ALEC Wants You To Pay 750 Percent More For High-Speed Internet

[proud2BlibKansan]

The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is the most powerful corporate front group you’ve never heard of. Drawing the vast majority of its financing from big corporations, the group allows these firms to help write bills that it then secretly passes off to state legislators to get turned into laws.

The organization has come under fire recently for backing “Stand Your Ground” laws and voter suppression efforts, leading to an exodus of some of its strongest corporate funders. But the group’s policy agenda stretches far beyond these areas, and impacts just about every area of American life.

Take public high-speed broadband Internet. A few years ago, the city of Wilson, North Carolina, decided that it would create its own broadband system, which it called Greenlight. The service offered speeds twice as fast as private competitors in the area for a similar price. Soon, the success of the service spread, and a number of other cities began offering municipal broadband systems that were cheaper and/or faster than private competitors’.

But state legislators — who received $600,000 in contributions from the telecom industry in the previous election cycle — reacted to the spread of these successful services by undercutting them with a bill that made it very difficult for cities to operate their own broadband systems. One provision in the bill made it illegal for cities to offer broadband services that are priced below their costs. “This bill will make it practically impossible for cities to provide a fundamental service. Where’s the bill to govern [cable provider] Time Warner? Let’s be clear about whose bill this is. This is Time Warner’s bill. You need to know who you’re doing this for!” thundered Rep. Bill Faison (D) at the time. The bill was unfortunately passed into law.

more . . . http://www.alternet.org/story/155041/alec_wants_you_to_pay_750_percent_more_for_high-speed_internet?akid=8607.287329.4SnA8S&rd=1&t=12

[LiberalEsto]

1. In other words, the rich would be able to communicate

while the rest of us, the "serfs", won't be able to afford the Internet.

[leftyohiolib]

2. just one more lesson, in a long line of many, to never vote for the shit-stains who call themselves

republikkkans

[alfredo]

7. It's not just the Republicans, it is the rich industrialist who own them. They have become the enemy

within. To them democracy is antithetical to the corporate ethic.

[madokie]

3. Geeeze, we gotta get money our of deciding our democracy

right now our congress critters are bought and paid for and most don't even bother to deny it any more. I think we have a few good Dems but for the most part they're a bunch of lying assholes selling us down the river.

[xtraxritical]

10. Yeah, sober up and VOTE DEMOCRATIC.

[Cirque du So-What]

4. AT&T is on ALEC's corporate board

Verizon, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Cox Communications are the big telecom companies I saw at first glance here:

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Alec_corporations

[flamingdem]

5. Good link thanks nt

[alfredo]

8. AT&T pushed a law to do away with land lines here in Ky. It failed.

[BadSaratoga]

6. Free-Market Economy Huh?

[HillWilliam]

9. Another reason I'm voting for Bill Faison in the primary

He was my rep and a damn good one. He's also strongly anti-fracking.

Mr Faison has always listened to his constituents and has answered every one of my emails with a thoughtful, personal reply.

Y'don't ever get THAT out of a pug.

The other two guys running for governor aren't Bill Faison, but they're light-years ahead of that teafreep Pat McCrory.