needle broadly upward.

Across the state, most home Internet services are delivered via telephone lines or cable TV connections that don’t qualify as broadband service today – defined now as download speeds of 25 megabits per second rather than the 2010 benchmark of 4Mbps. Businesses in some large cities have fast options for Internet service through telecommunications providers, but at a high cost and not at the level this project will provide.

The project is designed to address the fact that Kentucky ranks 46th in broadband availability, and slow service is still a reality in the 23 percent of the state’s rural areas that do not have access to broadband of any type.

The contract with Macquarie, estimated at $250 million to $350 million depending on how much existing infrastructure is used, will target Eastern Kentucky first for fiber optic installation and connectivity.

The state will support the project with $30 million in state bonds and $15 to $20 million in federal grants it is getting specifically for this job. In the recent omnibus federal budget, the Appalachian Regional Commission was awarded $10 million to improve broadband in central Appalachia. There is no additional cost to taxpayers under the public-private partnership Macquarie Capital has signed has signed on for; it will pay the rest of the costs with the anticipation of obtaining a return from the fees charged to future customers.

Not Even Close to Good Enough

Three years until everyone in Kentucky is able to "tap into high-speed internet" is complete and total bullshit.

 

Right now, everyone is Kentucky is able to "tap into high-speed internet."  For a price. Equal to your entire annual income due every month.

 

Availability of "high-speed internet" is not the problem.  AFFORDABILITY of high-speed internet is the problem, you lying motherfuckers.

 

And just to put the vomit icing on this shit cake, "every corner of the Commonwealth" really means just eastern Kentucky, and the contract is going to a private company, which means it will cost 10 times as much and take 10 times as long and complete 10 percent of intended service as it would if Kentucky just told Bell South and Verizon to fuck and die and built statewide broadband itself.

 

Jack Brammer at the Herald:

By 2018, all parts of Kentucky will be able to tap into high-speed Internet service, a move state leaders say will propel the state in education, economic development, health care and public safety.

 

At a news conference Tuesday in the state Capitol with Gov. Steve Beshear, U.S. Rep. Hal Rogers, R-Somerset, called the expanded service "the modern-day equivalent of the interstate highway system."

 

Beshear and Rogers, who are partnering to improve Eastern Kentucky through SOAR, the "Shaping Our Appalachian Region" initiative, announced that the state last Friday signed a contract with Macquarie Capital of Australia to develop "a robust, reliable, fiber backbone infrastructure to bring high-speed Internet connectivity to every corner of the Commonwealth."

 

Years After Broadband Promise, Kentucky Still Stuck in Dial-Up Speed

And we're not talking about people in inaccessible hollers and mountainsides.  I live a mile and a half from I-64 and I can't get broadband for any amount of money.

Tom Eblen at the Herald:

When Dr. Pamela Graber traveled in Uzbekistan and Turkey, she was surprised to find fast, reliable Internet connections. She just wishes she could get that kind of service at her home, 20 miles from Kentucky's State Capitol building.

"I sit here and wait for things to come up" on the screen, said Graber, an emergency physician who lives in the Beaver Lake area of Anderson County.

She and neighbors have petitioned a major Internet provider in their area for service, with no luck. So they use a satellite dish service. With data charges, Graber's monthly bill is more than $100 — much higher than she pays for excellent service in Florida, where she lives and works each winter.

While slow Internet is annoying for Graber and her husband, Melvin Wilson, it's a serious problem for two neighbors who have home-based online jobs. "When there's a wind storm, they can't work," she said.

"Internet's the main infrastructure we're going to need to work in the future," Graber said. "It's going to be a huge issue."
 It already is. Akamai Technologies' quarterly State of the Internet report last week highlighted Kentucky — and not in a good way. It said that while Alaska has the nation's worst average Internet connection speed, at 7.0 megabits per second, Kentucky, Montana and Arkansas are almost as bad, at 7.3 Mbps.

In 2012, Governor Beshear promised to bring high-speed internet to rural Kentucky, and announced with much fanfare the Commonwealth Office of Broadband Outreach and Development, which spends its time sitting around waiting for private companies to provide high-speed internet, which those companies are NEVER going to do.

