Following the vote last week by the Federal Communication Commission to unwind the net neutrality rules enacted during the Obama administration, House Republican lawmakers received an email from GOP leadership on how to defend the decision. The email was shared with The Intercept and the Center for Media and Democracy.
Net neutrality is the principle that internet service providers must treat all web traffic in the same way. If the FCC eventually undoes the Obama-era regulations in their entirety, an ISP like Comcast could demand that websites pay it fees in order not to slow or block them. Large companies like Facebook would easily be able to afford such charges, but smaller companies might not, creating an uneven playing field.
“Want more information on the net neutrality discussion?” wrote Washington state Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, chair of the House Republican Conference. “Here is a nifty toolkit with news resources, myth vs reality information, what others are saying, and free market comments.”
The attached packet of talking points came directly from the cable industry.
The metadata of the document shows it was created by Kerry Landon, the assistant director of industry grassroots at the National Cable and Telecommunications Association, a trade group that lobbies on behalf of Comcast, Cox Communications, Charter, and other cable industry companies. The document was shared with House Republican leaders via “Broadband for America,” a nonprofit largely funded by the NCTA.
“The FCC is wisely repealing the reckless decision of its predecessors to regulate competing internet service providers,” reads one of the document’s talking points. “We rightly protest when governments around the world seek to place political controls over the internet, and the same should apply here in America,” according to another.
The document also refers GOP caucus members to quotes they can use from other industry-funded nonprofits to defend the decision to repeal net neutrality through the rollback of Title II reclassification.
To respond to the “myth” that “only internet providers oppose utility regulation,” the document suggests citing a number of civil rights organizations that have opposed net neutrality.
The same groups cited by the talking points, however, are heavily funded by ISP companies, including AT&T, Verizon, and Comcast, and the group that mobilized certain civil rights leaders to sign onto a campaign against net neutrality has a long history of work on behalf of the cable industry.
“NCTA is one of hundreds of organizations engaged in public policy on communications, technology and media and it is common practice to provide policymakers with information and background on key issues,” said Joy Sims, a spokesperson for NCTA. “We are always happy to provide briefings, materials and other information to the media, policymakers and others.”
Broadband for America, the cable industry-funded group that passed the document to House Republicans, has long acted as a go-between for cable industry money to flow to allied pundits, lobbyists, and consultants.
The organization has enlisted a bipartisan set of talking heads to speak out against net neutrality. Harold Ford, the former Democratic lawmaker, and John Sununu, the former Republican senator, have been paid handsomely by the group while appearing in the media to warn about the dangers of adopting net neutrality.
Broadband for America has also retained a broad set of consultants to influence the telecom policy debate. The DCI Group, a Republican firm that specializes in “astroturf” campaigns designed to create fake grassroots support for political clients, has been paid at least $8,284,685 since 2012. SKD Knickerbocker, a firm founded by prominent Democrats, has received at least $3.1 million from Broadband for America.
In 2014, Broadband for America touted a lengthy list of allied groups that shared their opposition to net neutrality rules. But many of the groups on the list, including the Ohio chapter of League of Conservation Voters and a radio program dedicated to supporting veterans, said they were added to the list without their knowledge.
Rep. McMorris Rodgers did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Update: May 23, 2017, 12:28pm.
This piece was updated to include a comment from NCTA.
Top photo: The hearing room at the Federal Communications Commission headquarters in Washington, on Feb. 26, 2015.
“If Pai and therefore the FCC continues to ignore the public input and puts through the changes that will eliminate net neutrality, the FCC, which, according to its own website https://www.fcc.gov/about-fcc/what-we-do is charged with the following mandate…
“Promoting competition, innovation and investment in broadband services and facilities
Supporting the nation’s economy by ensuring an appropriate competitive framework for the unfolding of the communications revolution
Encouraging the highest and best use of spectrum domestically and internationally
Revising media regulations so that new technologies flourish alongside diversity and localism.
Providing leadership in strengthening the defense of the nation’s communications infrastructure.”
… AND is also overseen by Congress I have 2 questions:
1) Why isn’t that in violation of the stated purpose of the FCC
2) Shouldn’t the FCC be instructed by Congress that the proposed changes are therefore outside the jurisdiction of the FCC?
We’re fighting to fix Congress – read and learn…
http://fjl2018.org/downloads/docket-117-cv-00793-lavergne-v-us-house-representatives/
“Stand for what’s right, or settle for what’s left” – Frederick John LaVergne, Democrat for Congress, NJ CD3, 2018
How do people know this “leaked” stuff is real if you can’t validate the source? I could have stayed up late last night and written all that myself… but I didn’t.
