In his now-famous speech about the modern economy's reliance on good government, President Barack Obama mentioned the Internet as a basic example of something we build as a community that helps every business make more money.
Rural businesses understand the necessity of cooperative effort better than any other economic player. South Dakota's economy exists by dint of government/military invasion, government-subsidized railroads, government-run rural electrification, and the biggest government giveaway of land in American history. And now our rural businesses will get access to more rural customers online thanks to $115 million in grants from the Federal Communications Commission. The FCC is using the cash we all kick in via the Universal Service Fund on our phone bills to bring high-speed Internet to 400,000 people and businesses that the private sector just can't get around to connecting to the modern economy.
Among the recipients is CenturyLink, which gets $35 million to hook up 45,000 homes to high-speed Internet. (CenturyLink was hoping for $90 million.) That's 45,000 more customers who can subscribe to Netflix or Hulu to stream movies online. That's 45,000 more customers who can check out product reviews, Skype sales reps, and make more purchases online. That's 45,000 more customers who can establish a Web presence and market their own products online.
That's 45,000 more drops of oil greasing the rural economic engine... brought to you by our sensible investment of the common wealth through good government.
"Among the recipients is CenturyLink, which gets $35 million to hook up 45,000 homes to high-speed Internet."
So now you like the form of socialism we call "corporate welfare".
Rural telephone cooperatives also receive money from this fund to improve telecommunications access in rural areas. Without programs like this rural areas of our country would be real economic backwaters, no telephone, no electricity, no rural water. Life in rural SD would be a truly miserable existence stuck in the 1930s. Our country can do better than that, our country did do better than that, and I for one am glad it did.
If that is socialism then paint me red and run me up the flag pole it's socialism I can live with.
--President Barack Obama mentioned the Internet as a basic example of something we build as a community that helps every business make more money.
Of course, BHO was wrong when he said what he said about the internet.
The internet was not created to further commerce.
How is the military/industrial complex not about commerce?
-the Universal Service Fund on our phone bills to bring high-speed Internet
The USF is also used to provide cell phones to well, just about anyone.
Even BHO's FCC sent out a warning letter to the states to cut down on the fraud and abuse within the USF. Estimates are that billions have been wasted. Do we sue BHO for his failure to meet the terms of that social contract? Where do we go when the government fails to fulfill its part of the social contract?
And if this is an example of sensible investment that improves the common wealth, why is it that the "common wealth" are not all part of that social contract? It's phone users subsidizing all kinds of programs unrelated to phone use. If the "common wealth" benefits, why isn't the "common wealth" all contributing? Sorry, but phone users being taxed (it's not "investment"!) to subsidize programs that have little to do with phone service is well, socialism.
In reality, the USF is disinvestment, like most taxes.
--So now you like the form of socialism we call “corporate welfareâ€.
Not quite dear friend.
These programs are "corporate welfare" when one disfavors the intended beneficiaries, usually evil CORP O RA TIONS.
They are part of a "social contract" when they benefit my causes!
Clear?
“Anyone who thinks socialism failed in America has never spent time on a military base.â€
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/07/19/welfare_state
"Larry, anyone who thinks socialism failed in America has never spent time learning about the National Football League."
http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2012/01/30/goodell_admits_nfl_is_sociali
Clear. Got that Cory? Your thinking is based on a belief system, not sound logic.
Steve-
I think the point that CAH was making was that connecting rural customers may take 50+ years of service charges before an investment becomes profitable. Such a time frame is beyond any private sector company for obvious reasons.
Accordingly, the government is intervening into the private sector to make sure that its citizens have access to this type of service. We can debate whether or not this is a good policy, but the intent is not corporate welfare. The intent is to make available valuable services to its citizens.
In terms of corporate welfare, I highly doubt that this is some sweet heart deal where the corporation is going to pocket the money. The corporation is going to build out infrastructure with the money and then support that infrastructure.
Jule-
You do recognize that all forms of electronic communication pay into the USF? Check your internet bill.
Cell phones are being pushed because it's vastly cheaper to put up a wide reaching cell network than it is to wire the whole country side. If you are a conservative, you should be infavor of this approach because it's cheaper and provides a greater service than traditional wire communications.
Lastly, the reason USF charges on phones are being used to deploy broadband internet is because of the bill passed with republican support to reduce potential fraud! (the Universal Service Reform Act, sponsored by Terry (R-NE))
--That’s 45,000 more customers who can check out product reviews, Skype sales reps, and make more purchases online.
On-line purchases that would otherwise by made in their local (now dying) town, and for which they would have paid sales taxes that would have contributed to the social contract; goodbye to the neighborhood salesman who was paying income and property taxes and sending his kids to the local public school. Heck, the social contract works so well for so many.
Thank you FCC and the USF and BHO for putting another dagger in small town businesses.
Julie, that NE: non existent, right?
--Cell phones are being pushed because it's vastly cheaper to put up a wide reaching cell network than it is to wire the whole country side
So much for the SD workers who were employed to bury phone lines and to maintain them--I guess it's just cheaper for those guys to live in the Twin Cities and come out to SD every now & then to climb those cell towers. So much for the local wired service where the provider of the phone service lived nearby and was responsible for your phone service even in natural disaters and to provide quality customer service--after all, you KNEW them. Yeah, it's better to send all that USF money to DC, where it is run through the 1% bureaucracy to be sent back in crumbs to SD. That social contract means crap to the laid off telephone repairman.
Julie-
Are you saying that we should keep using an outdated, expensive technology over a more modern inexpensive one? Should we subsidize it with government money to make it competitive?
