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CLANDESTINE RADIO WATCH             CUMBRE DX SPECIAL
EXTRA March 15, 2001                337.6

The following report is a collaborative effort between Cumbre DX and
Clandestine Radio Watch.
===============================================

USA: Standoff with KSMR Underway

By Hans Johnson, Cumbre DX
        Nick Grace C., Clandestine Radio Watch - Washington Bureau
        with reports by Chris Lobdell and Martin Schoech.

[Mar 15] A standoff is underway between the U.S. government and the
recently-launched Kentucky State Militia Radio (KSMR) and the
situation is on the verge of reaching critical mass.  With time
ticking both sides are preparing for a showdown that could happen
within days.

Documents just obtained by CDX-CRW indicate that members of the
Kentucky State Militia (KSM) have been under investigation by the
Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for alleged amateur radio
violations since December.  The documents reveal a tense confron-
tation between KSM "Major" Steve Anderson, who engineers and hosts
KSMR, and "Commander" Charlie Puckett against the FCC, which has
culminated in the revocation of Anderson's amateur radio license.

Anderson, who held the Extra-class license AA8DP, received a
"Warning Notice," dated December 8, 2000 that states "Monitoring
information before the Commission indicates that on December 4, 2000
you operated radio-transmitting equipment on 6.890 MHz, a frequency
not licensed to you under your extra Class license."

Puckett, when interviewed independently by CRW and CDX last week,
denied published monitoring reports that the KSM or its members were
involved in the alleged transmissions, which jammed commercial radio
station WWFV.

The FCC, according to the documents, also began an investigation
into Puckett, who holds the Technician-class license KF4ZMG, for
operating on 3860 kHz in December.  Puckett denied the violation in
writing, stating that the transmissions were under the "control" of
Anderson - who is licensed for operation on that frequency.  When
the government requested specific details from Anderson about the
dates, times and the nature of the transmissions' identification, he
returned his license to the FCC.  "At this time," he wrote in
response to the government, "be advised that... the contract with
the agency Federal Communications Commission, an agent of a foreign
corporation, under the auspices of Amateur Radio license AA8DP, is
hereby rescinded.  All authority assumed by the F.C.C. is null and
void."

"I do not reside in any territory or possession of the Federal
Government of the United States of America," he continued, "and am
not subject to any regulation by this fictitious entity."

In what seems to be a major development, Anderson announced during a
broadcast on Friday, March 9, that he received another letter from
the FCC - presumably for his transmissions as KSMR.  "(There is) no
point in citing me," he stated.  "This is not my station.  This is
the Kentucky Militia station... We don't want to hear from you (be-
cause) you don't have anything to say to us.  You don't have any
authority over us.  We are asserting our First Amendment Rights here
and are protecting them with the Second Amendment."  The Second
Amendment refers to the right to bear arms.

-- "Take My Gun from My Cold Dead Hands" --

Anderson launched KSMR on March 3 and has broadcast nightly on 3260
kHz USB between 0300 and 0400 UTC.  The live programs, confirmed by
CRW and CDX to be sponsored by the KSM, begin with a song called
"Take My Gun (From My Cold Dead Hands)" by David VonKleist that
segues into 15 minutes of militia announcements.  Anderson proceeds
into a thirty-minute commentary on such topics as Christianity,
alleged U.S. government cover-ups, and justifications for the
existence of patriot militia movement - which perceives itself to be
defending the country against a corrupted and conspiratorial federal
government.  The program then ends with a 15-minute recitation of
militia contact addresses across the United States.

"We are trying to protect and defend the (U.S.) Constitution and our
sovereign Republic," Anderson told CRW-CDX when reached by
telephone.  "I hope we're giving a positive message."

According to Puckett, the KSM is sponsoring the station to provide
news and information that is not widely available to the public.  In
fact, he alleged, commercial shortwave stations have been censoring
patriot programming.  "They were selectively pulling programs off...
Information that people need!"

Published reports, however, indicate that many programs have been
taken off the air for financial and not ideological reasons.

