FCC Proposes To Extend So-Called "Obamaphone" Program To Broadband

jfruh writes: The FCC's Lifeline program subsidizes phone service for very poor Americans; it gained notoriety under the label "Obamaphone," even though the program started under Reagan and was extended to cell phones under Clinton. Now the FCC is proposing that the program, which is funded by a fee on telecom providers, be extended to broadband, on the logic that high-speed internet is as necessary today as telephone service was a generation ago.

Comments

Eliminate all tax withholding

[Anonymous Coward]

If people making $30,000 a year knew they paid over $1000 a month in taxes, the US government wouldn't have the resources to be so overweening.

Make people actually have to hand their money over to the government instead of never seeing it and could have an honest discussion over how much government the US REALLY wants.

If you don't like that, you really have to ask yourself how much you actually support the rule of "we the people".

Re:other people's money

[Anonymous Coward]

Like it or not, either way, you're going to spend the money.

Here's the thing about those phones. They prevent trouble. They give people opportunity.

You don't do that? The cheapest thing that can happen is somebody dies in a way that isn't even suspicious enough to keep a cop from drinking his coffee.

Then you're out a burial plot at most.

More expensive? Yeah, people end up being in prison where we pay even more to keep them there than if we just supplied them with weed and beer and cheap food.

Or worse yet. Revolution and riot. You know why the Roman leaders needed the bread and circuses? Because otherwise the out of work population of Rome would be pissed. Why did they lose work? Because the land-owners wanted slave-worked plantations, not citizen-owned farms.

You give a man something to do? Where they can be appreciated and respected? You'll get results. You piss people off and convince them they're hated, well, at a certain point, even the lowest worm will realize you're not better than they are.

And you won't always be the cat with the sharpest claws.

Re:Ronnie Phone

[Tablizer]

It's odd how it seems to politically matter who does something more than what is being done. Examples:

"GOOD" (or neutral) WHEN BUSH DID IT:

Corporate welfare
NSA
TSA
DHS
deficits
stimulus
bombing
medicare part D
golfing
hugging Saudi oilers
saluting with things in hand
feet on desk
subsidized cell-phones

"BAD" WHEN OBAMA DID IT:

Corporate welfare
NSA
TSA
DHS
deficits
stimulus
bombing
medicare part D
golfing
hugging Saudi oilers
saluting with things in hand
feet on desk
subsidized cell-phones

Re:other people's money

[silentcoder]

>What they need is to gain skils and obtain a steady job or make one.

Have you TRIED to get a job without a phone number ? What century do you think this is ?

Re:other people's money

[Rob Y.]

Medicare - before the new drug benefit that was explicitly barred from seeking good deals. Seems socialism's better than its reputation - except when crafted by Republicans who want it to look bad...