Our Public Servants -- Protecting the Tubz

[BellisimaJ.]

The protection of the Internet is expected to be back on the House floor today for the first time in three years. Granted, an observer would need the equivalent of a legislative microscope to find it, because the concept of an open, non-discriminatory network is buried deep in an $825 billion stimulus package.  In the grand scheme of things, the telecom portions of the stimulus bill don't amount to "a hill of beans in this crazy world," as Sam Spade once put it in a different context. No matter, except that it's our hill and our beans. Today (January 28), the House will vote for the first time to protect even a small portion of the Internet from the ravages of large telephone and cable companies and to make access to the Internet more competitive.
For those of us who waited for a new day to advance the cause of preserving a free, open and non-discriminatory Internet, the language in the House stimulus package is a great first step toward reclaiming the Internet and establishing once and for all the concept that carriers can't discriminate. Legislation being considered by the Senate also will be helpful to advancing the cause. Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller (D-WVA) has proposed to include network-opening provisions in the Senate version of the stimulus.

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