KSMR, Anderson openly revealed, operates at approximately 800 watts,
uses an extended-double zep antenna at 110' (36 meters).  The
antenna, he said, provides for a 3dB gain over a regular dipole
antenna, and plans are in the works to employ a 3kW amplifier he
calls the "rock crusher."  Regardless, the station is already heard
coast-to-coast and has even been monitored in Western Europe.

On Wednesday, March 14, he tested 6880 kHz and claims that the sta-
tion will soon carry live programming from the Genesis and Heritage
radio networks through a satellite feed.  If all goes as planned,
the station will operate full-time from 9 AM (1400 UTC) to 12 AM
midnight (0500 UTC) on 3260, 6880, and 12181 kHz USB.  When asked
for his reasoning to use this set of frequencies, which are all at
least 10 kHz below WWFV, Anderson noted that KSMR will occasionally
move off frequency in order to avoid interference.  But, he said, if
nearby WWFV "I'm easy to find."

"You'd be suprised at how cohesive and unified the patriot community
is," Puckett told CRW-CDX last week during a telephone interview.
"KSMR is truly a national effort."  He said that donations amounting
to US$2800 have already been collected for the station.  And indeed,
Anderson often announces during his broadcasts that new equipment
supplied by other militia groups have been shipped to the station
"garrison."

Although the Internet can be a useful and expedient communications
tool, Puckett explained, the government "can bring it down.  Short-
wave is the only reliable communication medium... Everyone in the
patriot community has got a shortwave radio."

In fact, both Anderson and Puckett claim that KSMR, as the first
unlicensed militia radio station, is not only showing other groups
that it is possible to establish an independent voice on radio but
also inspiring other groups to take to the airwaves.  During a
"major" militia rally in Norm Creek, Kentucky, next month, Anderson
will lead a discussion on communications and antennas to members of
other groups who will attend.

-- Lying in Wait --

The government, needless to say, is taking the KSM's defiance
seriously and, CDX-CRW has learned, is already planning for the
station's closure.

"We know who they are.  We know where they are," Riley Hollingsworth
of the FCC Enforcement Bureau said.  "There will be an enforcement
action... It's still an open case, and with his continuing the pi-
rate station on 3260 kHz he is at risk of a minimum US$7,500 fine as
well as equipment seizure."

KSMR, however, is unmoved by the thought of a confrontation with the
government.  "This is not one guy," Anderson announced during a
recent program.  "There's about 13,000 of us down here... We're not
worried."

When reached by phone, he said "We're not threatening anybody...
Wouldn't KSMR come in handy if there was a national emergency?  We
sure think it would."

Nevertheless, the vow to protect the station under their rights as
enshrined in the Second Amendment - the right to bear arms - has
caused some listeners to worry that the impending physical confron-
tation could lead to violence.  Given KSMR's vow to defend the
station, sources within the FCC have told CDX-CRW that law enforce-
ment personnel will accompany the agents during the closure.  But
according to Larry Clance at the FCC, there has never been a case of
an unlicensed station defending itself with firearms.

Whether KSMR becomes the first remains to be seen.  Clearly, though,
the standoff has already begun.

99 responses total.

These guys sound like an American version of the Taliban. The only 
difference is that their holy book seems to be their interpretation of 
the Second Amendment, not the Quran.

They are clearly operating an illegal station. Federal agents are going 
to shut them down, and when they do, they will be carrying firearms. If 
shot at, the agents will shoot back, possibly killing these guys. If 
they want to be martyrs, I guess that's their business, but it seems 
silly to me.

        *hic*

Somehow, i get the impression that the Feds are approaching this with
their usual machismo, by-the-bookism, and 'bout-as-sharp-as-cottage
cheese political savvy.

What's that mean? The broadcasts are illegal. The law should be enforced.

Re:3  That might not be a fair assumption, especially if it is solely 
based on the report in #0.  Consider the source.

Re:4  Surely you are not suggesting that brute force law enforcement is 
the logical response to such a potentially inflammatory situation.  The 
comments in #3 do not suggest that the law shouldn't be enforced, but 
rather that in enforcing them, officials should proceed in a more 
cautious manner than seems to be indicated in #0.  I would have thought 
you'd catch that.

