Congress Busted Using Cable Lobbyist Talking Points In Attacks On Net Neutrality
from the professional-parrots dept
By now, most Techdirt readers realize that far too many members of Congress don't so much have thoughts about technology policy, as they do bulleted mental lists of talking points provided by a lobbyist happy to do their thinking for them. That has been particularly true when it comes to telecom policy over the last few months, especially the GOP's ham-fisted attack on popular consumer broadband privacy protections and the telecom sector's self-serving frontal assault on net neutrality.
Over the last few weeks, as the FCC was preparing to begin dismantling net neutrality rules, House lawmakers received an email from GOP leadership educating them on how to best defend the agency's extremely unpopular decision. Included in that e-mail was an attached list of talking points (pdf) making all manner of disengenous claims about the net neutrality debate:
"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."
Usually, Congress members cover their tracks well enough to obfuscate the fact they let lobbyists and campaign contributions do the thinking for them. But the Intercept noticed that metadata attached to the talking points clearly indicate they originated with the cable industry's biggest lobbying organization, the National Cable and Telecommunications Association (NCTA):
"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."
As such, you'll surely be shocked to learn that many of the talking points included in the packet weren't remotely true, including one claiming net neutrality is somehow "anti-consumer," another regurgitating the repeatedly-debunked claim that net neutrality killed network investment, and several repeating the industry's favorite claim that net neutrality protections aren't necessary, because the broadband industry never does anything wrong:
"These “Title II” regulations, rammed through the FCC by the Obama White House, were based on a hypothetical fear of broadband providers blocking certain websites or putting competitors in slow lanes. But despite ten years of the left stoking those hypothetical fears, they never materialized. Why? Because it is not in the interest of broadband providers to degrade the experience of their customers, especially when watching video or streaming services. The broadband providers would lose customers to their competitors if they ever attempted to block content."
Here on planet Earth, we've watched as large ISPs used usage caps to hurt streaming competitors, block users from using certain services unless they pay for more expensive data plans, intentionally congest their networks to drive up interconnection costs, throttle entire classifications of traffic then lie about it, and even group up to block competing mobile apps and services they didn't want to compete with. Anybody that thinks it's hyperbole to state that ISPs will use their size, leverage and the lack of broadband competition to engage in a rotating crop of anti-competitive behaviors simply has not been paying attention.
And again, while it's still unsurprising to see lawmakers mindlessly parrot whatever giant telecom conglomerates tell them to, that doesn't make it any less grotesque. Combine that with the bot that's spamming the FCC with bogus support for the FCC's unpopular policies and the coordinated effort to make net neutrality supporters appear racist and unhinged, and you may begin to notice that the companies pushing this latest anti-consumer agenda aren't particularly concerned about integrity or playing fair.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: broadband, congress, lobbyists, net neutrality, talking points
Companies: ncta
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
'Not paying attention' would be the BETTER possibility sadly
Anybody that thinks it's hyperbole to state that ISPs will use their size, leverage and the lack of broadband competition to engage in a rotating crop of anti-competitive behaviors simply has not been paying attention.
Well you know what they say...
"It is difficult to get a politician to understand something, when their future 'contributions'/'retirement' depends on their not understanding it."
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
The race and gender wars fostered by the left are more of these tactics. They must divide and divert or the people would take the time to examine the arguments and see that progressivism (actually a misnomer, should be regressives) is a violent, bloody, failing ideology. You only have to look around the world to see the ultimate fate of these kinds of societies. Big government always leads to iron fisted control and death. It cannot tolerate dissent because its ideology cannot be defended. There are more than 100 million people in the ground due to this violence and if they have their way, there will be many more here and in Europe soon.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_a7dQXilCo
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
I suggest you examine your own behavior in the mirror and ask yourself how posting in such an inflammatory, finger pointing manner, acting like we're some violent mob out to get you is anything other than hypocrisy.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
Like good sheep
Why are conservatives infatuated with farm animals?
There seems to be a disproportionate number of references to sheep by conservatives that either suggest projection or, well, something more nefarious.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
Gianforte body slams a reporter
FCC reporter roughed up.
Journalist questioning HHS Secretary arrested.
All under a GOP WH, House and Senate.
No pattern here, move along.....or else.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
The only place where such stong emotional, irrelevant and overarchingly partisan drivel is valuable and that is for marking the territory for zealots. I imagine it is how terrorists justify killing innocent people:
It is like any historical expropriation: The opposite side is a bunch of "favourite slur" or associates with "fundamentally unlikable".
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: The inconvenient truth about the Democratic Party
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
trust
so OK, we can't trust Congress, the President, FCC, NSA, etc etc
Who specifically should we now trust within our government ??
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: trust
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: trust
Nobody. Government, like police, is a necessary evil. They serve needs of the populace, but should always be watched and never trusted.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: trust
I have been telling these fuckwits this for a while now.
You are dead on! Government is a construct that should never be trusted, even when they are crystal clear and squeaky fucking clean you still can never trust it.
While the door for corruption can never be closed in government, It is "trust" in ones government that opens the "FLOOD GATES".
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: trust
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
What branch of government can we trust?
The answer is, and always has been, none which is why we need transparency, it's why we need strictly enforced FOIA laws, and we need third parties interested in using that transparency to hunt for and expose corruption and wrongdoing.
The FCC suffers from regulatory capture, essentially Ajit Pai is on the take from the telecoms (Comcast or Verizon, I think) so he personally benefits from ignoring the interests of the public and instead serving those companies, e.g. passing regulation to help them hold their control of the industry, and not passing regulation that restricts them,
This is off topic but: Is this cause to not have government at all? Not really. No government or no regulation accomplishes the same thing, letting big industry do what they want, including engaging in numerous tactics to discourage competition, thus sustaining their regional monopolies, and forcing the public to suffer their abusive policies.
Telecommunication infrastructure requires regulation for consumer protection. We just don't have a system that works to assure the people are represented, nor a means to implement it in today's political clime. This isn't to say we shouldn't try, rather we should keep trying until we get it right.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
I'd love for them to point out the competition in the markets under-served by 1 or just to far out for anyone to bother but they got a law passed to make sure no one else could serve them.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[sarcasm]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
May as well be archaeology...
"The Internet is really blossoming, but some policy-makers and politicians want to control it and regulate access to it. We should not try to intervene in this marketplace…"
Made by the FCC Chairman...in 1999!
A time when competition ACTUALLY DID EXIST.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: May as well be archaeology...
People ask for regulation in hopes that i will help keep the place free, politicians take advantage of a now blessed power grab, wash rinse and repeat.
Before its all done, a lot of people start asking how his happened while calling the people telling them what happened a bunch of fools.
Then... they call upon government again, to solve a problem government was the cause of. People are stupid... very stupid.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: May as well be archaeology...
Please give me an example of how "competition DOES exist" (all caps, no less!) in the broadband internet market, the thing we are currently talking about.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: May as well be archaeology...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Competition DOES exist
I live in a Comcast monopoly region. My only choice for home internet service in my county is Comcast.
And mine is far, far from the only Comcast-only region
Tell me: where is this competition?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
so sad.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]