As part of its never-ending resistance to the Trump agenda, the California legislature passed a bill earlier this year to reinstate the discredited concept of “net neutrality” for access to the internet.
The California legislators know who butters their bread, and their Democrat majority just passed a bill that interferes with President Trump’s better approach of allowing competition to rule the internet.
This new law would prohibit cable companies and other internet service providers from charging high-traffic users more. This ban is an encroachment on the rights of private property, because the owner of the internet service should be able to require traffic hogs to pay rather than freeload on the private property.
California is essentially trying to force its self-interest on the rest of us with respect to the internet, to which California has no special claim of right.
Under the California law, cable companies and their millions of customers could not tell Google and Facebook to stop discriminating against content that people want. The California law inverts the internet by allowing Silicon Valley to dictate content on the internet, when internet users and internet providers should be able to tell Google to stop discriminating against Dennis Prager and other conservatives.
It is Google and Facebook that block access, and they want leverage to continue doing so. Trump and his Federal Communications Commission (FCC) recognize that’s backwards, and hopefully they will sue in federal court if this California laws goes to effect.
Meanwhile, Congress is held a hearing in September to review San Francisco-based Twitter’s bias against conservatives. The FTC could be investigating Google’s unfair business practices, Sen. Orrin Hatch pointed out.
Internet service providers may sue to overturn the California law, which would establish one system in that State which is different from most other States. California is essentially trying to force its self-interest on the rest of us with respect to the internet, to which California has no special claim of right.
Without net neutrality, the public would have far better and faster internet service than we have today, because cable companies could raise money from the traffic hogs to improve the service. Instead, billions of dollars line the wallets of Silicon Valley executives who invest very little of it in improving internet service.
