Michael Copps

TESTIMONY OF HON. MICHAEL J. COPPS
SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE FIELD HEARING
“PRESERVING AN OPEN INTERNET: RULES TO PROMOTE COMPETITION
AND PROTECT MAIN STREET CONSUMERS”
BURLINGTON, VT
JULY 1, 2014

Just about everybody understands the Internet to be the most opportunity-creating tool of our time. The question now is opportunity for whom? Is the Net going to be the tool of the many that helps us all live better -- or will it be the playground of the privileged few that only widens the many divides that are creating a shamefully stratified and unequal America? Are we heading toward an online future with fast lanes for the 1% and slow lanes for the 99%?

The most important decision the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has had to make in years is upon it. How this decision comes down will significantly affect the future of our nation’s communications networks. It will profoundly affect each of us as individuals -- and no one more profoundly than America’s minority and diversity communities. That’s because this is not only a communications issue. It is also a critically important civil rights issue. All of us who support the expansion of civil rights need to be in the thick of this decision.

[Editor's note: Kevin Taglang is traveling today so instead of our normal weekly round-up we share instead the latest op-ed from former FCC Commissioner Michael Copps. The Benton Foundation publishes articles penned by Commissioner Copps each month for our Digital Beat Blog.]

This is a story about more than just the national security implications of government surveillance, but it begins there.