McCain Gets Mavericky on Net Neutrality
by John Paczkowski
Posted on October 23, 2009 at 4:30 AM PT
They don’t call Sen. John McCain a maverick for nothing. Just hours after Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski officially unveiled Net neutrality rules, the Arizona Republican introduced a bill that would prohibit the Commission from enacting them. Called the Internet Freedom Act, the legislation says the FCC “shall not propose, promulgate, or issue any regulations regarding the Internet or IP-enabled services.”
Evidently, McCain views such rules, which would require Internet service providers to treat all Web traffic equally, as “onerous federal regulation” at best and, at worst, another one of those “government takeovers.”
“The [Obama] administration can’t resist imposing regulations on the Internet–particularly since Google Inc. and other Internet content providers were promised the imposition of such regulations as these companies seek to control what consumers see and don’t see on the Internet–despite the fact that these regulations will only serve to hurt consumers,” McCain wrote in an op ed in the Washington Times.
“The wireless industry exploded over the past 20 years, in part due to limited government regulation. Wireless carriers invested $100 billion in infrastructure and development over the past three years, which has led to faster networks, more competitors in the marketplace and lower prices in the United States compared to any other country….Regulation kills innovation. Let’s not kill the Internet.”
McCain, it should be noted, received some $894,379 in contributions from AT&T (T), Verizon (VZ), Comcast (CMCSA) and other telecom industry interests over his career–all of them opposed to the Net neutrality regulations the FCC hopes to implement.
Comments
thought mccain went back to working the night shift at denny’s…what’s he doing out?
Posted by Sam Harrison at October 23rd, 2009 at 12:09 pmWell, to continue the metaphor, the horse is already out of the barn on this issue.
We’ve elected people who promised us “Network Neutrality” without ever defining what it meant (if indeed they had any idea). Now we will live with FCC rule-making until something comes along to replace the Internet as the Internet did traditional telephony.
I’ve already witnessed inane conversations over whether it will be legal to “wire tap” Internet traffic. There will now be rooms full of people in Washington mandated to do just that. Oh, don’t worry, they promise not to look at the CONTENT of those packets.
For now anyway.
Posted by Mac Beach at October 23rd, 2009 at 12:19 pm