With the new leadership in Washington, DC getting ready to take over I’d love to see the list of who wants a handout, bailout or whatever you want to call it. It seems like every group or industry is positioning themselves to get something out of whatever economic stimulus package we get. I just wonder where all this money is supposed to come from when we’re also seeing stories of record government debt at the state and national level. Can you say, “print me the money?”

A story in Business Week talks about those who aren’t happy with the $6 billion in the House Democrats bill slated for broadband development.

“I was incredibly impressed how quickly the House moved,” says Shirley Bloomfield, senior vice-president for federal relations at Qwest Communications (Q), a Denver-based communications provider that serves 14 Western states. “They’ve got some good concepts. But $6 billion is not going to get you to ubiquitous broadband.”

It seems like almost 8 times that is “required.” How about just getting started with what you get and see how it goes? One thing seems to be certain though and that is that we’re going to see continued efforts to develop rural broadband.