wrote in message
...
The problem described
is almost 100% surely Google's problem.

Well, it can't be "100% surely Google's problem" because I haven't
accessed these groups with Google in the past month or so, and
Newsreader, that was previously (10 years or so) 100% reliable has also
been giving me "can't access" errors sporatically in the last week.
Coincidence? I doubt it.

Doubt all you want. Google's troubles cannot possibly be related to your
own, if you are not using Google to post.

You are using Cox's news server to post to Usenet. If you get an error,
it's because your news reader (NewsWatcher on Mac OS X) failed to
communicate with the Cox news server.

On the other hand, someone having problems posting with Google is dealing
with some failure of their web browser to communicate with Google's web
servers.

In neither case are you directly connected to "Usenet". You are relying on
a third party to do that communication for you, and you would not ever see
errors that happened during that subsequent communication. The only errors
you might see are when your news client (news reader or browser) fails to
correctly interact with your news provider (Cox's servers or Google's
servers). And a problem with Cox's servers won't cause any sort of issue
with someone using Google's servers, no vice a versa.

Pete