Not at all. i in #3 suggested that #0 contained some threats from
the FCC. It doesn't: the threats all come from Anderson. The FCC
is only stated to have said they will enforce the law. 

        The feds will be sure to randomly try to shut this down on
Patriots day, April 19th.

  "Patriots' Day"?  Who came up with that little bit of nauseatingly
  inappropriate marketing?

It's been around for quite a long time, actually. It's even a holiday 
in Massachusetts.

I wonder which country he thinks he lives in, since he clearly doesn't
think he lives in the same country as the FCC?

  how long is "for quite a long time"?  I'd be pretty surprised if the
  name if it predated the Branch Davidian incident and the Ruby Ridge
  shootout.  This is the first I've heard of any states recognizing 4/19
  as a holiday..

  re #10:  the letter-writer's refusal to recognize the legitimacy
  of the federal government is similar to the position of members
  of various far-right groups in the "posse comitatus" movement.
  Adherents generally claim not to recognize any government above a
  certain level (usually the county level, sometimes smaller, as with
  the Montana "Freemen" and their "Justus Township") and many proclaim
  themselves "sovereign citizens," claiming the right to issue their
  own idenfication and drivers' licenses, refusing to pay taxes to a
  federal government of a nation they claim not to be citizens of, etc..

  Some of the semantic shenanigans they engage in are fascinating,
  resulting in bizarrely contorted interpretations of the law and
  startling "conclusions" about the nature of the government and legal
  systems (such as the belief that courts which feature a fringe on
  the U.S. flag are actually courts operating under "admiralty law" and
  their decisions therefore null and void upon citizens not subject to
  said law..)  A lot of them use their bizarre (and discredited) legal
  reasoning to harass opponents and critics by doing things like filing
  liens against the critics' property, etc..  In some ways they're like
  a fundamentalist religious cult with a unique interpretation of 
  scripture, except that the "scriptures" they're interpreting are
  legal and historical documents.

Twas the 18th of April in '75
Hardly a man is still alive that remembers that famous day and year
la, la, la,
So listen my children and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere.

There are a lot of pirate radio stations, and very few are associated with
gun nut cults.  I'm a bit of a fan of pirate radio, myself.

Groups like this also serve another purpose.  They give the NRA folks 
some people to look up to as martyrs.  It doesn't matter what they were 
doing wrong...if they own a gun and dislike the government, to the NRA 
they're a saint.

I've been wondering how much of a martyr Timothy McVeigh will be to
these people.  It strikes me as a peculiarly stupid decision of the
federal gov't to execute McVeigh - the sort of thing only a politician
would want to do.

I love how he calls the Federal Government of the United States of America
a "fictitious entity," and then goes on to talk about rights guaranteed in
the US Constitution, and about defending the US Constitution.  Doesn't the
US Constitution pretty clearly establish the "fictitious entity" known as the
Federal Government?

Re: #4/5/6
I wasn't assuming much truth value in #0; just that there was a conflict
with the Feds and that said Feds were handling it in their usual way.

(I'd be surprised if the Feds were not somewhat selectively enforcing the
pirate radio laws against anti-government types - which might be illegal
*for the Feds*, and is certainly poor tactics.) 

Straight-forward law enforcement in this case seems about as likely to
inspire compliance with the law as shooting at groups of rock-throwing
Palestinians is to bring quick peace in the Middle East.  Is the law to
be enforced for its own sake, or is the actual goal compliance? 

well, if he really has 13,000 members ready to come over and help defend the
station, the feds might have a difficult time.  Radio station regulation is
one of the few areas I think the Federal government has a duty to regulate.

What I hear about FCC enforcement of the law, at least in ham bands (such
as the 3860 they used), is that it is mostly pretty ordinary quacks, often
being obnoxious, using profane language, interfering with other hams, etc.
I think this is much more common than "pirate radio". It is interesing
that they moved off the ham bands - perhaps not to get the hams down on
them (in addition to the FCC)? The hams might conduct a midnight raid of
their own if they are stamped on... 