Strange how many people change from “both parties are the same” to “that one is terrible.”
I know, I know…
Both parties are terrible — one is more terrible than the other. Just ask any of the deep thinkers here at TI who will lecture and froth about the wonderful patriotism of Julian Assange and the treasonous betrayals of Hillary Clinton who worked for her opponent enough to get him elected.
At least we have a president who’s going to drain the swamp.
We’d be in a real shitbucket rowboat if he was a rapacious capitalist dumbshit billionaire rather than a committed populist and all around good guy.
And really smart too. A Renaissance man.
I’m sure as the Democrats dismantle liberal government as they’ve been trying to do since their President Reagan pretended to be a Republican, they’ll get plenty of help from the sunshine bitches here.
Well said.
Honestly, WTF was the point of that little mini-rant about the basic uselessness of the two parties?
In this case there is a definite and important difference in the way the two parties are viewing net neutrality. Republicans are in the ISPs and telecoms’ pockets and they are doing their bidding to destroy the free Internet as we know it. If you argue that point, it simply means that you don’t understand what’s meant by ‘free Internet’ .
[[[ Republicans are in the ISPs and telecoms’ pockets and they are doing their bidding to destroy the free Internet as we know it. If you argue that point, it simply means that you don’t understand what’s meant by ‘free Internet’ .]]]
If you haven’t heard … Google (Gmail), Yahoo, Microsoft, the CIA org and the NSA spy machine ACTUALLY CONSPIRED against the Republican Party…. and DNC loyalists are sharing your email and facebook images with other Democrats — including YOURS.
If you argue YOUR point, it means that you are doomed to become food for the gods at the DNC as a willing slave.
Poor people don’t need advertising — they have no real money to spend.
the DOUBLE TALK repubes are trying to conflate the cellular internet with the cable’n’wire internet. There is no net neutrality in the cell arena but then internet sites are not wireless. The net neutrality issue is for cable and wire only. Comcast focus is on residential download whereas the wire services are both. Comcast has pretty much neglected local fibre and the telcos are about to go more fibre which means comcast is about to lose a lot of business as the telcos will have end-to-end B2C. IMO comcast is panicking – and then there is satellite.
I recommend calling the bluff (if it is one). The Republicans say they are for equal access for packet data. Fine. Pass a law saying we can’t throttle specific websites, blackmail netflix, and other misdeeds, and I, for one, am for letting you classify ISPs as whatever the hell makes sense.
We’ll see who the liars are then (i.e. the republicans claiming to be for free exchange of packets, or the democrats for claiming it’s not a power grab and free packets is all they want)
We need to remember that there is already no such thing as a free market in the US when it comes to media delivery. In most localities, a single cable provider is licensed and basically charges whatever they want; this is reinforced by zoning regulations, homeowners associations and the like that prohibit installation of antennas to allow people to receive TV free of charge or connect to a satellite provider. Members of both branches of the Party will tell you how they love free enterprise and market economic principles, but they are stupid, liars, or both. What they really favor is unbridled capitalism, in which the monopoly is free to charge whatever the market will bear.
We all have to remember that it is us who have made Google, Facebook, Twitter and their ilk the economic powerhouses that they are, just as it is us (collectively) who put the crooks into office in Washington and our state governments. We can sap the power of the monopolies by simply turning them off, and of the government by throwing the bums out. Sadly, the experience of the last twenty years strongly demonstrates our collective resolve to do so.
Good post. One point:
They are far from perfect, but the “OTARD” rules do provide significant protection. More people need to be aware of them and to be prepared to use them to force landlords, zoning commissions, HOAs, etc. to back off.
Whether Google, Facebook, Twitter, et. al are “economic powerhouses” none of them constitute an effective monopoly on the delivery of data packets.
I have my own issues with Google (read When Google Met Wikileaks recently) and with the others too, but we’re talking about a public utility and one which is comprised of companies that not only were not the product of a free market, but also had a great deal of their infrastructure and right-of-way funded directly by the taxpayer and protected by the FCC.
ISPs should NOT be able to snoop on packets for the purposes of throttling or hastening information flow – much less for the ability to extra-constitutionally share the data with the NSA, CIA and other LEOs (which of course is already happening, thanks to Bush and Obama and the know-nothing Congress).
Nobody is making an free-market argument here, other than that ISPs constitute government subsidized and coddled monopolies that should not have the further ability to limit the flow of information based on arbitrary and , for all intents and purposes, secret and accountability-free reasons.