You know why illiterate peasants in Uzbekistan have high-speed internet and Kentuckians don't?  Uzbekistan's government makes sure it's done. It provides to its citizens the services private companies can't or won't.

Kentuckians won't have high-speed internet until Kentucky's government provides it. That's what our taxes are for, goddammi.

Don't Hold Your Breath for Beshear and Rogers to Keep Broadband Promise

I've been covering the broadband-coming-to-Kentucky lies for going on five years now, and we have yet to see a pixel of actual high-speed access.

Anybody care to bet me that this time last year we still won't have seen a new pixel?

Governor Steve Beshear joined Congressman Harold “Hal” Rogers today to announce an ambitious state and federal investment to extend critically-needed high-speed broadband Internet access to the furthest reaches of the Commonwealth. 

The underserved eastern Kentucky region will be the first priority area for the project, which will be supported by $60 million in state bonds and $40 million in federal and private sources.

“Access to high-speed and high-quality Internet is no longer a luxury; it’s a necessity in the 21^st century economy.  Businesses and schools demand it,” said Gov. Beshear. “Our communities that lack reliable high-speed access will lag behind in economic development, distance learning and advanced health technologies, and that’s unacceptable.”

“The new ‘Super I-way’ will level the playing field,” said Congressman Rogers. “It takes away our historic barriers to better jobs, the difficult terrain and isolation. All of a sudden, the world is flat and the famed superior work ethic of our people will be able to compete with the world from home.”

Currently, Kentucky ranks 46th in high-speed broadband Internet availability. Nearly a quarter of the Commonwealth’s population -- 23 percent -- have no access to broadband.  The Next Generation Kentucky Information Highway will offer affordable and accessible high-speed broadband to reduce the barriers of geography for businesses and citizens.

The Commonwealth will partner with the Center for Rural Development for the first phase of the project in eastern Kentucky, leveraging various federal funds and private investment to attain access throughout the region.  The Center has initiated a feasibility study that will be complete in the next several weeks outlining the costs and plans of meeting eastern Kentucky’s broadband needs.

It goes on for thousands of more mendacious words, but I'll spare you.

High-speed broadband goes two places and two places only: densely-populated cities where telecoms can make obscene profits on minimum investment, and small towns whose progressive governments provide universal broadband at public expense.

As long as the Beshear/Rogers plan is dependent on private companies to serve rural counties, it's doomed to fail.

Fun fact: this press release from Governor's Beshear's Office is nowhere to be found among all the state press releases on kentucky.gov. But it is prominent on Hal Rogers' website, to which no, you may not have a link..

Free, Super-Powerful Wifi for Rural Areas.

Zandar says it would be dead on arrival if it weren't the purest moonshine to begin with, but that's all the more reason to publicize the possibility of something that is desperately needed, would galvanize the economy and would make significant progress toward reducing economic inequality.

It would be brought to you by your federal government and it's being fought by corporations. Which one's on your side, again?

Steve Benen at Maddowblog:

The Obama administration appears to have raised quite a few eyebrows with this one.

The federal government wants to create super WiFi networks across the nation, so powerful and broad in reach that consumers could use them to make calls or surf the Internet without paying a cellphone bill every month. [...]

The airwaves that FCC officials want to hand over to the public would be much more powerful than existing WiFi networks that have become common in households. They could penetrate thick concrete walls and travel over hills and around trees. If all goes as planned, free access to the Web would be available in just about every metropolitan area and in many rural areas.

The new WiFi networks would also have much farther reach, allowing for a driverless car to communicate with another vehicle a mile away or a patient's heart monitor to connect to a hospital on the other side of town.

As you might imagine, the proposal is not without controversy. Municipalities tend to support it, because free-for-all WiFi service would make it easy to connect schools, libraries, as well as local businesses that would benefit from a broader reach. Google and Microsoft are enthusiastic proponents, arguing that fast, publicly-accessible service from coast to coast would lead to more commerce and innovation.
But the wireless industry is far less pleased.

