Okay, you know from my posting yesterday (see immediately below) that the Swamp Fox is back in DC ensconced at PFF. And you know that, unlike Charleston, it's too darn cold and there's too much pavement for swamp foxes to survive up here. So rest assured that this is the last time--for a while at least--that I'll be using my nom de guerre earned in South Carolina.

The big news today, of course, is the official release of the report, "Trends in the Competitiveness of Telecommunications Markets: Implications for Deregulation of Local Telephone Services." If you are not convinced after reading this report, co-authored by Richard Levine, Joseph Kraemer, and me, that the telecom world is fast changing, and that even the local telecom markets are already contestable, if not effectively competitive, then you and I need to sit down and have a little chat.

Don't forget to register and attend our seminar on the Hill tommorrow on this very subject--local telcommunications competition, not the habitat of swamp foxes. We're going to have a good discussion, what with John Windhausen, John Morabito, Brad Ramsay, and Blair Levin reacting to the new report. And you and I can even have our little chat about telecommunications competition there!