Government Spending Billions To Expand Broadband but Can't Tell Who Needs It (Los Payasos)

 In November 2021, Congress passed and President Joe Biden signed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), a $1.2 trillion grab bag of public spending wish list items. One of those projects, the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program, would expand broadband access to communities that currently lack access to high-speed internet. BEAD would dole out $42.45 billion in state grants, and the Government Accountability Office estimated that the projects could require as many as 23,000 additional telecom workers to complete.

The only problem is that the government currently has no idea where broadband actually is and is not available.

...To determine what areas need investment, the government relies on maps from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). But despite costing $350 million, the FCC's maps are notoriously unreliable and have been for many years.

...Now, with more than $40 billion in state grants on the line, states are scrambling to challenge the new maps, which cost the FCC nearly $45 million in addition to the $350 million previously spent. Of course, the best option would be for the federal government to not have spent those billions in the first place and let states address their own needs: Before the passage of the infrastructure bill, Georgia not only made its own maps but partnered with Windstream to jointly spend $300 million expanding high-speed fiber internet access in the state...more

Los Payasos - Town Says Teens Who Cut Neighborhood Grass Must Pay $110 For Business Licenses

Government officials and the owners of professional lawn-mowing services in a Birmingham, Alabama suburb say teenagers must pay $110 for an official business license if they want earn some cash this summer cutting the grass in neighborhood yards. The site of the business license brouhaha is the town of Gardendale (pop.: 13,893), reports local ABC affiliate WBMA. Local residents say they aren’t happy about the $110 tax on teenagers who are actually trying to do something useful in society.  Gardendale Mayor Stan Hogeland explained that everyone operating a business within the city limits must fork over $110 for a business license. “I would really love to have something on our books that gave, I guess, a more favorable response to that student out there cutting grass,” Hogeland told the local ABC affiliate. “And see if there’s maybe a temporary license during the summer months that targets teenagers.”...more

Imagine that. A teenager who wants to mow her neighbor's yard must have a license. Los Payasos must have their revenue.

US Customs Destroys Virtuoso's Flutes Because They Were "Agricultural Items"

Before you whine about an airline temporarily losing your luggage, think of poor Boujemaa Razgui. The flute virtuoso who performs regularly with The Boston Camerata lost 13 handmade flutes over the holidays when a US Customs official at New York’s JFK Airport mistook the instruments for pieces of bamboo and destroyed them. Razgui, a Canadian citizen who lives some of the time in Brockton, had flown last week from Morocco to Boston, with stops in Madrid and New York. In New York, he says, an official opened his luggage and found the 13 flutelike instruments — 11 nays and two kawalas. Razgui says he had made all of the instruments using hard-to-find reeds. “They said this is an agriculture item,” said Razgui, who was not present when his bag was opened. “I fly with them in and out all the time and this is the first time there has been a problem. This is my life.” When his baggage arrived in Boston, the instruments were gone. He was instead given a number to call. “They told me they were destroyed,” he says. “Nobody talked to me. They said I have to write a letter to the Department of Agriculture in Washington, D.C. This is horrible."...more 

I don't have much truck with flute players but destroying this man's property is ridiculous.  The flutes have a mouthpiece with a reed in them and the fingering holes...and the fool thinks its a stick of bamboo?  This is the same government that wants to control my healthcare!

Its time to resurrect the Los Payasos designation and award it to this employee of U.S. Customs who appears to be nothing but a big old waste of skin.