If consumers can get online, quickly and easily, for no money, nearly everywhere in the country, they'd be disinclined to pay private wireless carriers for the service. What's more, local television stations may have to sacrifice some of their licensed spectrum, and many Republicans oppose the idea, preferring to auction off spectrum to the private sector for revenue that could lower the debt they helped create.

The proposal will need FCC approval, and even if given the green light, would need "several years to set up." There will be an enormous amount of lobbying, jockeying, and debate between now and then.

But the country hasn't seen a debate over access to technology on this scale in quite a while.

Andrea Peterson at Think Progress:

Some of the possible key benefits include:

1. Helping the U.S. close the broadband infrastructure gap. Despite being the birthplace of many internet innovations, the U.S. ranks 16th in terms of broadband penetration, speed, and price. A staggering 96 percent of U.S. residents live in areas with two or fewer wireline internet providers, and 5 percent live in areas without any providers. A massive public work Wifi program would help deliver high speed internet access to areas currently lacking and provide competition in areas with limited choice.
2. Using wireless spectrum as a public good. There is a debate raging over the best use of publicly owned wireless spectrum, with some business interests advocating for the space to be auctioned to private companies — creating the potential for monopolies. Using the spectrum for provide free internet access to the public is a way to to make sure average users benefit, rather than big corporations.
3. Expanding freedom of expression online. The United Nations calls freedom of expression online a human right, but not everyone has internet access in the U.S. and private attempts to build out access haven’t been able to bridge the gap. Eliminating the cost barrier by providing access for free will undoubtedly expand the number of total U.S. internet users, thus giving more people a voice online.
4. Bolstering innovation. Expanding the number of internet users means expanding the market for internet devices — that’s one of the reasons tech giants including Microsoft and Google are supporting the plan — and opening the way for more experimentation and innovation in that marketplace. The original Washington Post story notes that the last time the FCC opened up a spectrum for public use, creativity in the form of “[b]aby monitors, garage door openers and wireless stage microphone” directly followed.

Kevin Drum concludes:

The real argument here is about whether a significant chunk of prime spectrum should be left free for public use. 

The truth is that this probably wouldn't create serious competition for wireless carriers and wouldn't hurt their business much. It's too small, too local, and too unreliable for anyone who needs serious cell phone service.

At the same time, it sure would be useful to have large-scale Wi-Fi networks available throughout the country for casual use. The rollout might be messy, but count me as a supporter anyway. If Republicans want to take the anti-public side of this debate, they're welcome to it.

Who Does Rural Kentucky Have to Blow to Get High-Speed Broadband?

Any moron can figure out how to get even more high-speed internet to city-dwellers who already have high-speed internet.

 

Get high-speed internet to a place that does not already have high-speed internet and can't get high-speed internet for any amount of money, then I'll be impressed.

 

Carl Franzen at TPM:

As promised, Google on Thursday unveiled and began taking pre-orders for its newest product, some of the fastest Internet service in the country: A 1-gigabit-per-second connection known as Google Fiber.

To put that in comparison, the average broadband internet connection speed across the U.S. is a measly 5.8 megabits-per-second. (Perhaps being charitable, Google claims its Google Fiber service is “100 times faster than today’s average broadband.”)

Google Fiber is for now limited to Kansas City, Missouri, and Kansas City, Kansas, neighboring cities on the Kansas state and Missouri border that make up the Kansas City metropolitan area, a location chosen after a two-year-long contest to determine the best community for Google to kick-off its quest to compete with existing internet service providers, cable giants such as Time Warner and Comcast.

Poor or Elderly in Kentucky? No Phone Service for You!

By @KYYellowDog

The lie here is that broadband internet is generally available in Kentucky outside of metropolitan areas. It is not. I myself live fewer than 10 miles from a city with cable broadband, and yet I do NOT have access to cable, wireless or satellite internet. On various "coverage maps" by phone and wireless providers, my neighborhood is listed as having "good coverage." THIS IS A LIE. Without my telephone landline, I have neither internet nor basic phone service. Without a landline, I cannot even call 9-11 in case of a fire, crime or medical emergency.

