I am just glad to see USBC show concern.If only they would take away these 15 dry boards and put some skill back in the game.Glad to see my 21$ at work.And don't say they do with sport patterns.In my town you mention sport patterns and I would be bowling in a one man league.
I've typically sided with USBC on that issue only in as much as bowlers/proprietors have always been given the freedom to make conditions as easy or difficult as they want them. Like you said, it's the bowlers who really don't seem to want challenging patterns; that's why programs like Sport failed. When it really came down to it, too few bowlers actually wanted that challenge.
However, as I've thought about it more as time has gone on, I agree with you. USBC, as the governing body, needed to accept the role of being the "bad guy" so to speak and mandate conditions standards. Still, I can see why they didn't/haven't. With membership already declining, they are afraid that a move like that would send a huge number of bowlers away, which is something the organization couldn't survive. As such, they're opted for the slow bleed as opposed to risking the kill shot.
The decision to throw away the integrity of the sport wasn't due to people potentially stopping league bowling.
That decision was forced on the ABC/USBC by the BPAA which threatened to self sanction their leagues if the ABC/USBC didn't come up with a rule where proprietors could make the conditions easier to attract more business, while not risking having honor scores declined.
The reason ABC/USBC should have said no is because the "new" business the easy conditions would attract wasn't from non-bowlers who decided to bowl because of easy conditions, it was by proprietors taking existing bowlers from near by proprietors.
Easy conditions were in the self interest of the proprietor implementing them, not in the interest of bowling in general.
ABC/USBC rather than protecting the integrity of the sport, only protected their own paychecks.
