I spent much of the day yesterday at the New Organizing Institute, which trains young progressive political operatives on modern political campaigns. Zack Exley, who ran Kerry's internet division, and Judith Freeman, who does data analysis at the AFL-CIO, are both organizing geniuses, and it's interesting that we now have two generations of progressive operatives in politics today. There is no longer any dispute about the importance of open tools in our party, though the Republicans are resisting them fiercely.
There is a threat, though, to the opening of politics. And that is coming from entrenched interests who want to shut down the internet by eliminating net neutrality. But that's not the only way they are limiting speech; if you live in certain areas, it's impossible to get broadband access. I'm reminded of this because I was talking today to Adrienne Christian, who is managing Donna Edwards' Congressional campaign, and she mentioned that Donna couldn't easily participate in a web chat on Firedoglake because because she can only get dial-up access from her home. Here's Donna's comment.
Hi Howie. As I sit here on my laptop with dialup access, I feel the pain of so many communities who've not enjoyed the full promise of the new technology. I believe that Internet access expands your world view. When I was young, I used the books to visit other places and people. If we want all our children to be prepared for 21st Century challenges, they need full access to the technology that will transport them.
Donna's running in the fourth Congressional district against Al Wynn, who is financed by telecom interests. What's important to understand about the net neutrality fight is that it isn't a fight about an obscure telecom regulation, but an argument about who gets to speak in America. And regardless of whether we get net neutrality enshrined into law, if Verizon continues its current strategy of installing fiber only to wealthy areas, much of the country won't have access to what is quickly becoming our public square. This hits African-Americans, poor whites, and rural areas especially hard. I'm reminded of Tavis Smiley's words at the last Democratic debate, when he said 'When American gets a cold, black America gets pneumonia'. This is as true for broadband as it is for anything else. In other words, the net neutrality fight last cycle was a proxy fight for whether we can put policies into place for a universal internet, or whether government policy will continue to cut disempowered citizens out of our economy and democracy.
Now, in case you haven't noticed, the Democratic leadership has not put net neutrality on the legislative agenda for this Congress. There are a variety of reasons for this, mostly having to do with the Communications Worker's of America. Even though this is frustrating, we do have organizing work to do that can bring us much greater success fairly soon. Net neutrality regulations rely on the willingness of the Federal government to enforce the law, and in the case of the telecommunications industry, cable and telecom companies will simply ignore it. They will break the law and the internet if we cannot put together a coalition to stop them. And if we're going to put together a coalition to really get net neutrality enshrined in law, we might as well deal with the fact that in America, broadband access is leaving much of the country out.
Consider that AT&T, as part of its recent merger conditions, agreed to offer consumers $10/month DSL, but did not comply with the agreement in any reasonable manner. There was no consequence for a company like AT&T to do this. And with various agencies - like the Federal Trade Commisson - captured by industry shills, pursuing a strict regulatory strategy isn't the right approach. We need more political power to get the job of protecting and expanding the internet done.
What's needed is a grand coalition, tech companies like Google/eBay, small businesses, unions, an open left grassroots base, civil rights groups, and possibly telecom companies. Yes, you heard me right. Telecoms. You see, AT&T and Verizon are in quite a bind. Their technology is worse than that of the cable industry, so they will lose the battle for customers over the next twenty years. In addition, cable companies own a lot of content - for instance sports programming - that telecom companies need to sell video services. Right now, there's a fight in congress over this content , something called 'program access'. While telecom companies are often corrupt, cable companies are much smarter and more vicious (as well as being aggressively anti-labor). The cable industry stayed in the background, content to let telecom companies take the heat for net neutrality last cycle, but don't be fooled by their relative silence.
This is both a problem and an opportunity. Moving towards a universal and open internet run by a high quality unionized workforce means figuring out how to get legislative passed, restoring the potency of regulatory agencies, and implementing economic incentives for broadband companies to comply with the public interest. In the UK, British Telecom actually makes a lot of money promoting a very open internet, wholesaling their pipe the way that you can buy any computer and use or build lots of different software packages. There are all sorts of business models in the telecom industry, from high speed wireless services in some cities, like that of Clearwire, to Verizon's FIOS, to standard cable to profitable mobile network wholesaling. But basic issue is pretty simple. Will we have an internet that is universal and open, or will elites kill the new economy and the new public square?
Both models can make money, so that's not the issue. In fact, our model of openness will probably make a whole lot more money for a lot more people. It's just going to decentralize control, and power.
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