FCC Adopts Net Neutrality Rules

All Right!!!

Believe it or not, the FCC has actually ruled in favor of hundreds of millions of Internet users, at the expense of higher windfall profits for a few telecom CEOs.  Verizon, Comcast, Time Warner Cable et al have spent jillions of dollars on lobbying/bribery, all for naught.  At least they can write it off as a business expense.

The five FCC commissioners voted 3 to 2 — along party lines, needless to say — to reclassify Internet Service Providers as a public utility, like a phone company.  This reclassification will enable the FCC to enforce Net Neutrality, i.e. prohibiting ISPs from segregating the Internet into expensive fast lanes for some users and a slow lane for everyone else.

FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn said:

“We are here to ensure that there is only one Internet, where applications, new products, ideas and points of view have an equal chance of being seen and heard.  We are here because we want to enable those with deep pockets as well as those with empty pockets the same opportunities to succeed.”

Why, that there sounds like Comminism!!!

The two Republican FCC commissioners sided up with the oligarchs (shocking!).  Commissioner Ajit Pai dutifully recited his corporate-dictated talking points:

“The Internet has become a powerful force for freedom, here and around the world.  So it is sad to witness this morning the FCC’s unprecedented attempts to replace that freedom with government control. It shouldn't be this way.”

Suck it up Asshole.

And now for a rant.  This whole ongoing Net Neutrality debate — aside from “Net Neutrality” being the most bland sleep-inducing phrase Ever — has been one of the media's worst examples of False Equivalency.  During the Republicans' government extortion/shutdown fiasco, the mainstream media bent over backwards to appear unbiased.  Instead of just coming out and saying the GOP was using blackmail and extortion to achieve what it couldn't achieve through the legislative process, news reports would say “there's a lot of finger-pointing going on,” “both sides are blaming each other for the shutdown,” etc.

And this same False Equivalency is rearing its head again.  For weeks the media has been saying that if the FCC enforces open access to the Internet for everyone, it'll be “a victory for proponents of Net Neutrality.”  WTF?  “Proponents of Net Neutrality?!?”  Oh, you mean, the 99.9% of us who don't want to be segregated into a fast or slow lane.  “Proponents of Net Neutrality?”

Maybe the next time a notorious serial killer gets caught, the media can call it “a victory for people who don't want to get murdered.”