Nation, The

Robert Waterman McChesney passed away on March 25 at age 72. He was a globally respected communications scholar who was wholly welcome in the halls of academia, yet he was never satisfied working within an ivory tower. He was a rigorous researcher into the worst abuse of corporate and political establishments.

President Biden’s proposal to expand high-speed Internet access as part of his infrastructure bill affirms that broadband is an essential public service. It embraces the government’s responsibility to counteract the market’s failure to provide adequate Internet access to millions of Americans. By prioritizing universal service, it offers a glimpse of what a more democratic Internet might look like.

A Q&A with Vermont gubernatorial candidate Christine Hallquist.

It is frequently asserted that universal broadband access is an efficient means for people to secure not just access to the web but also education, jobs, and health care. But beneath this narrative’s egalitarian veneer, and politicians’ bromides about the virtue of participating in the “digital economy,” rest many of the canards about bootstrapping that helped cause these inequities in the first place.

Troy Walcott, a 39-year-old cable technician, felt vindicated in July when New York moved to expel his employer, Charter Communications, for allegedly failing to keep its promises to the state. “I shouted to myself,” Walcott said about hearing the news.