NET NEUTRALITY: YEAH, I GET PISSED AT NANCY PELOSI PLENTY-- BUT SOMETIMES SHE DOES STUFF THAT REMINDS ME WHY I ALWAYS VOTE FOR DEMOCRATS.

I know it's hard to come by ROLL CALL if you don't have a subscription and, you know me and how I hate breaking rules... but this article from today's issue is just too important not to share with DWT readers. If you haven't been following the battle to prevent the Republicans from giving away the rights to administer the Internet to their Big Business campaign contributors in a way that will wreck the free internet we're all digging so much, here's some background.

Today Pelosi showed some real backbone on the issue. One can only imagine what the pro-business-contributions members of her inner circle, like Rahm Emanuel and Steny Hoyer, are saying. This issue is too important for vital democracy-sustaining communication to let a few political contributions from AT&T get in the way of principles. When you read the article, note the quote from Jarvis Stewart, the sleazy former chief of staff for right-of-center Democrat Harold Ford. Remember, corrupt lobbyists, are overwhelmingly Republicans but if we're not careful... I don't expect much from Democrats who suck the corporate tit like Republicans-- scumbags like Ed Towns, Al Wynn, Charlie Gonzales, Bobby Rush and Gene Green-- but I was proud to see Pelosi take a principled stand on this today.

PUSH BY PELOSI IRKS TELECOMS
ROLL CALL
Tory Newmyer
May 10, 2006

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is drawing the ire of telecommunications giants after she came out against them in a fight between corporate titans of long-standing importance to Democrats — and encouraged her party colleagues to fall in line behind her.

The battle — over the relatively obscure issue of "net neutrality," which concerns whether and how the federal government should regulate the Internet — pits cable and phone industry giants against tech heavies such as Google, which is based in Pelosi's home turf of the Bay Area, as well as an array of consumer groups.

That the debate has turned partisan is angering cable and phone-friendly Democrats, who accuse Pelosi of trying to impose her personal views on the party.

"She's taking this bill personally. It's a constituent issue for her, and she's generalized it into a Caucus issue," said a senior aide to a Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee.

Jarvis Stewart, a former chief of staff to Rep. Harold Ford Jr.(D-Tenn.) who's now lobbying for Verizon on the issue, called the minority leader's involvement "heavy-handed."

However, Pelosi aides and others who support her position argue that it was Republicans who fired the first partisan shot in the debate. They say that Pelosi is simply seeking to get her Caucus on the right side of history by sticking up for the public's right to unfettered Internet access.

"She personally feels it's a good place for Democrats to be," said Pelosi spokeswoman Jennifer Crider, emphasizing that the Minority Leader is not going so far as to whip her Caucus on the issue.

The fight pairs two entrenched lobbying forces — the cable and telephone industries — against Web-based businesses, which are relative newcomers to the Washington, D.C., influence game, but who carry clout because of their role as engines of new economic growth.

Both sides have been dumping lobbying resources into the fight, plastering the Hill with consultants for briefings and one-on-one meetings, covering cable airwaves and Beltway publications (including Roll Call) with issue ads and roping in outside groups to help make their case.
For Democrats, the debate offers a chance to court an emerging industry with increasing clout on Capitol Hill. And insiders say that the potential for a backlash against the party, at least in the short term, is low, since most phone and cable companies have already maxed out their political contributions for the 2006 cycle.

What's at issue is a provision in a broader overhaul of telecommunications laws that's expected to hit the House floor in the next few weeks. Democrats are pressing to strengthen language in that bill to prevent phone and cable companies from discriminating against certain sources of online content delivered over their broadband networks. For instance, these Democrats don't want to see Internet service providers giving special treatment, such as faster downloads or quicker access, to Web sites that have signed sweetheart deals with some content providers, or to limit access to sites that have not formed partnerships.

The cable and phone companies counter that new federal regulations will stifle online innovations. And they argue if they aren't allowed to charge major Internet businesses, consumers themselves will end up paying the cost of expanding network infrastructure to meet growing demand for more and better access.

Ordinarily, Congressional face-offs between rival big-money interests break down along geographic lines, with lawmakers taking sides with whichever industry looms larger back home. Telecom measures especially have a history of passing with bipartisan support, with most contentious issues ironed out before bills reach the floor.

Given this history, industry insiders said they are surprised that the net-neutrality issue has emerged as a partisan flashpoint.

"I don't see where this is political," said BellSouth spokesman Bill McCloskey. "It just seems odd for the Democrats to take an anti-consumer position — to say the government should set rules to deny consumers choice."

Others, however, said that Democratic leaders were smart to move swiftly and outflank Republicans on an issue that could resonate with voters. Former Rep. Vin Weber (R-Minn.), who lobbies for a coalition of Internet companies on the issue, said "the endgame politics — the politics of Election Day — are overwhelmingly weighted toward our side" since "tens of millions of voters" stand to be impacted.

As Pelosi and Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Rahm Emanuel (Ill.) looked at this, "they must have thought, 'Holy cow, we've got a great issue here,'" Weber said. "That's why as a Republican who cares about my party, I'm telling people to please pay attention to this."

Pelosi publicly entered the debate last month, just as the telecom overhaul was passing out of the committee.

After the committee marked up the bill on April 26, the Minority Leader posted on her leadership Web site a petition urging people to become "citizen cosponsors" of an amendment, offered by Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), to add tough net-neutrality language to the telecom overhaul.

The night before, Pelosi had huddled for about an hour with committee members and staffers, several participants said, adding that the Minority Leader herself didn't talk much during the meeting, but that other lawmakers there tried to rally support for Markey's net-neutrality amendment.

Meanwhile, that week, a newly formed alliance of online activists and bloggers called the SavetheInternet.com Coalition started putting pressure on lawmakers to buck the cable and phone companies on net neutrality. While the group includes some high-profile conservative voices, perhaps most notable among its membership is MoveOn.org, the liberal group that helped pioneer online political organizing.

Other online voices from the left also got on board. DailyKos.com, a leading voice for the emerging "net-roots" movement in Democratic politics, began to trumpet Pelosi's work on the issue, as Pelosi logged on to encourage activists to get involved.

"Without Net Neutrality, corporate special interests will be able to charge extra fees and turn the internet into a multi-tiered network of bandwidth haves and have-nots," she wrote on the site that week. "The Netroots have made a tremendous difference in this debate — please keep up the good work."

Keeping the Democratic "netroots" happy and motivated is considered crucial if Democrats are to take over the Senate and the House this fall. Rank-and-file wired activists have been a boon for Democratic turnout and energy, but they have also riled party leaders at times for pushing for more aggressively liberal policies than the Democratic establishment prefers.

A month before Pelosi wrote her plea on Daily Kos, an unscientific poll of more than 14,000 visitors to the site found a mere 19 percent approved of the way Pelosi was doing her job, with 67 percent saying they disapproved.

The pressure from the online groups appears to have helped close the margin when the full committee voted on the Markey amendment, with two Democrats who had opposed the measure peeling off to support it. But the proposal nonetheless failed, and the overall bill then easily won a green light.

Now, insiders on either side of the debate predict the effort in the House could all be for naught. Democrats are readying an amendment addressing the matter to offer on the floor, but several sources said it is unlikely that House GOP leaders would allow it, to avoid forcing their members to put themselves on the record.

Instead, proponents expect their best chance at a win will come in the Senate, where Sens. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) and Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) are readying a bill on the issue.