Zandar nails it:

When you privatize a utility and cry "Government has no business in business!" and leave everything up to the free market and profit motive, you invariably get people who are priced out of the market. Take for example phone companies who want to simply end landline phone service in the some of the poorest counties in the country in eastern Kentucky.

The industry is pushing Senate Bill 135, referred to as "the AT&T bill" by its sponsor and others because it originated with that company's lobbyists. The bill would strip the Kentucky Public Service Commission of most of its remaining oversight of basic phone service provided by the three major carriers — AT&T, Windstream and Cincinnati Bell — such as the power to initiate investigations into service problems.

More significant, critics say, the bill would let the companies end basic phone service in less profitable parts of their territories if other communications options. State law now requires the companies to serve as "carriers of last resort" for households throughout their territories.

AT&T says it must follow where the market leads. Among its customers, land line usage has dropped 50 percent over the last 10 years and wireless usage has jumped 300 percent, said AT&T spokesman Brad Rateike.

When you take utilities out of the public domain, this is invariably what happens. Profit motive means providing the utility to areas where it's unprofitable means the service is ended. That's where we're heading right now, and with the country needing tens of billions of dollars worth of utility and infrastructure improvements, putting those under the aegis of the free market will only make things worse.

Taxes exist precisely for things like this. But we're told government itself is evil and useless. I may joke about how glibertarians want us all to fend for ourselves, but the reality is that's exactly where we're going under "smaller government".

One of the huge obstacles to progressive legislation in Kentucky is the overwhelming majority in the General Assembly of representatives from rural counties. The annual battle is not so much Democrats vs. repugs as it is urban liberals versus rural mouthbreathing dumbfucks.

The only thing that can unite them is massive amounts of corporate campaign cash. I predict AT&T wins this one.

Kentucky Broadband Survey is Here - Participate Now

The new Kentucky Broadband Survey starts tomorrow, Wednesday, February 8 and runs until Wednesday, March 7.

Since Governor Beshear and his Finance and Administration Cabinet appear to still be unaware that the vast majority of Kentuckians living outside Lexington and Louisville have no access to broadband internet, we have another chance to tell them.

From the press release:

The Commonwealth Office of Broadband Outreach and Development (OBOD) and the Kentucky Council of Area Development Districts (KCADD) are asking businesses and citizens to participate in a survey that will collect information on broadband use as part of the Broadband KY initiative to help increase internet utilization in the daily lives of Kentuckians.

“Broadband services are critical to the advancement of our state in education, economic development and job creation,” said Lori H. Flanery, secretary of the Finance and Administration Cabinet. “The Broadband KY initiative is working to help businesses and citizens take full advantage of existing broadband capabilities and identify areas of greatest need for broadband expansion in homes, schools and commerce.”

The public survey will be available online Feb. 7 to March 8, 2012, at http://broadband.ky.gov. More than 100,000 businesses, non-profit and health organizations, local governments and households in Kentucky will receive email messages this week requesting their participation.

The survey is designed to identify where internet access is not being fully utilized as an educational or business tool, and to target areas with limited or no broadband availability in the state. The results will help build a strategic plan to promote the internet as an economic development asset in all aspects of daily life.

In 2010, Kentucky joined a nationwide effort to identify and map broadband coverage and access. Gov. Steve Beshear created OBOD in the Finance and Administration Cabinet to facilitate this critical step toward expanding broadband internet access, promoting a better understanding of the many uses and benefits of the Internet and spurring economic growth. OBOD conducted a similar online survey in 2010 to collect data on home broadband accessibility.

“This is a unique opportunity for public to tell us about the obstacles they face in using Broadband internet,” said Brian Kiser, executive director of OBOD. “This program has been developed to help get all Kentuckians online and globally engaged.”

The Commonwealth has received more than $5.3 million in grants for broadband mapping and outreach programs, including Broadband KY, from the federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), State Broadband Data and Development (SBDD) grant program.

OBOD launched a similar online survey in 2010 to learn more about where broadband is available in Kentucky. This second survey will focus on who is using broadband and how they are using it in their daily activities. It is designed to identify opportunities across the state where broadband is underused or not valued as an educational and economical tool.

