So, Judd Gregg will become Commerce Secretary, and a Republican will keep Gregg's seat in the Senate. Gregg's lifetime Progressive Punch rating of 10.08 out of 100.00, and 6.91 "when the chips are down," should make him a much needed right-wing champion for the Commerce Department. Gregg should also be a useful voice during cabinet meetings, making sure that President Obama and the other radical liberals there don't over-reach.
Now, even though Gregg is a conservative Republican and I am a progressive Democrat, I generally agree with the argument that there are no progressives qualified to run the government. We are incompetent managers after all, just like Republicans have always said. This is why I did not apply for a job in the Obama administration. Better to leave it to the serious, non-ideological people.
Further, bipartisan gestures like this are likely to pay big dividends when President Obama and congressional Democrats need Republican support. Results speak for themselves, and Republicans have been voting with Democrats at a record pace so far during 2009.
Yet further, I agree with the arguments that the Commerce Department isn't very important. For one thing, it only has a budget of $8.2 billion. Even beyond its meager finances, as I explain in the extended entry, it also touches on a number of entirely unimportant areas.
Ah, the Anglo-American alliance that won two world wars and crushed communism in Europe, thus protecting freedom around the world! Now, that same alliance is on the brink of allowing telecommunication companies to restrict, or privilege, any content they see fit within the greatest cultural achievement in the history of humanity: the network neutral Internet. Yey for Anglo-American freedom!
Network neutrality prevents Internet service providers from blocking, speeding up, or slowing down Internet content based on its source. Recent developments in Canada (two months ago), the United Kingdom (two days ago) and the United States (yesterday in the Senate) have all put network neutrality in serious danger. The three allies who stormed the beaches at Normandy are once again on the march, this time making the world safe for telecommunication companies.
I am not exaggerating the danger to net neutrality in most of the Anglophone world. Gory details on each case are provided in the extended entry:
"Cram-down" bankruptcy and mortgage reform being marked up in House Judiciary committee: Just yesterday came the final word that "cram-down" bankruptcy mortgage reform was not going to be in the stimulus package. However, the House is not wasting any time pushing it through as separate legislation, and it is already being marked up in the House Judiciary committee. No word on the chances of this legislation passing the Senate just yet, but the rapid turnaround in the fortunes of this legislation is welcome.
Broadband grants pass with Net Neutrality intact: There was a lot of worry in the media reform community that the new grants for broadband would happen only with a gutting of regulations on network neutrality. Fortunately, from what I have heard, this aspect of the stimulus appears to have passed through the committee markups in the House and Senate with the Net Neutrality regulations intact. There is still worry that the $6 billion for broadband in the stimulus will turn into corporate welfare, though. Tim Karr has more on this at the Huffington Post.
Timothy Geithner is confirmed as Treasury Secretary. By a vote of 60-34 in the Senate, Timothy Geithner has been confirmed as Treasury Secretary. Four members of the Democratic Senate caucus voted no: Robert Byrd, Russ Feingold, Tom Harkin and Bernie Sanders. Feingold's no vote is surprising, as he rarely votes against Presidential appointees. Ten Republicans voted in favor of confirming Geithner. While I would have been fine with him being defeated, this is really a "meh."
John Conyers continues investigation of Bush administration. While discussion of investigation the Bush administration has often been couched in hypothetical terms, House Judiciary Chair John Conyers today showed that such investigations are currently ongoing. A few hours ago, Conyers subpoenaed Karl Rove, as part of an ongoing investigation of Karl Rove, former Attorney General Michael Mukaksey, former White House consul and Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers and former White House Cheif of Staff Josh Bolton that was actually written into the judiciary rules package. So much for hypotheticals, or for looking forward rather than back. Let the investigations continue!
In advance of tomorrow's action to try and push the DeFazio amendment to increase high-speed rail funding in the stimulus package, I was wondering if anyone had a list of legislative directors for Democratic members of the House Rules committee. For that matter, a complete list of House legislative directors would be extremely useful. The reason for this is that, as I am coming to understand it, citizen lobbying is far more effective if it is aimed at legislative directors rather than simply leaving comments with the front desks of congressional offices. It is worth noting that the Rules committee also appears to contain many progressives, and should be fertile ground for our action.