[[[ ISPs should NOT be able to snoop on packets for the purposes of throttling or hastening information flow – much less for the ability to extra-constitutionally share the data with the NSA, CIA and other LEOs (which of course is already happening, thanks to Bush and Obama and the know-nothing Congress). ]]]
Why do you use public email? “They” read it.
PROOF: Try using Port 25 on your broadband connection. (Email) Which forces you to use a public email system… so they can spy on you.
BOTTOM LINE: “They” are going to spy on you whether you like it or not… regardless of legislation that says otherwise.
That’s not relevant to my point. Of course anyone who provides a free email service will try to read your emails so as to push ads.
If you’re using webmail, you’re using port 8080 or other standard ports for SMTP or IMAP servers. Port 25 is normally associated with SPAM. Has nothing to do with spying on content.
So no. You’re dead wrong. There is a huge difference between a neutral pipeline and one where ISPs can filter or throttle packets based on what they’ve snooped to be contained within them. My aside about the NSA/CIA was simply an acknowledgement of what’s been going on for the past 16 years.
Let’s be real.
UNBEKNOWNS TO YOU, there was a conference in Las Vegas
of hedge fundie profiteers who were rallying and drooling at the prospect of privitising all public lands and services.
The greed virus has spread and mutated into something far more sinister. It wasn’t enuf for wallstreet to rob the country and investors of homes, or extort future earnings from students, or perpetrate wars that gets our youth killed and others around the world, now theses evil creatures want your schools and water and land.
Look at the expression on the face of charles manson. Then look at the face of Lloyd Blankfein.
Another thing – about Google.
Ever heard of Google Fiber? In essence they are entering the ISP game in some markets. Why would they be lobbying against their own interests if they thought would behoove them to have the same powers that the other ISPs are claiming they need?
similar to how lobbyists wrote aca, or dodd frank?
No. Maybe in only the most basic sense of how lobbyists work. But neither Dodd-Frank nor the ACA represented the undoing of a previously hard fought and agreed upon approach to preventing monopolies and abuse of monopolistic control over a utility such as what the ISP lobby is trying here.
Next?
I’m frankly surprised that craigsummers and other usual concern trolls aren’t here defending the cable/ISP industry by paraphrasing directly from the memo “toolkit” referenced in the article.
The day is young. I think they are here with me on the west coast. ;)
it’s midnight in HAIFA.
…..no no – that can not be so…. not under the Trump hard right administration.
Whaaat?? In case you’ve just returned from a vacation on Mars, Trump has consistently promised to gut all regulation of the economy. Or did you honestly believe he was only going to eliminate the rules that you personally disagree with?
Looks like YOUR talking points — as well as those of Google’s lobbying groups and many Democratic legislators — were written for you by Google! The fact is that the so-called “network neutrality” regulations are in no way neutral; they were written by Google, which achieved regulatory capture of the FCC and White House, to fatten its wallet at the expense of ISPs and consumers. How much advertising money does your publication receive from Google/Doubleclick?
Who pays you to post these comments? You were for the big telecoms don’t you! Oh shit I might be paid by Google to post this comment…. I guess the only avenue readers have left is to make informed decisions. Thank god there are so many articles on net neutrality.
The idiot doesn’t even understand that Google is nothing near a monopoly in the same sense that the ISPs are. Does Google engage in censorship? Yes – but there are other search aggregators and email providers and ad-revenue clearinghouses, etc. In many peoples’ and companies’ cases there is no alternative to the one or maybe two ISPs and telecom providers that control their access to ANY content on the Internet, worldwide.
AGREED. We need to stop these plutocratic clowns.
1. You either (a) don’t have the slightest idea what you are talking about or (b) don’t have the slightest idea what you are talking about and you are reading from the NCTA “industry grassroots” (hah!) talking-points list.
2.
How much advertising, from anyone, do you see here, you clueless twit?
You’re an easily-led moron. Literally the ONLY groups of people that oppose net neutrality are large ISPs which function as veritable monopolies in vast regions of the country and world.
Before you deign to provide what you think is a counter-point, you should really research the topic and have a fundamental level of understanding of which you write.
Let’s get down to brass tacks. Should your (or any industrial user’s) water or power company have a right to know what you’re using the water or electricity for – and further – have the right to restrict your use or charge you more based only on what you’re using it for after you’ve already paid for the size of the pipe or capacity of the circuit you use – within the framework of whatever level you’re on (commercial, industrial, etc.)? Further, should they be able to do so in complete secrecy without you having any insight into why your water or power is simply cut off or lessened one day?
