You have to be this big to ride

Welcome aboard the new Internet Bus Lines – you can sit up front and watch the movie or you can sit in the back next to the toilet. It all depends on how much clout you have with the owner. What? You’re a Liberal Blogger? You can wait for the next bus – it will be along when it gets here if we feel like letting you on at all.

The US House of Representatives, or the Witless Protection Program as I prefer to call it, rejected a Democrat-backed amendment that would have enshrined stiff Net neutrality regulations into federal law and prevented broadband providers from treating some Internet sites differently from others. Republicans shot down the amendment to the Communications Opportunity, Promotion, and Enhancement (COPE) Act, which a House committee approved in April, because Its Republican backers, whose true constituents are Verizon and AT&T, say more extensive rules would discourage investment in wiring American homes with higher-speed connections. I disagree, but I may soon have to resort to smoke signals to express opinions unpopular with our corporate masters.

So again one more piece of public property will be handed over to giant corporations who may or may not let us have access and then only by their terms. You wannna get heard? You gotta pay and you’ll keep your mouth shut or you don’t get on line at all. One more window on the world will be controlled by the people who own the papers, the magazines the TV and radio stations and converted to a show window for juvenile entertainment, imported toys and right wing propaganda. OK, so there’s still PBS, but Congress has already sent Pauly and Sylvio to put their feet in the cement. Fugettaboutit.

The timing is perfect, the Sopranos are off the air until next year and I’m starved for some of that Mafia action.