Lots of action in Capitol Hill, and also in the White House. Isn't it great to actually be governing? :)
We received word this afternoon that Rep. DeFazio's amendment that would have provided $2 billion in assistance to transit agencies was required to be withdrawn. We'll post more as we learn it, but had something to do with parliamentary issues.
If you called Rep. Slaughter on the Rules Committee today, we thank you very much for your support and effort to get that crucial funding included in the economic recovery package. (And we point out that calls to her should no longer be made.)
Frak. I didn't act fast enough on this one. Still learning about how these things work.
Do Any Progressives Actually Know How to Spend $700 Billion? The Pentagon does. Wall Street does. But in fact, almost no one alive today remembers what it is like to spend huge sums of money to engage in non-corrupt domestic spending on behalf of socially just infrastructure. It's been a long time since the New Deal, or even Eisenhower's build-out of the highway system. Fortunately, there are some smart people thinking about it in the context of broadband. Progressive group Free Press just released a $40 billion plan that should over three years increase broadband speeds, lower prices, and expand access to everyone in the country. You can read the plan here.
The basic difference between this plan and the rest you'll read is that this one looks at the problem of broadband not just in terms of access or speed, but in terms of access, speed, and value. That is, it attempts to answer the question of why 40% of the country chooses not to buy broadband and exempts itself from the 21st century empowerment tool. The plan offers a mix of direct grants through existing government agencies that work (like the Universal Service Fund) and tax credits to encourage competition and the build out of 100MB plus networks that are open and neutral.
I'm still learning more about the plan, since spending lots of money is a problem I'm not used to thinking about. My sense though is that $38 billion over three years should be a floor, not an estimate. I've heard that $100-200B would upgrade our networks to South Korean speeds; we should be asking for that. I also would argue that the government should just build out the networks directly; with AT&T cutting capital spending, tax credits around depreciation are just not going to work as well as they would in non-deflationary environments. We need direct spending.
Still, this is a very positive step for progressives. It's actually a plan to spend lots of money wisely on something that will universalize access to information, and therefore, power.
One interesting problem progressives are confronting right now is that basic lack of expertise in spending money. Let's take broadband, though this could apply to any arena - the TARP fund, the automakers, infrastructure, etc. Right now, AT&T is cutting capital spending, which means that the goal of universal broadband recently lauded by a broad coalition is actually being set back. Realistically, the government is the only entity that is going to spend to build out broadband in a severe downturn, and indeed, broadband is one of the best ways to generate new economic growth.
For instance, the Brookings Institution estimated recently that each percentage increase in broadband deployment would result in nearly 300,000 jobs each year. These are good jobs, jobs that don't emit much carbon, and that can be situated in rural areas and close to clean power sources (where Google's new server farms are located). Moreover, much of the problem with our broadband infrastructure is that 'broadband' speeds are often inadequate, a hundred times slower than in Korea or Japan. With the lack of speed, the excessive cost, and the lack of competition in the market, a good percentage of the country choose not to buy broadband because the options don't make sense. This is bad for all sorts of reasons, and the fix - lots of people making and stringing fiber and inventing new machines and services to take advantage of all of it - is exactly what our economy needs.
The cost estimates I've heard to get the US to Japanese world-class standards are between $100-$300 billion, and now is the time for that buildout to happen. Some of that can come from the Universal Service Fund, the rest can be appropriated from Congress. Now the problem is that the traditional model of doing stuff with government money looks a lot like the TARP model, which is really just Pentagon-style subsidization of private well-connected interests (check out the fight over mandating universal purchase of private health insurance for a good example). And that doesn't really build very good broadband, and it puts that built broadband in the hands of powerful companies. The government can't just subsidize AT&T, since they will just take the money and reduce investment elsewhere. That won't stimulate the economy or create jobs or increase broadband penetration.
And this is where Mike Lux's warnings about the culture of caution kicks in. Right now, it's standard DC procedure to think incrementally, like reapportioning USF monies, rather than boldly, like turning the postal service into a broadband delivery vehicle or calling this an Eisenhower moment for building out an entirely new system for communications. It's time to get creative, and ask for a whole lot. One question is that generations of policy-makers have been trained on incrementalism and warding off the worst of conservative policies while saving what remains of the 1930s liberal order - does the knowledge of implementing large and transformative progressive institutional models through government even exist anywhere?