Re #18: From what I've heard (amateur radio journals frequently report 
on FCC enforcement actions) they don't much seem to care what an 
unlicensed station is broadcasting.  They seem to prioritize more on how 
wide an area the station is covering and whether they're interfering 
with legal stations.  Build an AM station that broadcasts for a few 
blocks and park it on an empty frequency and it'll take them a long time 
to get around to you.  Start jamming commercial stations or broadcasting 
worldwide and they'll come down on you a lot quicker.

re #4 Rane it doesn't seem that cut and dried to me, what about the 1st
amendment right under the constitution of free speech?  According to a
long history of supreme court decisions the speech that should be given
the highest level of protection is unpopular political speech. I think
this station qualifies to the t under that criteria. 

While I may find many of the militias positions distasteful such as their
ties to "identity" racist Christian sects, and their anti environmental
positions, it is nonetheless the protection of their right of free speech
that also protects the right of free speech of alternative pirate radio
stations who I agree with such as "Radio Free Cascadia" in Eugene Oregon,
near where I live, that was recently shut down by the F.C.C.  It seems to
me that the answer to bad speech is more speech, not the government
censorship of shutting stations with unpopular opinions. 

Micro power stations should of course be prevented from interfering with
the broadcasts of other radio stations but I suspect that would come about
easily once licenses for micro power stations are made cheaply and easily
available.  I believe that at that point enforcement of F.C.C. laws would
be appropriate, however, at this point I think the F.C.C. laws are mainly
being used hassle micro power radio stations with unpopular opinions.  In
this case the first amendment right to free speech trumps any F.C.C.
regulations that are being used to suppress free speech. 

For more information on the struggles of micro power broadcasters see:
See Stephen Dunifers excellent site http://www.freeradio.org/
 

Now linked to cyberpunk, where we discuss among other things the role of laws
and social mores in a networked world.

"'Identity' racist Christian sects?" what are those?

Radio and television broadcasts have long been held to different standards
than most speech.  There is nothing new there.

"Idenity" chrisitans have some weird racist idealogy about Chrisitans and
their supposed racial origins.  I don't know anything more about them
because I find such tripe disgusting, however, if you are really curious
you could do a search on google and read some of thier propaganda. 

re #11:

Here's a bit of what I gleaned off the Net about Patriot's Day:

(from http://www.world.std.com/~adamg/patriotsday.html)
The shot heard 'round the world continues to reverbate. On the third 
Monday in April, Massachusetts and Maine celebrate Patriots Day in 
honor of the battles and skirmishes that began our fight for 
independence. This year, Patriots Day is April 16 - except in Concord, 
where they'll celebrate it on the real day: April 19. 

Yes, they take their Patriots Day seriously in Concord. On Patriots 
Day, troops of Minutemen assemble at dawn in Concord and surrounding 
towns to recreate the "line of march" to the Old North Bridge, 
Emerson's "rude bridge," where they face off in a gunbattle with a 
troop of Redcoats. 

===end quote===

Patriot's Day is also the day on which they run the Boston Marathon.

I don't think he has much of a case that closing down his station is 
denying him freedom of speech. Regulating who can set up a radio 
station, on what frequency, and at what power, is necessary to avoid 
total chaos. And as far as I can see, no one is preventing him from 
applying for a license to broadcast legally. 

He's trying to provoke a fight, and that's what he'll get. I also 
highly doubt, when push comes to shove, that he has the 13,000 
suppporters that he says he has.

If he really wanted to do it right, he should buy a ship, outfit it 
with the necessary gear, and head out into international waters. Out 
there, the FCC doesn't have any jurisdiction. I'm not sure if there are 
any stations out there now, but in the past, several "pirate" stations 
have used this approach.

re #27 That would be true if micro power radio licenses were cheap and
easy to obtain as ought to be in the case in a democracy that has a right
to free speech.  That is not the case however, rado licenses are expensive
(tens of thousands of dollars?) and the amount of red tape required to get
a license is enormous.  Yes, station operators should be required to space
their stations so they don't interfere with other broadcasts, and the
transmitters ought to be certified so they don't drift or occupy excessive
bandwidth.  However that process of educating broadcasters could be made
as inexpensive and easy as obtaining a ham radio license which it is not
at this point.  The main purpose of current license esp after the telecom
deregulation act of 1996 has been to preserve market share for commercial
broadcasters and space for NPR and the the few other "acceptable"
alternatives.  This lack of media diversity ought to be troubling to
people who understand that true democracy only thrives when the diversity
of information available to people isn't censored by the government.

