My Dysfunctional Relationship

I have something important to say.

This past week, after much thought, I ended an abusive relationship. After nearly 30 years, the lies, the cheating ,the blackmail, the disrespect have grown to be too much. So I've broken it off at last and found another.

Yes -- I'm .... no longer an AT&T subscriber.

Once a stodgy regulated monopoly, American Telephone and Telegraph was broken up, deregulated, and reformed into the very paradigm of the modern American corporation. That is to say, it delivers the absolute minimum value for the absolute maximum price. As time goes on, you pay more and more for less and less.

AT&T makes sloppy billing errors -- always in its own favor. It sells services that do not meet expectations. It herds you into online billing and then makes the task difficult, confusing, and buggy. I have vivid memories of Rhumba cursing like a sailor while she tried to pay our bill.

AT&T is big and stupid and greedy. And it lets the government listen to all your phone calls. It didn't even ask for a legal justification; it just caved right in.

But we had to stay with AT&T for the DSL, about the only affordable broadband in America. Without AT&T local phone service, we can't get DSL.

Oh, there is choice: broadband through Comcast, our cable provider. But Comcast products are just as expensive and bundled with services we don't want; and Comcast is just as bad a company as AT&T in every way.

We call this a duopoly: "free choice" between two equally bad companies that don't really compete with each other.

For you overseas visitors, I should point out that here in the states we now pay much more than you for broadband and phone service, and get a lot less. That's the power of a duopoly with bought-and-paid-for friends in high places.

And then somebody had to go and screw up: real competition is happening.

My local independent Internet service provider hooked up with an upstart regional provider called Sonic, and they are offering ultra-fast broadband and unlimited real telephone service for $45 a month. Cheaper than AT&T; better than AT&T; and most of all, NOT AT&T.

We switched this week without a single hitch. The service is just as advertised. Life is good; AT&T's not in it.

In other news, I opened an account at a local credit union and will move most of our money there from Big Bank Incorporated, where it is now. The credit union offers more convenience, more services, and a free national ATM network. And it will loan our money to our community in responsible ways.

Rhumba and I also seek alternatives to cable TV so we can cut Comcast out of our lives as well.

Do you see a pattern here? The class of extreme wealth controls telecom companies, cable companies and banks which people believe that they can't live without

Only they can. And if they can, they should.