(A good companion to Chris's latest. - promoted by Paul Rosenberg)
Want faster Internet? Want cheaper Internet? Want both cheaper and faster Internet - the kind people in Europe or Asia currently enjoy? Don't hold your breath.
When Congress authorized this auction, their stated intention was to pry open our cell phone and broadband markets to consumer choice and new competition. But having Verizon and AT&T control the most significant chunks of the spectrum -- including the so-called national C Block -- means more of the same for Internet users.
...
Verizon and AT&T are already among the most dominant providers of "wired" broadband access in the U.S. Their victories over the bulk of 700 MHz licenses leave slim prospects for genuine Internet competition via a wireless "third pipe."
But wait! What about that "open access" stuff Google was pushing for?
First, the U.S. still ranks 15th for broadband connectivity, behind countries like France, Australia, the UK, and Canada, with only 22% of homes connected. Bush's numbers [pdf] are far higher (50% for cities, 38% for rural areas) because he feels a 200kbs/sec connection is "broadband." Those citizens connecting to the Internet using a service barely faster than dial-up probably disagree.
Second, competition among service providers is woefully low. Most Americans have only one or possibly two choices for broadband access. This means we pay an average of $150 more for the same connection than the French. Our connections are slower too, with our average speed only barely above average for connected countries.
It all adds up to a slow, expensive, and frustrating experience for American users.
In a country with no net neutrality, where I pay $60/month for sometimes slow and throttled Internet service, where friends in rural areas can't even get online at all, we're supposed to agree with the President and declare that our connectivity goals have been accomplished? Please.
America has long been a hotbed of Internet innovation, but lately traffic and business dollars are moving overseas. American citizens have used the Internet to diversify their media consumption, create new communities, and organize a myriad of political campaigns, yet many Americans still lack the connections to participate fully in the new online democracy. The Internet revolution - which started here - can be fully expressed here as well, but only when Internet connectivity is treated as a necessary service (like water or electricity) and not a luxury.
Until then, the mission is decidedly not accomplished.
Hello, I'm Dick Durbin. I want to take this opportunity to say a final thanks to all of you who took part in the first stage of our interactive bill writing process last week. In particular, I'd like to thank Jim Baller, Paul Morris, John Windhausen, Andrew McNeill, and Waldo McMillan for their participation on Friday evening, as well as the numerous other experts who participated over the course of the week.
The last week has given me a great deal to think about. I figured at the outset that if I gave the broader public a chance to comment on these issues, a few good ideas would emerge. I was wrong. What I found instead was a significant number of well-reasoned perspectives and ideas that I had not previously considered. These ideas covered the gamut of policy areas, including net neutrality, incentive programs, spectrum policy, and community broadband.
Building out broadband access to everyone in America is not a simple topic, but as Jim Baller notes, the the need for a national broadband strategy in the context of global economic trends is clear. Just what is broadband? Is it current DSL speeds in the US, or 100MB connections like we see in Korea? How can we close the rural divide, and bring full broadband access to those in public housing?
There are some interesting public-private partnerships at, and we have Paul Morris of the Utah-based fiber network UTOPIA on how government policy can support such work. And then, of course, there's the issue of money. The Universal Service Fund, the Department of Agriculture, and HUD are all possible places where money for universal access can be found. John Windhausen writes on full deployment and the Universal Service Fund, and Waldo McMillan at One Economy Corporation disussed his organization's 'Broadband in Public Housing' initiative through HUD. And finally, Andrew McNeill of Connect Kentucky described his telecom-backed private-public program, and how it should be expanded to the rest of the country.
The live-blog should be interesting. To be honest, I'm quite skeptical of McNeill's broad claims. John Windhausen pointed out that real deployment is going to cost $2000 per household, and the idea that there's a free lunch out there, where industry will pay for full deployment, seems like a stretch. I'd like to see McNeill and Windhausen discuss where they agree, and where they don't.
Building out infrastructure in broadband is core to America's future. How it happens, or doesn't, is something that should concern us all.
Once again I want to thank Senator Durbin for developing and promoting this innovative exchange of ideas. The discussion has certainly been lively, informative, and full of passion.
On Tuesday, I presented a broad outline of CWA's Policy Proposal for Universal High Speed Internet. Tonight, I want to provide some thoughts on how we'll build and pay for a universal system. This is a very complex area, but an essential one. The hallmark of our communications policy since the Communications Act of 1934 has been a commitment to universal service. Until recently, that meant affordable voice service. In today's world, we must expand our definition of universal affordable service to high-speed broadband.
