Is The Internet About To Be Taken Over?

I've blogged about 'net neutrality' before, and now it's crunch time.  The FCC is taking a vote tomorrow on whether or not to implement regulations on the Internet.  For a detailed examination of how we got to this point, check out this story by Robert McDowell in the Wall Street Journal.  The bottom line is this:

For years, proponents of so-called "net neutrality" have been calling for strong regulation of broadband "on-ramps" to the Internet, like those provided by your local cable or phone companies. Rules are needed, the argument goes, to ensure that the Internet remains open and free, and to discourage broadband providers from thwarting consumer demand. That sounds good if you say it fast.

Nothing is broken and needs fixing, however. The Internet has been open and freedom-enhancing since it was spun off from a government research project in the early 1990s. Its nature as a diffuse and dynamic global network of networks defies top-down authority. Ample laws to protect consumers already exist. Furthermore, the Obama Justice Department and the European Commission both decided this year that net-neutrality regulation was unnecessary and might deter investment in next-generation Internet technology and infrastructure.

Analysts and broadband companies of all sizes have told the FCC that new rules are likely to have the perverse effect of inhibiting capital investment, deterring innovation, raising operating costs, and ultimately increasing consumer prices. Others maintain that the new rules will kill jobs. By moving forward with Internet rules anyway, the FCC is not living up to its promise of being "data driven" in its pursuit of mandates—i.e., listening to the needs of the market. ...

On this winter solstice, we will witness jaw-dropping interventionist chutzpah as the FCC bypasses branches of our government in the dogged pursuit of needless and harmful regulation.

The U.N. is also considering slapping regulations on the Internet, as well, making full use of the recent Wikileaks scandal.  Investor's Business Daily adds this:

This policy, as we've said before, would institute a dangerous system that would violate free speech and property rights. ...

Genachowski's plan is likely to be approved by the five-member commission, but that won't be the end of it. A group of GOP senators has sent a letter to Genachowski telling him, as Upton did, that they will work to rescind net neutrality if it becomes part of the nation's regulatory regime.

Those Republican senators will likely be helped by some Democratic colleagues, in addition to the support they'll be getting from the GOP House. Few on the Hill like what Genachowski is trying to do, which is both regulate beyond government's authority — the Republican complaint — and bypass the legislative process in doing it — which neither party cares for.

The Internet is in no need of supervision from the U.N. or Washington. It is an energetic, broadly accessible marketplace of ideas.

Expression is wide open on the Web, and commerce thrives there. It has evolved intelligently on its own — giving a master power to oversee it or to ensure a bureaucrat's or politician's sense of fairness is not only unnecessary, it's counterproductive.

As Rod Beckstrom, president and CEO of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, said in September at the Vilnius meeting that the Internet works. It lets us communicate on an unprecedented scale, and its relative lack of regulation has made "it a fertile field for innovation and competition."

The best thing for the U.N. and Washington to do is just stand back and let it flow.

As I said before, I think there are two reasons for the increasing interest in taking over the Internet.  First is financial - the vast majority of Internet commerce is untaxed, and government types look at that as an untapped treasure trove of your money that they can spend.  Second is that of control, especially for liberals.  The inherent nature of a free and unregulated Internet allows for freedom of speech, expression, and criticism.  It also allows for the dissemination of truth, both in word form and, especially with recent improvements in mobile computing and broadband, video form (and you know that a single vivid image or video clip will persuade people more than all the written words in the world).  Since the Left's ultimate goal is control, having a free and unregulated Internet is a gigantic obstacle that needs to be overcome.

If nothing else, just look at the lengths to which the current crop of Leftists in Washington are willing to go in order to institute this control.  They're going to break with almost two decades of precedence (since the beginning of the Internet), bypass the clear authority of Congress, and blatantly ignore an explicit ruling of a federal judge to get their fist around the Internet.

Make no mistake, this is a very, very serious first step.  I truly hope that the GOP has the stones to exert their power on this issue in January because if this clear infringement on freedom is implemented and allowed to stand, the days of expressing dissent from whatever the government says about anything are numbered.