How do we know that the NSA stuff is being driven by anti-Americanism? So much outrage about NSA and American allies, but so little about Russia, China, and American rivals. Heck, I’m not even seeing a peep about a Chicom firm Lenovo buying Google Motorola.
Now here’s a major reform idea I could get behind: merging FCC and FTC. By removing one entity, we reduce the added burden on business when two different regulators come after them for the same stuff. Getting rid of DoJ’s antitrust division would help, too. Because now even SEC is grabbing new tech powers.
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More Net Neutrality! With the oral arguments having happened, people are chewing on what happened. Some are confident the FCC will lose, which is unsurprising since they’ve lost on this before. Hence this title, Net Neutrality Returns – As Farce.
We need an FCC that will stop just trying to take power and instead will adapt to rapidly-changing technology in a smart and humble way. From what I’m hearing, Michael O’Rielly is a good choice for that, though of course I have no high hopes for Tom Wheeler.
Though apparently it’s not just FCC that’s terrible about this stuff. SEC writes regulations it can’t even follow itself, Darrell Issa points out.
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The big stories this week continue to be LightSquared and cybersecurity. Even as House Democrats complain about government doing too much, incredibly, we see that Senate Democrats are so inflexible that John McCain is in a gang of Republicans to fight the Democrats on the cybersecurity bill. Consider that. That’s how extreme Harry Reid, Joe Lieberman, Jay Rockefeller, and Susan Collins are on this. John McCain is putting together a team to make a Republican bill with Kay Bailey Hutchison and others, rather than sign on with a Democrat on a bill. Danger, Will Robinson! Harry Reid is that much of an extremist!
Reid is rushing to pass it, but details come out anyway, such as an attack on FOIA. Transparency! Not.
Speaking of transparency, the firm that the Barack Obama FCC has remained oddly silent on, and that insists the FCC should remain silent on, is ready to go on the offensive. It almost seems like LightSquared bet the company on this, and will go down swinging. They may end up making a spectrum trade though, which if workable would be interesting.
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I meant to talk about the cybersecurity bill on Monday as it’s a big story. But, it’s gotten even bigger since. You see, a broad spectrum of Republicans is coming out against it. Names like Kay Bailey Hutchison, John McCain, Mike Enzi, Saxby Chambliss, Jeff Sessions, and even Lisa Murkowski are against the crazy Rush Harry Reid and the Democrats are putting on the bill pushed by Joe Lieberman, Jay Rockefeller, and Susan Collins.
And they’re right to oppose it. The case is overblown, and even if they claim the Internet Kill Switch is gone, it’s still a power grab. We’re at the point where Dianne Feinstein is a voice of reason, as she promotes voluntary data sharing, a plan Tech at Night has previously supported when also proposed by Dan Lungren in the House. Yeah, seriously. If you know California political history you know how funny it is that Republican Lungren and Democrat Feinstein now have another thing in common. But I think they’re both right on this. The way we’ll get more secure is to share more data and to prosecute the offenders.
In other major news, the FCC has rejected LightSquared’s proposal to build a terrestrial wireless LTE network.
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