Top cell telephone industry lobbyist Steve Largent says the
FCC's new network neutrality regulations won't boost the economy, increase jobs
or investment, weren't necessary and were essentially the lesser of two evils.
That was the thrust of his response to House Energy &
Commerce Republican leaders in response to questions on his view of the FCC's
Dec. 21 decision to expand and codify its network openness guidelines.
That followed the committee's Feb. 16 oversight hearing on
the rules with the five FCC commissioners--only the three Democratic
commissioners voted for the rules.
Largent, president of CTIA: The Wireless Association, said
he did not believed the rules were necessary. But asked whether it was equitable
that the regs apply to wireless but not to web companies, he refused to
argue for regulating them. "CTIA does not believe that there need to be
rules applied to the wireless industry," he said, "nor have we sought
to impose regulation of this sort on others who are part of the broadband
ecosystem."
Asked whether he supported the FCC's order, of whether it
was "just better than the FCC's other proposals, eh said that it was not
necessary but, "we certainly view it as preferable to the Title II regulation
advanced by some parties.
Actually, Largent would likely have preferred one of the
FCC's options. In its proposal of a modified Title II regime, the FCC also
offered the options of doing nothing and imposing full Title II regs.
