Progress on Net Neutrality

The Agonist has bad news and good news on the Net Neutrality front.

The Markey Amendment failed in committee 22-34. Democrats Rush, Green, Gonzalez, Towns, and Wynn all voted no on the amendment and betrayed the netroots. The rest of the committee Democrats voted for the amendment.

Action now moves to the Senate.

However, today was a victory as a few key players on the full committee changed their votes. Important action is required heading into the Senate but we have created significant momentum and the telco cartel is very afraid of us now.

This is not how they wanted it to go down. They wanted this amendment to fail quietly, so the Senate would not take it up.

As one staffer on the Hill today told The Agonist:

They wanted this to pass in the dead of night. Instead, people are going to be energized, and the Senate is really going to matter.

We changed the rules today. Great work.

MyDD has more, including more on the five committee Dems who voted to pass the bill. San Antonio Rep. Charlie Gonzales comes in for some extra scorn for proposing a bizarre amendment that was said to be about "regulating search engines". Vince examines Gonzales' actions in more detail.

I think the point to take away here is that the more attention we pay to this, the more likely we are to get a favorable outcome. So, if you haven't done it yet:

Read Save the Internet.
Sign the MoveOn petition.
If you're a MySpace person, go here.

And be sure to let your congressperson know how you feel about this. Let him or her know this vote is important to you.

Posted by Charles Kuffner on April 26, 2006 to National news | TrackBack