November 19, 2014
You probably remember when Sen. Ted Cruz from Texas attempted to criticize net neutrality, saying it is “Obamacare for the Internet”, and claiming that it would lead to government control over broadband pricing and services. Over the weekend, Minnesota Sen. Al Franken called out Cruz, saying the claim was “baloney,” and pointing out the fact that we’ve had net neutrality for years and all the while, telecom and cable Internet companies have been enjoying record profits.
“He has it completely wrong,” Franken insisted on CNN’s State of the Union with Candy Crowley. “He just doesn’t understand what the issue is.”
The Senator went on to say that neutrality has existed throughout the Internet age. It only became an issue after certain Internet Service Providers successfully sued in order to gut the rules so that they could add fast lanes and charge more to companies that can afford to pay.
Franken argued that net neutrality is not comparable to Obamacare because the attempt to keep the Internet neutral was intended to maintain the status quo, and only requires new rules because the telecoms and cable companies don’t want to abide by the old ones anymore, whereas Obamacare is a program that created something new. “This would keep things exactly the same as they’ve been,” said Franken.
The FCC is only considering the possibility of reclassifying broadband as telecommunications infrastructure — as opposed to its current designation as an information service — because it’s the only way in which the government can effectively tell ISPs they can’t create fast lanes, and there are those who contend that such a reclassification may fail a legal challenge if it is challenged in court.
“It’s because these ISPs, which have been getting bigger… they essentially have an oligopoly,” said Franken about the need for FCC-enforced neutrality. “They have been talking about a fast lane — they have been talking about charging big, deep-pocketed corporations extra money to go faster, meaning everyone else goes slower.”
As for the recent claims that reclassifying broadband would cripple innovation, new businesses and investment, Franken says, “That’s baloney,” and that a truly neutral Internet won’t be the end of business investment or freedom.
“All this stops them from doing is making a whole bunch of extra money,” says the Senator. "But this is not going to stop them from wiring the country.”