Mr. McNeill will be liveblogging on OpenLeft this evening at 7 PM EDT.
The challenge of ensuring high speed internet access to all Americans is a daunting one. Whereas a significant portion of the United States does have access to this technology and derives the benefits from having it, there is still a large segment of American households, primarily in our rural areas, that are lacking service.
This is the challenge that the state of Kentucky found itself facing in 2004. Confronted with the challenge, the state and private sector collaborated with ConnectKentucky - a public/private partnership - to launch the Prescription for Innovation. It is a comprehensive approach to addressing both the supply and demand side of the equation to enhanced broadband access and adoption.
Mr. McMillan will be liveblogging on OpenLeft this evening at 7 PM EDT.
Hello, my name is Waldo McMillan and I am Vice President and General Counsel of One Economy Corporation. One Economy is a global nonprofit organization that uses innovative approaches to deliver the power of technology and information to low-income people, giving them valuable tools for building better lives. We help bring broadband into the homes of low-income people, employ youth to train their community members to use technology effectively, and provide socially responsible media properties that offer a wealth of information on education, jobs, health care and other vital issues. Our mission is to maximize the potential of technology to help low-income people improve their lives and enter the economic mainstream. To learn more about our work, please visit us at www.one-economy.com.
Before offering a specific public policy proposal, I would first like to thank Senator Durbin for using the internet in an innovative and groundbreaking way to bring the real work of Congress to the American people. Formulating a national broadband strategy that brings the benefits of high speed internet to all Americans regardless of income or place is the most important issue facing today's technology and telecommunications landscape. At One Economy, we believe that providing everyone with affordable access to broadband is very possible, and we are confident that if the federal government takes some intentional and immediate steps towards this end, broadband can be made available to all by the end of 2009.
Tonight at 7 PM EDT, Paul Morris of UTOPIA, John Windhausen of Telepoly.com (having spent many years on the Hill), Jim Baller of the Baller Herbst Law Group, Waldo McMillan of One Economy, and Andrew McNeill of ConnectKentucky will be liveblogging. Please join us - and be sure to read their posts below.
Good evening again for our last night on OpenLeft.com. I would like to once again reiterate my praise and appreciation for Matt Stoller and the various experts who have done a fantastic job framing issues and guiding our discussion.
Last evening, we discussed new ways to use the public airwaves to expand broadband access. I thank Dr. Gerald Faulhaber, Harold Feld and Sascha Meinrath for joining us.
Tonight, I'd like to focus on other ways to provide incentives to build broadband networks. Public/private initiatives like Connect Kentucky have achieved success where the market alone has failed. Other projects like Lafayette, Louisiana's Fiber for the Future and Utah's UTOPIA project have also made significant steps.
Mr. Morris will be liveblogging this evening at 7 PM EDT.
I appreciate the invitation to participate in this important dialogue regarding public/private partnerships. My name is Paul Morris and I am the Executive Director of the Utah Telecommunication Open Infrastructure Agency or UTOPIA. UTOPIA is a consortium of 14 Utah municipalities, big and small, urban and rural, joined together to build and operate a fiber-to-the-premises (FTTP) network on an open access wholesale basis. Our purpose in building the network is to promote economic development and enhance the quality of life for our residents. The initial offering is 100 Mbps up and down to each home and business. The network is designed to allow for continual increases in speed as the need arises. We see a day, in the not to distant future, where each home will have a Gbps or more of symmetrical speed.
We think the best way to achieve these goals is to create a true public/private partnership where the public side focuses on infrastructure, a traditional government role, and the private sector, which can react more nimbly to the market, offers current and next-generation services. Because it is an all fiber network, it allows for this abundant bandwidth, and because it is open access, multiple providers compete against one another for the consumers' dollars, thus creating an environment for robust competition and innovation.
Mr. Baller will be liveblogging on OpenLeft this evening at 7 PM EDT.
Senator Durbin, thanks very much for inviting me to participate in your creative online forum. As you know, I strongly believe that the United States must promptly develop an aggressive national broadband strategy if it is to remain competitive in the emerging global economy. My partner Casey Lide and I have written two articles about this, the first discussing the need for such a strategy, and the second setting forth a specific 8-step action plan. These two articles and a great deal of other pertinent material, including information about what the leading nations are doing, are collected on the National Broadband Strategy page of our website, www.baller.com/national_broadband.html.