Julie also would have blamed FDR for destroying rural America by bringing it electricity. What rot. The Internet is like electricity and water: it is an essential utility for every American seeking to participate in civic and economic life. The Internet is not a death knell for small towns; it is a lifeline, allowing telecommuters to work wherever they want, allowing consumers to obtain goods that they never could buy at the local five-and-dime, and allowing local craftsmen and consultants to sell their products and services to a wider market than the hometowns where they'd love to raise their families but where they would never find a sufficiently large market to support their business.
And those positive business opportunities wouldn't happen in a private sector guided solely by the invisible hand. These broadband grants are just one more example of why President Obama is right when he says we all build the modern economy together, through government.
PP harps on whether Brookings should divest of her extensive holdings: "Julie" writes in very much the same vane.
Larry, I got slapped like a Burmese piss-carpet monkey for quoting some real guy's (Mr. Black) name. "Julie" is the lady's real name.
-Julie also would have blamed FDR for destroying rural America by bringing it electricity.
I don't think it's useful to create a strawman.
--What rot.
In some ways, you're right. What you fail to understand though, it that ALL moderization has negative consequences to the social contract that you love so much.
- The Internet is like electricity and water: it is an essential utility for every American seeking to participate in civic and economic life.
That may be true, but what of those who wish to live a simpler, less "connected" life? Why are they forced to subsidize values that they do not wish to support? Electricity brough many good things, but it also brought TV. TV brings values into the home that are not wanted, and a more sedentary lifestyle that leads to obesity. The internet brings easy access to porn and alternative "lifestyles", and rampant consumerism.
Where's the social contract that allows for tolerance for those who not wish to enter into ALL the conditions of that social contract? Why should a "social contract" FORCE things upon individuals ina society. Thats not a contract, is it?
--why President Obama is right when he says we all build the modern economy together, through government.
You understand that you've just outlines socialsim?
Not full-tilt socialism, but not full-tilt capitalism, either. I outline a practical system not beholden to the rhetorical absolutes preached by Romney and the right-wingnuts to whom he's pandering. The free market is nice, but it doesn't work without a significant dose of public investment and oversight.
What's your point about "tolerance"? You don't like having to pay for the benefits of the social contract that allow us the leisure time to have these conversations instead of spending every waking moment defending our property from barbarians? I will grant it's a little tough to escape the social contract, since formal communities have taken up most of the useful land. You do have some choices for leaving the contract, like the wilderness and Somalia.
Social contract is not a perfect term, but it helps make simple sense of how society works. We establish a government and submit ourselves to its rule. Government submits itself to the people, working to protect our liberty. If either party fails to meet those requirements, said party faces consequences.
But you don't get to pick and choose, not unless you want to play South Carolina 1861, at which point things go badly. You get your chance to change the conditions of the contract in a democracy via elections, legislative debate, and arguments before the court. But once we settle the terms, you don't get to unilaterally pick and choose.
And now that the social contract has kept you alive and provided you all sorts of benefits, you don't get to say, "So long and thanks for all the fish."
The technological argument seems mostly irrelevant to the political argument here. The fact that some people take up Internet porn does not change the fact that government makes possible useful infrastructure that the free market will not provide universally. Drunk driving accidents don't indict the government that built the roads. Don't like Web porn? Just hit the off button.
Now, how many more red herrings would you like to throw at the basic truth that the modern economy depends on a robust social contract with a government to maintain public goods and enforce contracts?
--We establish a government and submit ourselves to its rule.
Another odd concept of democracy. We establish a government and IT submits to our rule.
--Government submits itself to the people, working to protect our liberty.
And an odd concept of liberty. When the people rely upon or demand that their government protect their liberties, the obvious consequence is that the gov't can and will infringe upon or deny those liberties. Liberties in our country are neither created nor protected by gov't, otherwise that same gov't can & will take from us what we expected it would protect.
Liberties are GOD GIVEN, and WE must protect those liberties. Not gov't.
It constantly amuses me to see how libs have created and espouse their own religious faith in gov't. And it's not even a secular faith--it's truly a thoughtless devotion to a god called gov't.
--Don’t like Web porn? Just hit the off button.
Don't like handguns, don;t buy one, right?
Does your social contract and moderization of our economy include allowing the possession and consumption of alcohol on the Pine Ridge? Really, prohibition is soooo 1930s.
Julie, we are the government. Permit me to fold both sentences about submission into one: we submit ourselves to our own rule. We experience the Rousseauian liberty of obedience to a law that we prescribe ourselves. There is no liberty without government. That's not a religious statement, not a declaration of faith. That's a fundamental explanation of how and why we do democracy.
Porn, guns, alcohol on Pine Ridge... how did we get there?
--Julie, we are the government.
Trite, jingoistic, and largely false. When the speaker of the house says that we need to pass a bill to know what's in it, and she meant it, the gov't has little to do with the people.
--There is no liberty without government.
This simply ignores history. Up until Wilson, about the only contact folks had with the the federal gov't was the post office. Yet, liberty abounded. Why was that?
--Porn, guns, alcohol on Pine Ridge… how did we get there?
All part of your social contract, right?
Trite? No, not said enough, not embraced and practiced enough. This is a democracy. We are the government, if we do our jobs as citizens.
Show me one example of a people who could rightly claim to have liberty without some form of government. (You're arguing against one particular federal government, not the statement I made. Try again.)
Porn, guns, alcohol: the social contract can include regulations of varying degrees on many things. What's your point?