NASCAR Congress
I was just reading about the latest attempts by the far rightest party controlling America's congress - so-called "Republicans" - to sell the internet to the highest bidder. The internet is the greatest invention of my lifetime. It has changed the world profoundly and will continue to do so far into the future. We all know that.
What we don't know is that like everything else, rightists want to sell it off. Not even to the highest bidder - a 'high bidder' implies some form of competition. Rightists don't believe in competition. They are Cartel Capitalists. Like the Robber Barons of the 19th century, the modern financial raider does not compete. They take. And now they've come for the internet.
The internet is special in part because it is a level playing field - one of the few available to us. This post has the same chance of being read as a post by a major newspaper or a corporate PR shill. If I were a more worthy correspondent I could hope to create a media following like my idol, Bill Simmons, who turned his love of sports and pop culture into an internet giant.
That sort of fair play doesn't sit well with the totalitarian mindset. It's not that they don't want people to post things - they certainly pay enough 'wingnut welfare' to their useful idiots. No shortage of sponsored rightist idiocy is there.
Rightists want to allow large internet providers to sell faster service to powerful customers. They don't want the internet to be regulated, not because Freedom! Regulation would force internet companies to provide fair service to all.
Trying to sell their usual 'regulation stops freedom' snake-oil, congressional rightists are trying to prevent the internet from being regulated as the telecommunication is. Freedom, in their little minds, is the freedom of large companies to take anything they can get from you. The freedom is all on the corporate side. Freedom means, literally, cash.
So if you don't have enough "Freedom" to pay off Congress, you lose.
So I think Congress should maximize their Freedom grabs all they can. I think they should start putting on patches from their owners, like NASCAR drivers do on their uniforms. John Boehner should slap some oil company logos on his suit. Maybe wear a telecom or two on his tie. And I'm sure the Koch Brothers could put a big toilet paper logo on his back.
Hey - why do this thing half-assed? Get as much Freedom as you can. As Rod Blagojevich said:
"I've got this thing and it's (expletive) golden. I'm not just giving it up for (expletive) nothing."
What we don't know is that like everything else, rightists want to sell it off. Not even to the highest bidder - a 'high bidder' implies some form of competition. Rightists don't believe in competition. They are Cartel Capitalists. Like the Robber Barons of the 19th century, the modern financial raider does not compete. They take. And now they've come for the internet.
The internet is special in part because it is a level playing field - one of the few available to us. This post has the same chance of being read as a post by a major newspaper or a corporate PR shill. If I were a more worthy correspondent I could hope to create a media following like my idol, Bill Simmons, who turned his love of sports and pop culture into an internet giant.
That sort of fair play doesn't sit well with the totalitarian mindset. It's not that they don't want people to post things - they certainly pay enough 'wingnut welfare' to their useful idiots. No shortage of sponsored rightist idiocy is there.
Rightists want to allow large internet providers to sell faster service to powerful customers. They don't want the internet to be regulated, not because Freedom! Regulation would force internet companies to provide fair service to all.
Trying to sell their usual 'regulation stops freedom' snake-oil, congressional rightists are trying to prevent the internet from being regulated as the telecommunication is. Freedom, in their little minds, is the freedom of large companies to take anything they can get from you. The freedom is all on the corporate side. Freedom means, literally, cash.
So if you don't have enough "Freedom" to pay off Congress, you lose.
So I think Congress should maximize their Freedom grabs all they can. I think they should start putting on patches from their owners, like NASCAR drivers do on their uniforms. John Boehner should slap some oil company logos on his suit. Maybe wear a telecom or two on his tie. And I'm sure the Koch Brothers could put a big toilet paper logo on his back.
Hey - why do this thing half-assed? Get as much Freedom as you can. As Rod Blagojevich said:
"I've got this thing and it's (expletive) golden. I'm not just giving it up for (expletive) nothing."
posted by fiduciary at 12:23 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home