I work for SBC and believe me, we would wire everybody if the gubmint would get out of the way. They will only allow us to go places where there is already competition. Now that the dot com bubble has burst, there is planned expansion on hold because we would have an "unfair advantage" if nobody else was there. It is regulation that is stopping expansion in Texas. Yes, we can and will go farther than the 18k limit by using pair gain or what we call SLC huts with fiber to DSLAM systems. No, you don't have to have fiber to the house to do it. Several of the competitors have gone under during the economic downturn, and have thwarted our expasion plans. The gubmit even forces us to give our competitors floor space in our C.O's with cages in them for their equipment. We cannot even stop the techs from access to our offices. This was hairy during the recent upsurge in security we couldn't even challenge people in our buildings as long as they had badges. They could be ex cons or Taliban for all we knew. If the gubmit will cut the RBOCS some slack, you'll get your speed and we'll make money. Our stock has been in the $36-$38 range recently, partly because of the Broadband delay's. I also install fiber mux's for the competition and recently we have had a spate of disconnects. So wireless and cable haven't been doing all that well either.
BTW, I live and work in the country, not in the city. Broadband maybe doing fine in the city, but I don't have first hand knowledge.
I won't give you a hard time for defending your company, but I disagree with your analysis of why SBC has stopped deployment of DSL. The reason they have stopped is to pressure Congress into passing the Tauzin-Dingell bill. It's nothing less than extortion.
SBC promised to get a certain percentage of customers access to DSL availability, then they broke their promise. Whitacre blamed it on the WTC attacks and federal regulations (the same regulations that were in place when he made his original Project Pronto announcement.)
I hope Congress won't give in to SBC's blackmail. They should just declare DSL the new telecommunications standard and give the RBOCs a few years to switch over - with incentives like investment tax credits if the RBOCs are successful, and more access by the competition to the RBOC network if they fail.