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IMSO, Amateur Radio GHz 99.5% arcane hobby and %.5% beneficial to society. The whinings of the ARRL are self serving, ludicrous and narrow sighted. Technology available to non-hobbyists continues to advance, ever diminishing the benefits of Amateur Radio to society while at the same time, the Amateur Radio Community struggles radically to gain membership. In fact, the common track is to continually reduce aptitude requirements for licensing. A death spiral I see!

You are forgetting alot of things here, IMO.
First, for those of us in "rural" areas, Ham radio does lots of things. The Sheriff's office RELIES on the Ham radio operators as back up to when their ordinary systems get hammered by weather or whatever.
Ham radio operators are ESSENTIAL in mountain rescue operations, co-ordinating search teams, bouncing their signals off the mountain top relays THEY have INSTALLED and PAID FOR. This may not count for much in the city areas, but it means alot to the rural areas.
Alot of athletic events in the rural areas are also dependent on the Ham operators, as event communications.
What will also be affected, I have heard, is CB communications. For those of you who don't travel by car alot, the entire trucking system relies on CB communications from truck to truck on the open road. I have a CB in my truck, and I have had to use it 5 times with various breakdowns of mine or another person. There is an incredible amount of goods moved by truck that the whole country uses EVERY day. The Homeland Security agency has enlisted and trained long haul truckers for more eyes and ears in the problems of possible terrorist activities. That is their communication.
Lots of truckers have cell phones, but they live on the CB radios. What disruption to that part of the commerce of the USA will be hammered by this "advance" in technology?
Short wave radio will be overrun, also, and there are a great number of persons who enjoy listening to shortwave from all around the world.
I personally don't see the need for "broadband" to be using the electrical system of the country, effectively riding the coattails of the power companies who placed the lines and poles in place. Not every person in a rural area even wants broadband. They barely use computers, and they like it that way. They have no use for alot of "big city" ways, and they are not going to appreciate it being crammed down their throats and added to their current telephone bills.
As for power outages not being as bad as another poster stated? I live north of Sacramento. The power went out 3 times yesterday for short periods- NOT just a flicker. Don't tell us about "NO POWER OUTAGES". We live with it all the time, expecially in winter. The longest I have dealt with was almost 2 days in the last couple of years.

"IMSO, Amateur Radio GHz 99.5% arcane hobby and %.5% beneficial to society. The whinings of the ARRL are self serving, ludicrous and narrow sighted. Technology available to non-hobbyists continues to advance, ever diminishing the benefits of Amateur Radio to society while at the same time, the Amateur Radio Community struggles radically to gain membership. In fact, the common track is to continually reduce aptitude requirements for licensing. A death spiral I see!"

Remember those words come the next hurricane, big forest fire, or attack on the infrastructure. ANd stick to them - and refuse any information that came your way via ham radio.

What would you have rural police, fire and EMS depts. on low band do when their calls can't get thru due to BPL interference? Someone who's an expert on off roading is very familiar with conditions in remote rural areas by definition - and thus has the answer to that problem. Right?

Amateur radio engineers have used the amateur spectrum as a testbed for many of the wireless technolgies and packet structures now seen in the mass market. Over 10 years ago, two of my friends had a 10 mbit microwave link between their PCs, and the transmission theories behind their links are the same that were eventually incorporated into the 802.11 standards. Additionally, hams were doing digital spread spectrum years before the technology made it into cordless phones and other mass market uses.