Why the Kankakee County Farm Bureau hates net neutrality

The Kankakee County Farm Bureau wants to stop net neutrality. So does the Erie Neighborhood House, along with Downtown Springfield Inc, Big Brothers/Big Sisters of Will and Grundy Counties, and the mayor of North Chicago. The organizations all share several things: they are located in Illinois, they want the FCC to focus on broadband adoption rather than net neutrality, and... they all have connections to AT&T.

It's not necessarily a question of buying opinions, either. AT&T reps sit on the local Chamber of Commerce, they sponsor local service agencies. That money does good things in many towns. When the AT&T reps describe the "danger" they are under from regulators run amok in Washington, it all sounds reasonable—and it's coming from someone in your community. When groups are then told they can weigh in at the FCC on some issue, and given dates and docket numbers, many of them do so and make remarkably similar arguments.