It is time that the Federal Communications Commission should have been abolished at least 20 years ago. The marketplace has evolved in a thousand different directions — all of which are away from FCC relevance.
It is possible to give the Commission’s few useful things and leave the rest up to one of the many thousands of agencies in government. We could also close the entire thing.
This is DC. This is government. We are reminded once more of Ronald Reagan.
“The closest thing to eternal life on earth is a government program.”
DC instead of doing right things, DC continues on in the wrong direction.
Which brings us to last week’s Joe Biden Administration announcement of its two FCC nominees.
Biden nominated FCC Chair; New Commissioner to Give Democrats Majority
Democrats and Left are driven crazy by the absence of a Democrat minority in a Democrat-led administration.
Biden Camp Takes Too Much Time to Staff the FCC Properly, Say Activists
The FCC is made up of five commissioners — one of whom also serves as chairman. A full contingent is three of the President’s Party and two of the other.
It’s been a 2-2 tie since before Biden was sworn into office. So the Commission hasn’t been able to unilaterally, illegally impose all sorts of new, awful government policy on the Internet and elsewhere.
But Biden has now nominated acting Chair — Democrat Jessica Rosenworcel — to be permanent Chair. And appointed Gigi Sohn, a long-standing Leftist activist for government expansion, as fifth commissioner.
Sohn will break more than the tie.
Full Disclosure: I’m Gigi. She’s a very nice person. I once upon a time hosted a couple of Capitol Hill Internet policy debates — and Gigi graciously participated in both of them.
But Sohn’s hardcore Leftist policy prescriptions are, respectfully, insane. It will be a devastating blow to the Internet, and also our economy.
Because we know exactly what she is looking for, I am able to tell her.
This will not be Sohn’s first FCC gig. During the Barack Obama Administration, she served as then-Chairman Tom Wheeler’s “Special Counsel for External Affairs.”
But it was the FCC’s super-secretive internal affairs that were the most concerning.
‘Most Transparent Ever?’ Behold the FCC’s Secret, Crony Socialist Meetings:
“‘FCC Encourages Media Companies to Provide Confidential Complaints on (Comcast’s) Time Warner Cable Purchase’
“Sounds totally transparent to me.
“This ain’t about Comcast’s purchase of Time Warner. It’s about the Obama Administration’s yet again squid ink-like ‘transparency.’
“The FCC reviewing mergers isn’t duplicative – it’s triplicative. Both the Federal Trade Commission and Justice Department conduct review. Unanimously blocking any one of these three arms can be done by the Leviathan.
“However, unlike prospective denials by the FTC and Justice – the FCC’s can not be challenged in court. They say Nay – and it’s all over.
“And the FCC has the most nebulous of review standards – does the merger serve the ‘public interest?’ The FCC their own selves get to define ‘public interest’ on a rolling, a la carte basis.
“They simply proclaim something is not in the ‘public interest’ – and that’s all she wrote.
“Given how murky their standard is – their process should absolutely be crystal clear. Secret meetings are possible? Not so crystalline….
“Again – it ain’t (just) about the merger. There are several power grabs that the FCC is attempting to take. Including unilaterally imposing Network Neutrality – and even Title II Reclassification to do it.
“And the companies getting Crony Socialist secret meetings – who are opposed to the merger – are in favor of the Title II-Net Neutrality power grab. It would enable them unlimited bandwidth, without paying for it.
“Will Title II Reclassification and/or Net Neutrality also be discussed in these super-secret meetings? What about any other FCC-pending actions? Are any additional FCC actions being requested? We won’t know – the meetings are secret.”
In secret, the Obama FCC held many meetings with Democrat-crony firms to discuss issues that are supposed to affect public policy. That’s not very good stuff.
And Sohn her own self — as an allegedly non-partisan FCC employee (paid by you and me) — was more than happy to publicly lean hard-Left during what are supposed to be non-partisan FCC endeavors.
FCC Comments Period is meant to be neutral. The FCC Comment Period is where the public can weigh in on the FCC’s proposed actions. The FCC commissioners then pretend to consider the public’s opinion — prior to voting exactly as they had always planned.
The Utter Dumbness of the Bureaucracy ‘Comment Period’
Bureaucracy Power Grab Comment Periods Are Always Stupid – and Often Corrupt
Corrupt? Sohn TweetedYou can find this link:
“If you’re participating in #InternetSlowdown pls consider filing your comment via [email protected] It’s faster & each will be counted”
Pro-Title II Net Neutrality Leftists put together the #InternetSlowdown. And the FCC’s allegedly impartial “Special Counsel for External Affairs” was promoting it and directing its participants to file FCC Comments.
Sohn as commissioner is allowed to be hyperpartisan at best. The past of supersecret meetings with Democrat crony businesses is not good news. Do you think these cabals might also return?
The past cannot be repeated. And DC’s trend-line is rocketing away from transparency and good policy.
So a restoration of Obama-era FCC personnel and policies — in the midst of this new era of even more secrecy and awful policy — is nothing but very bad news.
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