“We need Kentucky to provide a voice so that we can begin deconstructing barriers and working to promote a healthy, vibrant, advanced Kentucky,” said Abby Piper, director of communications and special projects for KCADD. “This progressive program will reach all corners of the state, and we are sincere about making changes for a better Kentucky.”

Click here to take the survey.

Time for Cable Companies to Put Up or Shut Up

Virtually all our economic problems can be traced back to corporations throwing temper tantrums unless they are handed massive profits on a platter.

Zandar:

Some 133 US cities now offer broadband internet as a public utility, but cable companies say that's an unfair advantage and are lobbying to pull the plug.

The reason we don't have universal, very high-speed, affordable broadband is because those very cable companies refuse to provide it. For years, their customers, their toothless regulators, their local officials and the federal government have been begging them to build the universal broadband system that Europe and Japan have enjoyed for so long.

But the fat and lazy cable companies just yawned and called for more monopoly bon-bons. Now that 133 cities have shown they can provide universal broadband faster and more affordably than the cable companies, the cable boys waddle to Washington and blubber about "competition."

The proper response to these companies is this: You have 30 days to build and connect universal high-speed broadband to every single resident in all 50 states. Fail, and you lose the right to offer internet service to any U.S. resident ever. You think ACA is a government takeover? You ain't seen nothin' yet, assholes.

Help Expand Broadband Internet in Kentucky

How are the geniuses in Frankfort supposed to know where they need to expand broadband internet in Kentucky if you don't tell them?

They are actually asking, so take 30 seconds and send in this survey.

In February, 2010 Gov. Steve Beshear announced that Kentucky had been awarded a $2.1 million grant funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) to map broadband availability to help plan for the expansion of Internet services in areas of the state that are currently unserved or underserved.

To meet the timelines and requirements of the grant program, the Finance and Administration Cabinet’s Commonwealth Office of Technology (COT), in association with Michael Baker Corporation, a nationally recognized engineering firm specializing in geographic information systems (GIS) mapping, has commissioned an online survey to collect data on home broadband accessibility.

“Creating the most accurate map of broadband availability is a vital step in bringing high-speed Internet access to all regions, citizens and businesses of the Commonwealth,” said Jonathan Miller, Finance and Administration Cabinet Secretary. “Broadband services are a critical tool in expanding economic development, public safety resources, our living standards and educational and healthcare opportunities.”

Homeowners and businesses are encouraged to take the survey which typically requires five minutes to complete. The data collected from the survey will enable the state to assess the impact of existing and future broadband investments and to ensure that households, businesses and organizations have the services and support that they need to be competitive and keep pace with technology.

The survey is strictly voluntary. The data collected will be used to supplement and validate broadband data collected from service providers, internet surveys and field surveys to determine locations across the state where broadband is unavailable or available only at low speeds.

Households may access the Broadband Availability Survey online at www.ky-bb.com/public. The link for businesses to participate in the survey is www.ky-bb.com/biz.

Individuals who do not have broadband in their homes may complete the survey online at a remote location to indicate where they live and report why they do not have broadband access where they live.

Kentucky Misses Out on National Broadband Funding

Seventeen states will share $7.2 billion in grants and loans to expand broadband internet to areas that don't have it.

Kentucky is not one of them.

Vice President Biden today kicked off $7.2 billion in Recovery Act broadband grant and loan programs, of which $2 billion will be made available on a rolling basis over the next 75 days to bring high-speed Internet to communities that currently have little or no access to the technology.

SNIP

The awards are not only expected to provide initial job opportunities in infrastructure and manufacturing, but help bridge the digital divide and boost economic development for communities held back by limited or no access to the technology.

“New broadband access means more capacity and better reliability in rural areas and underserved urban communities around the country. Businesses will be able to improve their customer service and better compete around the world,” said Vice President Biden. “This is what the Recovery Act is all about – sparking new growth, tapping into the ingenuity of the American people and giving folks the tools they need to help build a new economy in the 21st-century.”

Read the full list of lucky recipients here.

But what the fuck does Kentucky need with 21st-century technology? Or a 21st-century economy? We have coal - the Magic Buggy Whip industry - and it will save us all!