19 Presidential Candidates In Search Of A Broadband Policy

Telecom Policy Report, July 23, 2007

As to how he would lift the world standing of the United States in broadband deployment, though, so far not a word. We'd be interested in hearing his ideas.

Mitt Romney

Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney is another would-be presidential candidate who doesn't seem to have a broadband policy. Nothing good, nothing bad, nothing quotable that the WCA could find to mention.

Romney has come out in favor of public-safety interoperability but hey, it would be hard to be against that. But interoperability, while an important issue in telecommunications policy, as we've said before is not a broadband issue.

Tom Tancredo

Colorado congressman Tom Tancredo has a conservative party-line voting record against net neutrality, in favor of a ban on Internet gambling and so on.

Tancredo does have one piece of broadband policy of note that few others have: He introduced a bill in 2003 to scrap the FCC's E-rate program that mandates discounted broadband rates for schools and libraries. Tancredo's logic was that there were various other federal programs available that schools and libraries could use to subsidize their broadband connections.

We applauds Tancredo for taking the time to think out a position on a broadband issue. Unfortunately, we think the position he chose is a disaster, one that will seriously damage the use of broadband in the United States. Not only has he crafted a formula that would damage the ability of already underfunded schools to provide broadband, but his idea also would reduce public- library access to the Internet that for some of the more economically disadvantaged is their only access.

Thompson & Thompson

The Republicans are blessed with two Thompsons - former Tennessee senator Fred Thompson and former Wisconsin governor Tommy Thompson. One them, Fred Thompson, is characterized as an avid blogger.

That sounded hopeful but beyond a show of being "with it" by using the blogosphere to talk to potential voters, Fred Thompson hasn't come up yet with a coherent broadband policy of note.

Tommy Thompson, meanwhile, has focused almost entirely on broadband access for health providers and first responders. Those are important issues, to be sure. What BBF thinks, though, is that there wouldn't be any big issues of broadband access for health providers and first responders if there weren't big issues for broadband access for significant segments of the population as a whole.

The Wrap

BBF's editors think the United States needs a national broadband policy. And at this point, we don't see one candidate who has formulated one. What's even worse, we don't see one candidate who has even shown an understanding of there being such a need and at least called for development of a national policy.

We are well-aware that there are some who claim a policy isn't needed, that the United States is doing just fine. They dispute the findings of various research organizations. Or they argue that the rural nature of much of the American continent explains the lower broadband penetration in the United States than in such highly urbanized places as Estonia.