Obama vs. the Internet

So much for the will of the voters. Before last Tuesday’s elections, President Obama said that while he wasn’t on the ballot, his policies were. Now that the American people have rebuked those policies, Mr. Obama is attempting another federal power grab over an innovative U.S. industry.

On Monday he urged the Federal Communications Commission to apply to the Internet century-old telephone regulations designed for public utilities. In a video posted on Youtube, Mr. Obama endorsed the regulation of Internet access providers under Title II of the Communications Act of 1934.

These rules weren’t at the cutting edge of innovation even in the 1930s. As former FCC attorney Randolph May notes, this regulatory framework was written into the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887 to oversee monopoly railroads. The Communications Act drafters then copied the 1887 law, replaced the references to railroads and clarified that the new regulations would apply to telephones as well as telegraphs. Eighty years later Mr. Obama has decided, in his market wisdom, that these rules should apply to the Internet.

When the FCC floated this idea in May, we called it “ObamaCare for the Web,” but that was too kind. The Obama Internet plan would treat cable, telephone and wireless broadband networks as common carriers subject to federal price controls and myriad other regulatory restrictions.

Like the telephone companies of old, broadband providers would be required to “file a tariff” at the commission, meaning they would submit mountains of paperwork and ask the government to approve the prices they intend to charge for services. The bureaucrats would then consider whether the prices are fair. FCC bureaucrats would also hold sway over plans to expand or build digital networks. Under such conditions, who would invest to build the next generation of broadband technologies?

In his breezy video, Mr. Obama said he is promoting such regulation to preserve “the idea of Net neutrality,” which he claimed has “unleashed the power of the Internet and given innovators the chance to thrive.” This is upside down logic. The Internet has thrived in large part because policy makers and judges have rejected nearly every attempt to enforce “Net neutrality.” That is the hazy concept generally defined as preventing network operators from discriminating against particular online content but—for its most zealous advocates—amounting to a ban on differentiated services, such as express delivery of information.

Instead, a bipartisan consensus has allowed the Internet to grow relatively unmolested by Washington. The result has been intense competition among phone, cable and wireless companies to provide consumers with ever faster speeds, which in turn has allowed the U.S. to lead the world in digital innovations.

Mr. Obama played the demagogic card that “cable companies can’t decide which online stores you can shop at,” without naming any companies that are doing so, and without saying that the Federal Trade Commission already has the legal authority to combat such practices. Comcast and other Internet service providers have already agreed to abide by Net-neutrality rules as part of merger agreements.

The President also had the nerve to assert, amid his public lobbying, that “the FCC is an independent agency and ultimately this decision is theirs alone.” But Mr. Obama might as well have painted a bull’s-eye on FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, who will now have to acquiesce or face a deluge of liberal abuse.

Mr. Wheeler thanked Mr. Obama for his comments but noted potential problems with forcing broadband companies into Title II. “The more deeply we examined the issues around the various legal options, the more it has become plain that there is more work to do,” said Mr. Wheeler, who we hope resists his patron’s bullying.

Mr. Obama is trying to exert in his final two years in office the same political control over the Internet that he has already imposed on health care and banking. If he succeeds he’ll set a terrible precedent for despots around the world who also want to assert political control over cyberspace. The Obama Administration is already ceding greater control over the Internet registry ICANN to foreign outfits that could easily become fronts for repressive regimes.

If the FCC caves under White House pressure, Congress has every right to defund this regulatory overreach before it becomes a clear and present danger to the U.S. economy and global freedom.