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Comcast Donates Heavily To Defeat Mayor Who Is Bringing Gigabit Fiber To Seattle
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Andrea Peterson reports in the Washington Post that one of Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn's big policy initiatives has been expanding the quality and quantity of high-speed Internet access throughout the city. However incumbent providers, particularly Comcast, have invested heavily in defeating McGinn in the mayoral election. While Comcast denies there is any connection between McGinn's broadband policies and their donations, the company has given thousands of dollars to PACs that have, in turn, given heavily to anti-McGinn groups. One of McGinn's core promises in the 2009 campaign was to 'develop a city-wide broadband system.' The mayor considered creating a citywide broadband system as a public utility, like water or electricity. But aides say that would have been too expensive, so the mayor settled on public-private partnerships using city-owned dark fiber. This dark fiber was laid down starting in 1995, and the mayor's office now says there are some 535 miles of it, only a fraction of which is being used. In June, the partnership, called Gigabit Squared, announced pricing for its Seattle service: $45 dollars a month for 100 Mbps service or $80 a month for 1 Gbps service plus a one-time installation cost of $350 that will be waived for customers signing a one-year contract. For comparison, Comcast, one of the primary Internet providers in the area, offers 105 Mbps service in the area for $114.99 a month, according to their website. If Comcast is indeed attempting to sway the election, it would fall in line with a larger pattern of telecom interests lobbying against municipal efforts to create their own municipal broadband systems or leveraging city-owner fiber resources to create more competition for incumbent providers. Peterson writes, '...if Comcast's donations help Murray defeat McGinn, it will send a powerful message to mayors in other American cities considering initiatives to increase broadband competition.'"
...Lobbying needs to be illegal. Period.
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has it's limits" - Albert Einstein
people will continue to parrot the line that the reason the U.S. has expensive and slow internet service is because the country is too big.
"It's too big!"
Nonsense. If it's too big, how in the world did you get those water, sewer and phone lines?
Watch how many people will say the same thing again and again in comments below.
"It's too big!"
Votes, not money, decide the answer; but you can campaign untruthfully with no ramifications. At that point money = votes.
Corporations don't live or breathe, people do. And the people who run those corporations and profit from them have the exact same weight in the ballot box as anyone else. Anyone who is used to getting their way every day because they have money finds this equality to be horribly unfair.
Here's the thing: if Comcast made a product that was so fabulous that nobody would even want a government run version we wouldn't be having this discussion.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
This is just the way capitalism works in the US. Corporations buy politicians (and get rid of politicians who don't go along with their program).
The free market is wonderful.
USA is number 1 !!!!
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
Isn't this what Google wanted? I've always been under the impression that Google didn't necessarily want to become a large ISP, but instead wanted to spark competition.
"To prevent this day from getting any worse, I'll just read ERROR as GOOD THING" 1GJU8xLuDKDxEs4KLf8fAGyptoDsqvEsBT
According to the numbers in the article a Comcat executive contributed $700 and the company contributed $10,000 to PACs. Sorry buit I doubt that $10,700 will buy an election.
Look at all contribution to People for Ed Murray. The total contribution are $122,800 making Comcast's contribution 8.7%.
Why should anyone donate to have a government servant put in place? It's pretty ridiculous. There should be no donations allowed. And there should be voting on issues, rather than people. Being a politician should just be a job, not a popularity contest.
which is totally what she said
Already in the US, we pay more per Mb/s than pretty much any other 1st world country. This isn't due to the size, as some would have you believe, but rather due to the lack of oversight, regulation and, most importantly, competition. There are no laws preventing the formation of what basically become monopolies from companies such as Comcast, where they can charge what they want and basically print their own money. I sincerely hope that they are not successful in basically paying to avoid having real competition. I know I, personally, would love to have "real" Internet speeds provided to me at world-comparable rates, no matter if they came from State, county, city or private sources. Just bring it on!
...in the US is called "lobbying".
Quite sad, actually.
Is there huge public backlash against Citizens United? Are people marching in the streets against corporate "lobbying"? Are people dumping Comcast because they disagree with their business practices? Will people come out in droves to denounce McGinn's opponent for benefiting from sweet corporate cash? Are the corporations who will do _anything_ to make a profit getting the message that the public disagrees with their business practices?
No.
Stories like this make me upset, because its the same as story about one soldier dying in a war where millions of soldiers are killed. This is one tiny example of how business works in America. Every day in every federal, state, county, and city goverment shit like this happens. Lets have a discussion about that.
It's not for Comcast to judge whether it is a good or a bad idea. It is for the people of Seattle to decide.
If no-one but the broadband companies has an interest in not seeing it happen, then it's probably a good idea. After all, why should the rest of us make decisions based on what's best for broadband companies? The viability of their business model is not the concern of the general public; if someone else can provide the same service better and cheaper, too bad for them.