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Sunday, November 16, 2014

Good try, Al, but Ted doesn't WANT to "understand"!

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COMMENT: Oh, Cruz understands it alright. This is just a conservative posturing tactic to bash net neutrality and associate it with a program that conservatives have not supported (ObamaCare). And because there so many people who really do not understand the affordable care act and refuse to recognize it's benefits, Cruz is hoping they'll be just as much confusion with net neutrality. Big business is pulling the strings here and Cruz is just another of it's marionettes.
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Al Franken Explains Net Neutrality To Ted Cruz
By Christina Wilkie, November 16, 2014

Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) responded on Sunday to a Washington Post op-ed in which Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) wrote that net neutrality is "Obamacare for the Internet."

Franken said Cruz “doesn’t understand” what net neutrality is.

“He has it completely wrong and he just doesn't understand what this issue is,” Franken told Candy Crowley on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

Franken is a longtime proponent of net neutrality, or the idea that all traffic on the Internet should be treated equally. The Federal Communications Commission is in the process of revising rules around the concept, and major Internet providers have pushed for Internet "fast lanes" that let them charge websites extra for faster loading times. On Monday, President Barack Obama called on the FCC to “implement the strongest possible rules to protect net neutrality.”

Writing in the Washington Post on Thursday, Cruz called net neutrality policy “Obamacare for the Internet,” arguing that “it would put the government in charge of determining Internet pricing, terms of service and what types of products and services can be delivered.”

But as Franken explained, net neutrality isn’t a new government program, like the health care exchanges created under the Affordable Care Act. On the contrary, “we have had net neutrality the entire history of the Internet.”

“When [Cruz] says this is the Obamacare, Obamacare was a government program that fixed something, that changed things,” Franken said. “This is about reclassifying something so it stays the same. This would keep things exactly the same that they've been.”
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Ted Cruz Lashes Out Against Net Neutrality, Calls It 'Obamacare For The Internet'By Ashley Alman, November 14, 2014 
Never missing an opportunity to remind America how much he resents Obamacare, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) took to Twitter Monday to lash out against President Barack Obama's net neutrality endorsement by comparing it to the health care law. 
Earlier Monday, Obama urged the Federal Communications Commission to "implement the strongest possible rules" to protect a free and open Internet in a video message and written statement. 
Cruz, who has openly opposed the FCC's role in modernizing telecommunications laws, responded to the president's statement on Twitter:
Senator Ted Cruz @SenTedCruz
"Net Neutrality" is Obamacare for the Internet; the Internet should not operate at the speed of government.
7:43 AM - 10 Nov 2014
Cruz spokeswoman Amanda Carpenter echoed the senator in her own tweet, writing, "Net neutrality puts gov't in charge of determining pricing, terms of service, and what products can be delivered. Sound like Obamacare much?" 
The comparison isn't unprecedented, as a May opinion piece featured in the Wall Street Journal included the analogy. The author hammered down on the FCC's vote to open net neutrality rules for debate, saying the FCC would have to go to great lengths to "prevent chaos" in the new Internet market. 
"Think of this as ObamaCare for the Web: enact an unworkable system and then get busy issuing waivers to prevent the new system from operating as designed." 
The president's statement and Cruz's response come as the FCC weighs whether Internet service providers should be allowed to create Internet "fast lanes" for content providers willing to pay more. The Wall Street Journal recently reported that the FCC may not arrive at a finished product by the year's end, due to the complexity of the highly-anticipated rules.
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