Over the last several months, a large and growing number of organizations and thought leaders have called for the United States to develop a national broadband strategy. At the same time, a small but vocal opposition has also emerged.
Mr. Windhausen will be liveblogging on OpenLeft this evening at 7 PM EDT.
Many congratulations to Sen. Durbin for instigating this "outside-the-box" discussion of broadband policies and universal service. Broadband services are more than simply an evolution of our existing telephone technology and services; broadband networks are and will fundamentally alter the way our economy functions, the way students learn, the way workers are trained, the way medical care is delivered, the way communities share information, and the way government governs. So we need to think big about our broadband policies and not fall into the trap of only trying to "fix" existing programs. I suggest that we start thinking of our overall objectives and develop a real broadband plan.
Any good piece of legislation is built on a solid understanding of the available research and data. Sen. Durbin has enlisted several knowledgeable experts to help him in this project and there's been some great discussion in the comments on OpenLeft. But comment threads can only go so long before the, well, threads get tangled.
So, to fully enable collaboration between all the Internet wonks, policy geeks and regular Joes and Janes out there who have some relevant information (or can find some), we've created an open knowledge base on the Congresspedia wiki for Sen. Durbin's project.
I run the nonprofit Mountain Area Information Network (MAIN)http://www.main.nc.us... in Asheville, N.C. Among other things, MAIN is a wireless ISP serving four mountain counties with broadband Internet.
Our sustainable business model is based on a simple principle: give citizens and locally-owned businesses the option of spending their Internet dollars to support local news and information.
We currently have 400 wireless subscribers, and we're adding 8-10 new subs per month. We began operation in 1996 as a dial-up ISP, serving the entire mountain region of western North Carolina (roughly the area of Vermont).
Our ISP revenues (we also offer webhosting and nationwide dial-up under the IndyLink.org brand) support a low-power FM radio station, WPVM-LP http://www.wpvm.org at 103.5 FM and an online news and information portal that attracts more 16,000 unique visitors per day. We also led the effort to create public access TV in Asheville, which went on the air in August, 2006. http://video.google....
Mr. Meinrath will be live-blogging tonight here at 7pm EDT.
Thanks to everyone who has been participating these past few days -- your input, feedback, and commentary have been quite inspiring and have helped me to formulate the ideas I lay out below. As an Illinois resident, I'm also quite proud to know that Senator Durbin is leading the charge to reform broadband service provision to maximize the public benefits of this vital communications resource.
While some commentators may want to spin the Internet era as something entirely new and unprecedented, what's clear is that the history of telecommunications provides ample caution for those of working in the public interest.
Dr. Faulhaber will be liveblogging here this evening at 7pm EDT.
Gerald Faulhaber is a Professor of Business and Public Policy, and of Management, at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, and Professor of Law, University of Pennsylvania Law School. He has written widely on telecommunications and Internet issues, most recently on spectrum policy issues, public safety radio, and file sharing. He was Chief Economist of the Federal Communications Commission in 2000-2001.
First, a note of thanks to Sen. Durbin for hosting this online real-time blog regarding these issues critical to our nation's infrastructure.
Municipal broadband, particularly in its WiFi incarnation, has seized the headlines over the past few years, with my hometown of Philadelphia in the forefront. The ubiquity of WiFi-enabled computers and in-home WiFi receivers, all using unlicensed spectrum in the 2.4 GHz band, has spurred interest by cities and towns to provide broadband access to all their citizens using this popular technology. Free (or cheap) broadband for all was the watchword.
Has it worked? Yes and no. Towns without broadband from commercial providers have been most successful, with WiFi being deployed by municipalities directly, by municipal power companies, or by community volunteer organizations. While many have had problems, it seems that this market most amenable to successful municipal WiFi, and I certainly applaud it. Cities and towns where commercial providers are already present is a rather different story. The rationale for municipal deployment is usually to provide more complete coverage (digital divide issues) or cheaper coverage. Unfortunately, many of these systems have had coverage problems and have had difficulty pricing the service to compete with existing vendors and still cover their costs (an interesting and balanced review of the studies of municipal WiFi is in Ars Technica, at http://arstechnica.c... ).