I agree with you that micropower radio station license should be more 
widely available, BUT this guy isn't interested in a micropower radio 
station. He would not be satisfied with the kind of coverage that a 
micropower station would give him.

While I don't think it's a good thing that the conglomerates are 
snapping up radio stations, I don't think micropower radio stations are 
the answer to that particular problem. Their coverage is going to be 
way too limited, and as a result, their staffs too small to really make 
a difference.

To make a difference to whome?  I would love to have a micro power station
in my community that focused on regional issues.  It seems to me that a vital
component of democracy is to have public forums to discuss local issues
ala the New England town meeting.  To my mind micro power radio is one of
those forums.

800 watts is not a micropower station.  There are international 
shortwave broadcasters that run less.

re 30:
        Given that radio frequency is a limited resource, how would you decide
who does and does not get it?

From the beginning, freedom of the press (which is probably more relevant to
this case than freedom of speech) has been limited in that it applies only
to those who have presses.  If you have the capability to print a newspaper
or pamphlet (a capability that's rather easy to obtain now, but certianly
wasn't 200 years ago), freedom of the press means that you can print almost
anything you want.  It does not, however, give you the right to walk into your
local newspaper's printing plant and print your own paper without permission
on their equipment, nor does it give you the right to demand that the
newspaper include articles you have submitted.

Having a radio frequency is somewhat like having a printing press.  It costs
money, and there are a finite amount of them.  The difference is that the
finite number of radio frequencies is considerably smaller than the finite
number of printing presses, and that printing presses are easier to make more
of if the deman exceeds the supply.

Micropower FN transmitters are permitted - you can buy them at Radio
Shack, and no license is required. Now, *mini* power stations are
something else. One problem that must underlie the refusal to license
them is conflict with other stations. With the required frequency
spacing (0.1 MHz), there are not a lot of free channels at any given
spot. There is also not very much spatial separation between stations
operating on the same frequency. Properly locating them and regulating
them will be more work than regulating the current big stations. 
Then, since they would cost a lot less to set up and operate than a
regular station, there will be many more conflicts between different
groups wanting mini stations in the same area - how will that be 
resolved? These are all NOT simple problems to resolve.

Re #22: I am also not in favor of "shutting stations with unpopular opinions",
but I am in favor of regulating the resource - radio bands - that are
required. Your "freedom of speech" is already heavy regulated by requirements
concerning using related resources: you must have a license to drive
to the spot where you will speak; you must schedule and/or obtain a 
permit for some forms of speech (parades, rallies, etc) any place where
the use of public spaces must be available to all; you may be required
to clean up your own litter and remove your soap box, etc. The speech is
free, but not the infrastructure to support it.

Yes but why isn't the FCC attempting to address these problems rather than
just shutting down micro power broadcasters?  The only reason a liscense
to broadcast costs 10,000+ dollars is to limit access to the radio as a
medium to diseminate information to the rich, period.  If we can liscense
cars which are far more dangerous than radio transmitters for less than
200 dollars than then we should be able to do the same with radio
transmitter for a similar amount of money.  There is spectrum to spare
and it ought it be distributed
on a first come first served baises to anyone who is properly trained in
running a radio transmitter that does not bleed over into adjacent
frequencies. 



I imagine most Grexers would be pretty upset if running a Unix based BBs
required a 10,000 dollar liscense.  Why should we be any less upset that
this sort of restriction is being placed on the micro radio community, a
community I might add that serves low income people far better than a BBs
as far more people have access to radios than have access to computers.
Have we really come to a point in this country where our right of free
speech is contingent on ponying up beucoup bucks to the government?  If so
we are in a sad state of decline indeed.

The reason your analogy in the last paragraph of #34 fails is because 
radio is broadcast technology while bbs/internet is narrowcast 
technology.  

