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December 21, 2010
Moonbat Bureaucrats Move on Internet
Posted by Dave Blount at December 21, 2010 10:04 AM
You had to know ever-expanding Big Government would close its ham-like fists around the throat of the Internet eventually. Today FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, aka "Julius Seizure" is launching a major offensive that will serve as a beachhead for eventual total control. Republican FCC Commissioner Robert M. McDowell blows the whistle in the WSJ on what his statist colleagues are up to with Net Neutrality:
For years, proponents of so-called "net neutrality" have been calling for strong regulation of broadband "on-ramps" to the Internet, like those provided by your local cable or phone companies. …
Nothing is broken that needs fixing, however. The Internet has been open and freedom-enhancing since it was spun off from a government research project in the early 1990s. Its nature as a diffuse and dynamic global network of networks defies top-down authority. Ample laws to protect consumers already exist. Furthermore, the Obama Justice Department and the European Commission both decided this year that net-neutrality regulation was unnecessary and might deter investment in next-generation Internet technology and infrastructure.
It's mainly the part about defying top-down authority that bureaucrats have a problem with. They also don't like free market principles being allowed to hold sway.
Analysts and broadband companies of all sizes have told the FCC that new rules are likely to have the perverse effect of inhibiting capital investment, deterring innovation, raising operating costs, and ultimately increasing consumer prices. Others maintain that the new rules will kill jobs. By moving forward with Internet rules anyway, the FCC is not living up to its promise of being "data driven" in its pursuit of mandates — i.e., listening to the needs of the market.
Clinton helped the Internet, mainly by leaving it alone. But despite his recent awkward attempts at triangulation, Comrade Obama is no Clinton. His administration has one overriding priority: expand the scope and power of the federal government in all directions, no matter what harm it causes.
Both Congress and the courts have repeatedly slapped down efforts to put the Internet under the jurisdiction of the unelected bureauweenies of the FCC. But totalitarians know that Rome didn't fall in a day. If at first they don't succeed, they attack our freedom again and again:
Still feeling quixotic pressure to fight an imaginary problem, the FCC leadership this fall pushed a small group of hand-picked industry players toward a "choice" between a bad option (broad regulation already struck down in April by the D.C. federal appeals court) or a worse option (phone monopoly-style regulation). Experiencing more coercion than consensus or compromise, a smaller industry group on Dec. 1 gave qualified support for the bad option. The FCC's action will spark a billable-hours bonanza as lawyers litigate the meaning of "reasonable" network management for years to come. How's that for regulatory certainty?
To date, the FCC hasn't ruled out increasing its power further by using the phone monopoly laws, directly or indirectly regulating rates someday, or expanding its reach deeper into mobile broadband services. The most expansive regulatory regimes frequently started out modest and innocuous before incrementally growing into heavy-handed behemoths.
On this winter solstice, we will witness jaw-dropping interventionist chutzpah as the FCC bypasses branches of our government in the dogged pursuit of needless and harmful regulation. The darkest day of the year may end up marking the beginning of a long winter's night for Internet freedom.
Once the beachhead is secure, and Big Government has a hand in the nuts and bolts of the Internet's workings, traffic will inevitably slow to a crawl. Then we'll have a real crisis, which bureaucrats will be only too happy to fix with more regulation. Like healthcare, bandwidth made scarce by government control will have to be rationed. Naturally sites that are not deemed by leftist apparatchiks to serve the public interest will have low priority. This could be why countermoonbat Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) calls Net Neutrality "the Fairness Doctrine for the Internet."
If you like the lukewarm leftist oatmeal dished out on NPR and PBS, you'll love what they turn the Internet into.
On tips from J and Zappatrust.
