Nearly Half of Colorado Counties Have Rejected a Comcast-Backed Law Restricting City-Run Internet (vice.com)

bumblebaetuna shares a report from Motherboard: In Tuesday's Coordinated Election, two Colorado counties voted on ballot measures to exempt themselves from a state law prohibiting city-run internet services. Both Eagle County and Boulder County voters approved the measures, bringing the total number of Colorado counties that have rejected the state law to 31 -- nearly half of the state's 64 counties. Senate Bill 152 -- which was lobbied for by Big Telecom -- became law in Colorado in 2005, and prohibits municipalities in the state from providing city-run broadband services.

Some cities prefer to build their own broadband network, which delivers internet like a utility to residents, and is maintained through subscription costs. But ever since SB 152 was enacted, Colorado communities have to first bring forward a ballot measure asking voters to exempt the area from the state law before they can even consider starting a municipal broadband service. So that's what many of them have done. In addition to the 31 counties that have voted to overrule the state restrictions, dozens of municipalities in the state have also passed similar ballot measures. Including cities, towns, and counties, more than 100 communities in Colorado have pushed back against the 12-year-old prohibition, according to the Institute for Local Self Reliance.

Comments

That's odd

[Anonymous Coward]

What could possibly motivate state legislators vote for a law that restricts the ability of communities to compete with companies?

Re:That's odd

[interkin3tic]

You're suggesting bribery, but I think a lot of state legislators are/were simply motivated by the religious belief that government cannot do anything useful beyond police and military. "Government no make jobs! GOVERNMENT NO MAKE JOBS!!!"

In some ways, that's worse. Bribery is at least logical, and can be outlawed. The cult of the free market on the other hand cannot be reasoned with, nor can you jail someone for it.

Re:That's odd

[WheezyJoe]

Bribery is at least logical, and can be outlawed. The cult of the free market on the other hand cannot be reasoned with, nor can you jail someone for it.

Bribery can be obfuscated, and the strongest "cult" is the one with the most money to build the biggest church on the most valuable piece of property. Politician say "GOVERNMENT NO MAKE JOBS!!!", corporation/fat-cat say "Good boy, now roll-over while Daddy pays Super-PAC to produce vicious attack-ads to run at all hours on all channels of his big cable network spanning every district."

Politician say "Big cable GOOD! Big cable GOOD!"

Re:That's odd

[alvinrod]

I think people who make this argument really misunderstand what is meant when people say that government cannot make jobs, though I suspect there are plenty of people who make the statement and support it without understanding it either.

From a plain language perspective, it's pretty obvious that government can make jobs. At a minimum any government official is holding a job position that wouldn't exist without the government. Those officials will likely create a lot of other government jobs as part of a bureaucracy in service of those initial jobs, much like a company has administrative assistants, HR departments, and plenty of other staff that don't have anything to do with the core business of the company. Similarly, the FBI, IRS, and other government agencies all need staff. The Department of Homeland Security certainly created a lot of jobs in order to fulfill the purposes it was created for.

But here's the funny thing. Government doesn't create jobs, but neither do companies. Sure a company can employee people for some task just like a government does, but the company can't just create any job at its whim. I could pay a few hundred people to create sculptures of 16th century philosophers fashioned entirely out of their own shit, but I could scarcely afford to for very long. It's consumer demand that ultimately creates jobs, and not any one person's particular whims about what kind of labor should be done. Unless you have customers willing to pay for your products, any job you might create is extremely temporary at best.

The notion that governments can't create jobs isn't about whether or not they can pay people to perform some activity. It's plainly obvious that they can. What is really meant by the phrase is that governments can't hope to direct the economy because they cannot possible imagine what it is that people actually want and value most. The Soviets and many others tried and failed miserably to direct economies no matter how much effort they devoted to central planning. That is also plainly obvious from history.

The difference is that a free market system allows for participants to see the kinds of jobs created that they're willing to pay to maintain rather than have them created by government decree. Furthermore, a government ban on municipal services is against free market principles. Also long as a city municipal internet company does not have any unfair competitive advantages by law, there's no reason why that option shouldn't exist. A free market cannot possibly exist if the government has legislated a monopoly.

If it seems that so many people who are in favor of free markets are against the government getting involved in markets its because a business in a free market is able to fail, freeing up the labor it used for other uses. Government jobs tend not to go away once created, even when most people wouldn't want to buy those services in any form. Look no further than the TSA for an example of where the government is forcing something down consumers throats when you'd be hard pressed to find people who would be willing to voluntarily purchase that kind of service.

Re:That's odd

[FudRucker]

lobbyists are just legalized bribery in Washington DC

Love-hate relationship with the irony

[istartedi]

The irony of this--Colorado rejects Federal drug laws and goes rogue because the "war on drugs" has become nothing but pork for the prison-industrial complex. Now their counties reject the state's law because it's just pork for the telecoms.

My love is that there's a fight back against these things. My hate is that we even got here in the first place.

Re:Love-hate relationship with the irony

[blindseer]

Everything you know about the NRA you must have learned from Whoopi Goldberg.

What's the argument for legalizing marijuana or any other drug? It will be something like the benefits outweigh the harms, states' rights, personal rights, federal government over reach, or so. All the same arguments apply for the right of self defense, or most all anyway.

What kind of restrictions are people expecting for marijuana possession? I mean even the marijuana legalization people aren't expecting a free for all. Largely the argument is that marijuana should be regulated like alcohol. Only adults can possess marijuana. If allowed for children (I emphasize *IF*) then it must be under adult supervision (parent, physician, other person responsible for the health of the child). Sellers must be registered, inspected, and trained. Buyers must present an ID. People in prison or a mental institution will not be allowed access with perhaps exceptions for medical need. All of these same restrictions are called for by the NRA and would at least be tolerated by most Second Amendment advocates, any medicinal claims excepted as I am unaware of any medicinal use of a firearm.

I recall a Second Amendment Foundation official that addressed a "gun show loophole" bill by proposing this alternative, everyone that entered a gun show must have a background check done at the door, no exceptions. This background check would be done through the same FBI database as used by licensed firearms dealers. The groups wanting to close the "gun show loophole" rejected this. Why? Because it didn't require the registration of the firearm transfers. This proves beyond a doubt that this is not about background checks, this was an attempt to create a database of all firearms and who owns them. Why would any government want a database of all firearms and who owns them? Ponder that, and look at what history taught us about previous firearm registries.

Whatever you can think of that would apply to removing restrictions on marijuana would also apply to firearms. You think I don't know that the government might ban bump stocks? Of course they are going to try, they might even be successful in passing that into law. Here's the thing, this will be just as successful as previous bans on marijuana, alcohol, and "assault weapons". If I wanted marijuana then I'm pretty sure I know I could get some by this weekend. I don't because I have respect for the law. Those that lost respect for the law have their drugs, and guns, and alcohol, and bump stocks, and silencers, or whatever else the government thinks that they can make disappear with a law. Marijuana is a weed, people will get it. A bump stock is a piece of plastic, people will make them. A silencer (at least according to the ATF) is a short piece of threaded pipe. A machine gun (again, according to the ATF) is a piece of string. These laws don't keep the criminals from having them. All they do is put good people in prison, because if a piece of string is a machine gun then the government can put anyone in prison.