"So I am curious as to why you say the ARRL has no interest in hams like us."
Maybe the word 'no' should be substituted with the word 'little'. It is true that the ARRL does throw some crumbs to their members who don't consider emcomm the be all and do all of ham radio, but I would not consider any of what was said is "done" for members not interested in emcomm as the league actually doing much of anything in that regard.
The plain simple fact of the matter is that the league is interested in pushing emcomm to extremes to get and keep getting government interested in what ham radio does--AND to keep getting grant monies coming into the league coffers. THAT is all the ARRL is interested in right now, and it's sad that the premier ham radio organization is sinking to such depths.
I think your perception is rather distorted.
Let's take a look at this month's QST. Leaving out ads, tables of contents and League officers, small fillers etc, we have:
Front cover: Something called WSPR, "Weak Signal Propagation Reporter".
Page 9: Editorial about the history of WRTC (World Radio Team Championship), an HF contest.
Pages 12 & 13: News. Couple of small blurbs that are emcomm related. Picture of AWA convention folks promoting amateur radio in schools, and teaching a ham radio class.
Page 20: "Up Front" - various small articles - suitcase antenna mast, sunspots, interesting picture, and an article about a pumpkin patrol.
Page 24: Correspondence. Nothing about emcomm
Pages 30-32: Cover article about WSPR.
Pages 33-35: Portable vertical antenna made from tape measures. Sort of a manual SteppIr at a tiny fraction of the price. Might have emcomm applications if you do emcomm on 20 trhough 10.
Pages 36-39: Infrared remote control for your HF transceiver - adapter for the FT-817. Amazingly simple - couple of small parts, a PIC, and an infrared detector.
Page 40: Antenna Gain Specs - What Do They Really Mean? - Article on antenna pattern interpretation.
Pages 41-42: An Improved Center Insulator For Antennas Fed With Window Line - old idea brought up to date.
Pages 43-44: An Expanded Scale Voltmeter for 120 or 240 V AC - With A Bonus - Know your line voltage so the tubes in your amp aren't running with low or high filament voltage.
Pages 45-46: Revisitng a 10 and 6 meter Mobile Antenna - homebrew dual band whip for 10 and 6
Page 46: ARRL Homebrew Challenge III - Contest for designers to come up with a low cost homebrew SSB/CW rig for 10 and/or 6 meters.
Pages 47-54 and some others: Product Reviews/New Products:
Icom IC-R6 portable receiver, Hamtronics R303-137 Weather Satellite Receiver Board, Wouxun KG-UV2D and KG-UVD1P Dual Band Handheld Transceivers, APRS Live add-on software, Lightning Protection products from Times Microwave, MFJ matching unit for 160/80 verticals, Bird wattmeter upgrade, Radio Operations Center software, Solid state 9 cm amplifier, Alexloop magnetic loop antenna,
Pages 55-57: Technical Correspondence - Automatic lowpass filter bypass switch.
Pages 58-59: Doctor Is In Q&A. No emcomm
Page 60: Short Takes: S9V vertical antennas
Pages 61-62: Noise figure article
Pages 63-64: Hands-On Radio: Experiment 94 (SWR and line loss)
Pages 65-66: Hints and Kinks
Pages 67-68: Ham Friendship Transcends Time and Space - DX friends meet
Pages 69-71: Article about EME from Kyrgyzstan
Pages 72-73: Alt-Rock Meets Ham Radio - Rock band from Canada
Page 74: FMT announcement
Page 75: Use Beacons to Spot Band Openings
Page 76: W2SKE Award Announcement
Pages 77-80: Happenings of the month
Pages 81-83: Public Service/Emergency Communications (Finally! Three whole pages!)
Page 84: Eclectic Technology - SDR
Pages 85-87: Contest announcements
Pages 88-89: How's DX
Pages 90-92: World Above 50 MHz
Pages 93-94: Vintage Radio
Pages 95-101: At The Foundation, Convention, Hamfest, Special events, 25, 50 & 75 years ago in QST, PSHR, Strays, Silent Keys, Hamspeak
Seems to be a lot of non-emcomm stuff in there.
73 de Jim, N2EY