Anything you want to publish/post on the internet is inherently incapable 
of directly interfering with someone else's legitimate rights to do the 
same, short of intentional sabotage.  

Radio broadcasts necessarily impinge on other radio broadcasts -- not 
even necessarily in the same frequency range -- depending on signal 
strength.

*That* is why microradio regulation is necessary to a degree not required 
for any internet technology.

Sure regulation may be required by the liscenses do NOT need to be so
expensive, and there is free spectrum in many areas so the FCC needs to
get in gear and open up this spectrum to those who would use it. After all
the airwaves are public space, why should they be reserved for a few
private corporate individuals?  Even if the research neccesary to do dole
out this spectrum in a fair and techinacally correct fashion costs a few
million dollars isn't this a better use of goverment money than the say 60
BILLION that is mandated for a national missle defense system that is
proven not to work? 

It's not true that "interference" isn't possible on the Internet.  The proper
Internet analogy to radio frequencies is probably IP addresses.  IP addresses
are the numeric addresses that identify all hosts on the Internet, and each
IP address hs to be unique so that data headed to it will get to the right
place.  IP addresses are allocated in large blocks by some central registries
to medium to large ISPs, which then assign smaller blocks of addresses to
their customers.  Every Internet connected network (generally on the ISP or
large company level) uses a protocol called BGP to announce what blocks of
IP addresses they have or can reach.  While the registries control who owns
the IP addresses, they have no technical control over who is actually
announcing the address blocks, so it happens from time to time that somebody
announces a route to a block of IP addresses that they shouldn't be
announcing, and if other networks listen to the announcements this creates
problems reaching whoever is supposed to have that address block.

I should note that those blocks of IP addresses cost money, although not
nearly as much as radio licenses because there are a lot more avialable IP
addresses.

In raven's complaints about the license fees, he seems to be missing a basic
understanding of market economics.  As things stand now, there is a very
sharply limited supply of radio frequency space that can be picked up by the
radios currently being sold to consumers, and which is being allocated to
standard radio broadcasts.  Since running a radio station is very profitable,
and is something lots of companies want to be doing, and since this frequency
space is limited, there are far more companies wanting frequencies than there
are frequencies available.  Prices get imposed on things for two reasons. 
One is to recover costs or make money.  The other, which is applicable in this
case, is to limit demand for a scarce resource.  Radio licenses are expensive
becasue that's what keeps more companies from attempting to buy them than
there are licenses available.  Given that companies are willing to pay that
much for them, it's likely that if they were being sold cheaper they would
be snapped up by speculators on a first come/first served basis, and then
resold to the radio stations for those high amounts.

re #37 Radio frequencies, however, are a public resource somewhat like our
national parks and national forests.  Why should these public resources be
handed over to corperations just so they can make a buck? Don't the
people have a right to speak on their own public airwaves that we own in
common as people of the USA? It seems to me that one of the highest roles
of a government in a constititional democracy such as ours is to encourage
diverse public debate in every forum possible. 

Just as people need public parks for recreation (Steve being in
California surely you can appreciate the value of the public forests
there) so people also need non comadafied mental space in the form of
small diverse micro broadcasters, or are we are mearly a nation of shop
keepers as Samual Johnson long ago complained about England? 

If we can spare billons for "defense," surely we can spare a few million
to defend our right to be able to speak in our public ariways in a fashion
that won't be disruptive to other broadcasters. Has the U.S. really become
so small minded that the right of free speech only belongs to those who
can pay a market price of millions for that right in liscensing fees,
large transmiters, etc?  A right of free speech that is only available to
the rich and well connected in the "market" is pretty meaningless.

Furthur I can say from a practical point of view that having listened to a
lot of pirate radio in Humboldt county California that it's a hell of lot
more interesting than what you hear on comercial radio.  Are we really
well served by yet another rebroadcast of Rush Limbaugh on frequncies that
could be used for something more interesting?

        What made that pirate radio interesting?
        The talk?  The personalities?  The music?  Because it was there?

- Backtalk version 1.3.30 - Copyright 1996-2006, Jan Wolter and Steve Weiss