After FCC Chair Genachowski's decision to reclassify broadband and protect Neutrality, the telcos are hitting back with a massive lobbying campaign, the WSJ reports.
The rewrite won't happen right away—and could stretch on for more than a year—but phone and cable companies are already gearing up for a lobbying battle that is likely to be expensive.
Earlier this week, key Democratic lawmakers announced plans to take up a telecommunications revamp, a move applauded by phone and cable companies that hope it could stall the FCC's efforts to regulate their Internet lines....
Congressional Republicans have mostly offered scathing reviews of Mr. Genachowski's efforts. More than 150 House Republicans have signed a letter scheduled to be released Friday that urges the FCC to stop its efforts and leave the matter up to Congress.
The Democratic leadership has supported the FCC's efforts. But some more fiscally conservative Democrats have expressed reservation. On Monday, 73 House Democrats sent a letter to the FCC raising concerns about its efforts.
Lawmakers are reacting to angst from cable and phone companies—particularly AT&T and Verizon Communications Inc.—which are concerned about possible new FCC regulation of their Internet lines. The companies have been urging Congress to get involved, saying it is past time the laws were updated.
Lawmakers should be reacting to the angst from their actual constituents--the ones who vote for them rather than the ones whose PACs give them lots of money--to protect the freedom of the Internet that we have all come to know and depend upon. Tim Karr, Free Press and SavetheInternet.com Campaign Director, had more on this story earlier this week.
Big phone and cable companies are so determined to dismantle consumer protections on the open Internet that they've spent millions to flip Congress against you. Earlier this week, many in Congress delivered.
On Monday, 74 House Democrats joined 37 Senate Republicans to sign an industry-written letter that tells the Federal Communications Commission to halt all efforts to protect Internet users and stop big companies from blocking Internet traffic....
The letter is so full of misleading information that it's hard to know where to begin.
But behind it all is one dirty little secret: Nearly every one of these representatives has accepted massive contributions from the phone and cable lobby.
Such behavior by elected officials is outrageous and unethical. Perhaps some of these representatives just didn't know what they were signing. Or perhaps this is just business as usual -- members willing to sell out the public in exchange for campaign cash. (Is it any wonder the latest Gallup public opinion poll counts a congressional disapproval rating of 73 percent?)
But in putting their names to this letter, these members are telling us to have blind faith that phone and cable companies have the best interests of Americans in mind - and will deliver fast, open and affordable Internet services without government oversight.
Save the Internet's whip list for those members of Congress who are doing the bidding of the telcos is here. They've also helpfully provided you with contact information for representatives, if you're representative is on that list and you wish to let them know you would rather they represented you than AT&T, or Verizon, or Comcast.
There are good guys in this fight in Congress, and one of them is Rep. Jay Inslee, who is circulating another letter expressing support for the FCC's intention to protect the Internet. You can sign a petition in support of this effort, and contact your own Representative to ask him or her to sign on to the Inslee effort with this tool from PCCC.