Comment by mrguyorama

Why was that not a problem in the mid 1800s when we crisscrossed the entire country with railroads and telegraph cables?

Sure is funny how FDR had us spend a little cash 100 years ago to ensure even the remotest farm gets electricity, and we already gave ISPs a shitload of cash to do the same, but now "We can't" build telephone poles to rural places. Even though those same places already have telephone poles for power and telephone.

AT&T was able to leverage it's monopoly position and defense industry relationship to basically invent everything that runs the modern world (and were compelled to license those advancements out) while modern monopolies can't even dig some holes.

Sounds like we need some more "Consent Decrees" and a DoJ that makes large companies scared.

We damned every single river in the nation. We built so much railroad that it crashed the industry. We built those railroads purposely in places where nobody lived and then willed towns into existence around them. We built the interstate highway system.

Why can we suddenly not build anything? Maybe it's because people keep insisting, against all historical evidence, that we can't, and they don't even try.