Deja vu in D.C. 

I posted a Jolt three years ago starring U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) when she spoke out on the senate floor to help kill a Republican bill that would have stopped the FCC from enacting net neutrality rules.

In January this year, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit struck down net neutrality rules. 

And so Sen. Cantwell was back on the senate floor today (with nearly the exact same poster board prop) in the name of net neutrality—the concept that ISPs can't charge content providers different rates for better delivery service.

This time Sen. Cantwell was calling on the FCC to enact the standards again. (The best analogy I can think of to explain net neutrality is sure, if you use more water, you pay a higher utility bill, but your water isn't going to rush out of the spigot while your neighbor's water trickles out.)

Cantwell's own creepy scenario? From her speech today: "This has a major ripple effect. Imagine you’re a doctor examining a patient via telemedicine, or a student trying to access a report through a university server. All of this put at challenge by whether they have fast access or not."

And she continued:

“We do not want artificial toll lanes on the innovation economy of the future. We can't allow Internet Service Providers to set up fast lanes for those who can pay and slow lanes for those who can't. Tiered Internet would allow Internet Service Providers to cut backroom deals to determine what information America can access online.”

I feel compelled to repeat myself three years on as well re: this cause celebre of the left.

Creepier leverage over internet content comes from search monopolies like Google. I wish legislators were as focused on that. 

Here's what I said in 2011, and I stand by it. 

Net neutrality is a bit more complicated than it sounds and ISPs may be less of a problem when it comes to Internet control than search engines, as Microsoft VP Brad Smith has pointed out. Microsoft, a content provider once wary of powerful ISPs, used to be a loud advocate of net neutrality rules, but has stepped back from the battle because, they say, they haven't seen a problem with ISPs.