Now extend this to the internet, which is essentially a series of pipes, wireline and wireless infrastructure, a lot of which was built on the public dime or with massive subsidies and the protection of the FCC (in the case of wireless) from competitors. You (or Google) pay for a pipe – according to the law of supply and demand. If pipes are expensive in your area, you can try to find another pipe provider or negotiate a better price. Same with Google or any content provider like Netflix. They pay for a pipe and the associated bandwidth (and uptime, etc.) and expect that the ISP will honor the capacity agreement of this pipe.
What the ISPs want to do is exploit a veritable monopoly in numerous regiouis around the world to snoop on your Internet traffic and that of all the people and companies that provide you with content, over the pipes that you and the providers have paid for. They will be free to arbitrarily restrict or throttle content based on corporate whims – including competing corporate offerings (such as an ISP deciding it wants to get into the TV/Movie content generation game) and you will have no knowledge, much less recourse in the matter.
Are you for or against monopolistic practices in the provision of a basic utility type service that makes use of taxpayer funded and incentivized infrastructure that utilizes public land and airwaves?
Net neutrality laws/regulations are as much a “placing of political controls” as is laws against murder.
I think a clarification is needed for the paragraph about corporate interests paying heavy hitters, Ford and Sununu, to spread the anti-neutrality gospel, saying they have been appearing in the media to, “…warn against the dangers of adopting net neutrality.”
I don’t know if the word ‘adopting’ was an oversight, but, as I understand the issue, net neutrality is what exists now, no adoption necessary. The sentence as articulated would lead one to believe that net neutrality doesn’t exist presently and must be prevented from becoming the standard state of the internet, which is totally inaccurate, as neutrality is precisely the net’s present state.
Ford and Sununu have been hired not to fight against adopting net neutrality, which has existed from the start, but to help destroy it. A simple removal of ‘adopting’ from that sentence would clear it up.
Am I splitting hairs?
Yes, you are splitting hairs, but in a good way. By using the word “adopting,” the writer is making Ford and Sununu’s argument for them. It’s use immediately brings into question the validity of the present reality, which is an important first step to changing reality to reflect your own prejudices. Carefulness in language is never a captious action to be blamed on those pointing out where it’s lacking.
The pretense of the privateers is to confuse the public by using their typical republican trojan horse, a slight of hand, as if to inform the public who has come to believe in “net neutrality” that somehow we actually dont have it and need to have it now.
IMHO, if Trump was “tech literate”, I don’t think he would go along with it.
Therefore, the bigger problem isn’t necessarily Trump. Instead, policies like these are being pushed by The Establishment operatives (aka The Swamp) that surround him.
Trump’s signature is really act of appeasement.
Trump doesn’t really have all that much to do with this, other than naming Ajit Pai as chair of the Commission, while two of the five seats are vacant. Under these circumstances, the Republicans have a 2-1 majority and the death of net neutrality was entirely predictable.
Just FYI, only three of the (normally) five members of the FCC can be of a single political party and, consequently, Republican Pai was nominated to the commission by Barack Obama (on the advice of Mitch McConnell) and was unanimously confirmed by the Senate.
HTH.
As though we needed further evidence of Obama’s incompetence
[[[ the Republicans have a 2-1 majority and the death of net neutrality was entirely predictable.]]]
You think it would be any different if the Democrats had a 2-1 majority?
I don’t. The only difference would be how “neutrality” is presented. With the Democrats, they say “neutrality” (talk is cheap) while your internet ports get shut down at the same time.
PROOF: Try using Port 25 on your broadband connection. (Email) Which forces you to use a public email system… so they can spy on you.
Why are you playing so intentionally obtuse? I’m not a fan of Democrats in general, but they do indeed favor the current form of net neutrality – in as much as ISPs are regulated mostly as a utility. So once again, you are wrong, and there is a difference.
Ever heard of the expression, “Let’s don’t and say we did?”
Democrats are the worst. Republicans coming in second.
The current “net neutrality” is A LIE. It always has been. I gave you the #1 proof. My example was NOT the way it was before about 2008.
Today, emails are the basis for all political BS on TV today. DNC. Russians. Terrorists. Right wing. Left Wing… John Podesta and Hillary Pedophile scandals, too. FISA court… Ed Snowden… and even Obama was spying on “unmasked” enemies of the DNC.
The Bush/Cheney regime was spying on everything long before Obama, you right-wing troglodyte. Much of the impetus for it was the predecessor programs that were outed in the REAGAN years through Adm. John Poindexter who was convicted on multiple felonies, but later served as director of Shrub’s DARPA Information Awareness Office.
Obama and now Trump have simply continued the whole thing unabated.
Stop flinging feces at the wall in your cave, and go look at interviews with NSA whistleblowers such as William Binney, J. Kirk Wiebe, and Tom Drake.