If You Like Your Internet, You Can Keep Your Internet

If you've been paying attention - and I sincerely hope you have - you know that tomorrow the FCC will vote on a 332 page plan to regulate the Internet.

The plan to regulate the Internet was proposed by barack obama. Support for it is split along partisan lines. An earlier version was rejected by a federal court. The current version was written behind closed doors; no details have been released to the public.

Sound familiar?

Critics of President Obama’s “net neutrality” plan call it ObamaCare for the Internet.

That’s unfair to ObamaCare.

Both ObamaCare and “Obamanet” submit huge industries to complex regulations. Their supporters say the new rules had to be passed before anyone could read them. But at least ObamaCare claimed it would solve long-standing problems. Obamanet promises to fix an Internet that isn’t broken.

That right there is the crux of the matter. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

As the Federal Communications Commission and Federal Election Commission toy with regulating aspects of the Internet, critics on those agencies are warning that speed and freedom of speech are in jeopardy.

In a joint column, Federal Communications Commission member Ajit Pai and Federal Election Commission member Lee Goodman, leveled the boom on the Obama-favored regulations, essentially charging that it will muck up the freedom the nation has come to expect from the Internet.

“These Internet regulations will deter broadband deployment, depress network investment and slow broadband speeds. How do we know? Compare Europe, which has long had utility-style regulations, with the United States, which has embraced a light-touch regulatory model. Broadband speeds in the United States, both wired and wireless, are significantly faster than those in Europe. Broadband investment in the United States is several multiples that of Europe. And broadband’s reach is much wider in the United States, despite its much lower population density,” the two wrote.

Europe has socialized medicine. obama and the progressives want us to be like Europe.

Europe has slow Internet speeds, limited broadband reach, and restrictions on free speech. obama and the progressives want us to be like Europe.

More evidence that it ain't broke:

According to a report last year by New York Law School, the number of high-speed broadband lines more than doubled between June 2009 and December 2012, while the percentage of Census districts with one or fewer fixed broadband providers fell to 1.2% from 3.5%. Broadband cable prices plunged to $1.10 per megabit per second in 2013 from $19 in 1998.

More evidence that the feds are making a power play to grab control of the Internet:

(Federal Communications Commission chairman Tom Wheeler) asserts that public broadband is necessary and in the public interest because “commercial broadband providers can pick and choose who to serve based on whether there is an economic case for it.”

Sounds like the free market to me - as opposed to government sponsored initiatives.

Rather than driving competition, municipal broadband can undercut the private market. Because they benefit from public financing and right-of-way, munis can price services below private carriers ... (financing) broadband via tax-exempt municipal bonds, loans from the public electric utility and federal grants.

This puts taxpayers and in some cases electric-utility ratepayers on the hook if the ventures go belly up. Taxpayers in Monticello, Minnesota, had to bail out their government-run FiberNet after it defaulted on municipal bonds. The publicly financed network in Groton, Connecticut, was sold to private investors at a $30 million loss. Google paid $1 for the failed municipal broadband enterprise in Provo, which cost taxpayers $60 million. Largely because of these risks, 21 states impose restrictions on municipal broadband, which range from requiring public hearings to outright bans. 

And yet the dems/libs/progs want to hand over the Internet to the feds. What is wrong with those people?

And in true liberal fashion, they are keeping us in the dark about their plans.

A key Republican lawmaker in Congress called for Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler to make proposed net neutrality regulations public before a planned Thursday vote on the measure.

"Although arguably one of the most sweeping new rules in the commission's history, the process was conducted without using many of the tools at the chairman's disposal to ensure transparency and public review," (Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, chairman of the House Oversight Committee) said.

Chaffetz urged Wheeler to publicly release the 332-page draft order that was given to the other four commissioners nearly three weeks ago

A senator who supported the FCC's postponement back then, Chaffetz notes, was then-senator Barack Obama. "He specifically noted while a certain proposal 'may pass the muster of a federal court, Congress and the public have the right to review any specific proposal and decide whether or not it constitutes sound policy. And the commission has the responsibility to defend any new proposal in public discourse and debate,'" Chaffetz said citing the original letter sent by Sen. Obama (to the FCC).

Typical obama/liberal hypocritical crap.

Of course, there's also the tax angle. If the Internet is classified as a public utility, as net neutrality proponents want, then it can (and undoubtedly will) be taxed as a public utility.

The bottom line:

“Internet freedom works. It is difficult to imagine where we would be today had the government micromanaged the Internet for the past two decades as it does Amtrak and the U.S. Postal Service. Neither of us wants to find out where the Internet will be two decades from now if the federal government tightens its regulatory grip. We don’t need to shift control of the Internet to bureaucracies in Washington. Let’s leave the power where it belongs — with the American people. When it comes to Americans’ ability to access online content or offer political speech online, there isn’t anything broken for the government to “fix.” To paraphrase President Ronald Reagan, Internet regulation isn’t the solution to a problem. Internet regulation is the problem.”

Please contact your congressperson today and tell them: "Hands off our Internet!"