Telecoms Set to Mount Astroturf Campaign Against Net Neutrality

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Think Progress is all over it:

This morning, representatives from various front groups launched a new coordinated campaign to kill net neutrality. Speaking on Capitol Hill, these front groups took turns decrying the evils of the principle of a fair and unbiased Internet. LULAC, which is funded by AT&T, called Net Neutrality “Obamacare for the Internet.” (LULAC was not present at the press conference. The Hispanic Leadership Fund, another group funded by the telecom industry and opposed to net neutrality, spoke at the event. We apologize for the error.) Americans for Prosperity — a corporate front group founded by oil billionaire David Koch but also funded by telecom interests — unveiled a new ad smearing net neutrality as a “government takeover” (the initial ad buy is $1.4 million dollars). And Grover Norquist, representing his “Americans for Tax Reform” corporate front group, said net neutrality is like what China does, “putting policemen on every corner, on the street or on the Internet.” Watch it:

(Strikout original)

And once again, Declan McCullagh,* who can be relied on to take any lie from a telco industry lobbyist represent them them as truth, had published a gotcha article claiming that it was just a bunch of college kids, only he missed the following facts that his lobbyist friend sources neglected to tell him:

  • The person running the web site is not a student. She is professional paid staff of an astroturf lobbying group.
  • She used a professional PR service to track the distribution of the story.
  • The “students” met with Norquist and His Evil Minions™.
  • Norquist and His Evil Minions™ have been parroting the terms from the presentation word for word.

Fundamentally, if you read something from McCullagh that might have to bear on his rather extreme libertarian views, find a 2nd source to verify.

When push comes to shove, he will put forward the Cato Institute line ahead of the truth.

*No link this time, you can find the link at the Think Progress rebuttal. Mccullagh is, as Andrew Orlowsky notes, a “Draw by crayon libertarian,”†and so he quotes uncritically industry-funded astroturf groups in his article.
†He is also the guy who created the, “Al Gore claimed to have invented the Internet,” myth, and he remains proud of that bit of hackery.

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