-By John Armor
Two days ago we were sitting on the dock in Como, having a gellato, waiting for our ship to come in. Not actually a ship, just a small commuter boat that connects the small communities on the shores of Lake Como in northern Italy.
It is a breathtakingly beautiful place. I can see why VIPs come to a small hotel, built by a mediaeval Cardinal as his residence, just up the Lake. No wonder that George Clooney has a villa here, that is reached only by helicopter, or so the gossip says.
And, this area’s history reaches deep into the mists of time. The streets of the town were laid out about 2,500 years ago, when Julius Caesar conquered the city from its previous conquerer. I came to talk about the sweep of time and history, and how gellato in Italy is a divine concoction, compared to what bears that label in the US, and how going on vacation is good for the soul.
But the other Julius intervened. That’s Julius Genachowski, Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. The BBC had a report last night that “the FCC was going to demand internet neutrality.” So, I looked that up on the Net this morning to find out that Genachowski was the author of this idea.
Let’s take it a step at a time. According to the First Amendment, “Congress shall make no law concerning freedom of speech.” The FCC is a creature of Congress, so the First Amendment covers it, too.
According to Thomas Jefferson, a fairly able commentator on matters of constitutional theory, the government had no authority to determine that a particular speech inappropriate or “false.” Instead, under that Amendment there would be a “free market” in which “truth would combat falsehood” and if the people were “educated,” truth would prevail.
Under our new Julius, however, the government must control the content of speech on the Internet to keep it “neutral.” There is not, there cannot be, any provision for “New York Times neutrality,” or “ABCCBSNBCCNN neutrality.” The Internet is the main source of criticism of the current administration. It sounds like the new Julius is like the old one, a dictator who has crossed the Rubicon and intends to enforce his will on the populace.
Of course, the Internet is not “a broadcaster.” Neither is cable TV, but the FCC bootstrapped its jurisdiction there by looking at the effect of cable decisions on broadcast TV. It is, apparently, looking for a similar bootstrap in that a small fraction of the Net consists of carrying TV programs. The Net is the ultimate narrowcaster. Messages go from one individual to another, only reaching millions of users if tens of thousands of users decide that that message deserves to be shared.
Bottom line: the FCC is about to issue a new set of rules for the Internet which will restrict freedom of speech in the freest medium for speech that has yet been devised. The mainstream media ought to feel a chill wind blowing from D.C. They ought to be up in arms. But they aren’t.
A dog that has been whipped often enough will tuck its tail between its legs, lower its head, and accept the next whipping as just the way things are. The whipped pups of the MSM are either too tied, too defeated, or simply too corrupt on the subject of freedom of speech, to object.
How sad. Julius Genachowski is, based on his actions, unfit to hold any position at the FCC, including emptying the wastebaskets. He should certainly not be holding any position with policy implications for the First Amendment. But, we cannot hold just the Obama Administration to task for nominating this abomination as Chair of the FCC. We must blame the Senate of the US which confirmed him, and every Senator who voted for him, for not pursuing the writings and speeches by our Julius that showed his dictatorial tendencies.
American freedom, if it is lost, will be lost by degrees. Abraham Lincoln made that point. So did Thomas Jefferson. And George Washington. If there are defenders of the First Amendment in the house, please stand up now. If there are none, will the last journalist to leave the Internet please turn out the lights.
____________
John Armor is a graduate of Yale, and Maryland Law School, and has 33 years practice at law in the US Supreme Court. Mr. Armor has authored seven books and over 750 articles. Armor happily lives on a mountaintop in the Blue Ridge. He can be reached at: John_Armor@aya.yale.edu
Fair Use: This site may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. I am making such material available in my efforts to advance understanding of political, human rights, economic, democracy, and social justice issues, etc. I believe this constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research, educational, or satirical purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site/blog for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.