Michael Powell on FCC Overreach

Obamacare for the Internet?

President Barack Obama strongly weighed in on the net neutrality issue, petitioning the F.C.C. to consider the internet like a public utility for Americans.




While net neutrality is understood as internet companies adjusting internet speeds for certain users.  Mr. Obama's statement declares:

"I believe the FCC should create a new set of rules protecting net neutrality and ensuring that neither the cable company nor the phone company will be able to act as a gatekeeper, restricting what you can do or see online."

However, the ramifications of the Obama Administration's modest proposal goes beyond "internet fast lanes".  By applying the net neutrality to cellular companies, who offered tiers of service based on payments and who will govern a small number of bandwidth hogs.  Enforcing net neutrality could either raise rates for everyone or cause congestion reducing access for many mobile data users.

Of course, treating the internet like a public utility means lots of government bureaucrats and functionaries to apply and monitor these rules.  The problem is that instead of applying the principle of subsidiarity, where governing happens on a local or state level, inevitably this would be centralized in the District of Calamity (sic).

Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) offered some quick and incisive reaction on Twitter to Mr. Obama's play on net neutrality.

Do we really want to cede control of the internet to the government, which spent $2 Billion on Healthcare.gov  and could not build an efficient and secure webpage?

Mr. Obama rightly notes that the F.C.C. is an independent agency so which unelected bureaucrats will govern us with little chance of redress?

Let us not forget about mission creep.  Currently, the F.C.C. is taking comments on the alleged offensiveness of the term "Redskins" to force owner Dan Snyder to change the name of the sports franchise from "The Washington Redskins".  This is being pursued by trying to pull the licenses of a couple of Red Zebra am sports radio stations that the Redskins owner controls.  This would set a precedent of government censoring content based on shifting political correctness, not well established community standards like George Carlin's "The Seven Words" that you can't say when broadcasting.

Furthermore, how much will the government stifle innovation on the internet as government bureaucrats figure things out and assess what is fair and neutral.

There has been wrangling for years over net neutrality. But it would be prudent to give a death panel to the notion of making the Internet into Obamacare via public utility regulation by the federal government.

A Partial S.O.S. From Legislative Leviathans

Three years ago, President Barack Obama signed into law the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act ( Pub. L-11-203).  When it was passed, it was a long  2,319  page piece of legislation.  Although financial legislation can be tricky, Sarbanes-Oxley (2002) was only 66 pages and Gramm-Leach–Bliley (1999) was 145 pages.    This contemporary financial legislation was legislatively loquacious compared to the Federal Reserve Act (1913) that took 31 pages or Glass-Steagall (1933) that was 33 pages.  

But much like Obamacare (the misnamed Affordable Care Act), the bloated Dodd Frank bill delegated bureaucratic the authority to write implementing regulations. Currently, Dodd-Frank is comprised of 13,789 pages of rule-making from ten different regulatory agencies. 
  

To put this into terms which most people can wrap their minds around, Dodd-Frank is now the equivalent of 28 copies of War and Peace.  And Mel Brooks quipped that no-one makes it through War and Peace.   What can be done to avoid such governing monstrosities again?      


 ***  

1. Either abolish or reorganize the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection to have an Executive Board rather than a Consumer “Czar” and be financially responsible to the legislative branch rather than being an “independent” branch of government. 
2. While it might seem kind of quaint, but  to follow the Constitution.  
3. Congress need to stop rushing legislation.   When he first ran for President in the 2008 cycle, Mr. Obama promised that: “As president, Obama will not sign any nonemergency bill without giving the American public to review and comment on the White House Web site for five days.”  So much for that promise.  Speaker John Boehner repeatedly promised that all bills would be put on line for 72 hours before being voted upon.  This pledge has been repeatedly broken.  These Federal politicians need to live up to their political pledges or be held accountable at the ballot box rather than accepted as the standard practice of the Cocktail Party in the District of Calamity (sic).
4. Congress should pass legislation that is no longer than 50 pages long.  This is longer than some Tea Party type legislators advocate, but it is readable by the Member and can accommodate for the complexities of contemporary government.
5.  Congress must Enact legislation to  take control over expensive Executive Branch regulations.  It is understandable that members of Congress are not going to have expertise in complex areas of governmance, like the financial industry and the environement.  But they must not cede authority to smug technocratic bureaucrats who are given wide deference by the judiciary and are not beholden to the ballot box.

***

Compliance costs with the legislative leviathan is strangling growth in the American economy and is chipping away at household budgets.   The REINS legislation could be enhanced by adding a 5 year sunset provisions to any costly regulation which could be reapproved by Congress.  This would rein in an overzealous Executive Branch in issuing regulations as well as tempering the bureaucratic beast.

SEE MORE at DCBarroco.com 

Winston Churchill on Regulations