The rest of the telco business is the part that isn't profitable anymore. But telco executives know if they sow enough confusion congress will raise barriers to competition and create an effective monopoly in fact through regulation and/or subsidy.
I have never heard such nonsense.
The telecoms do not get 100% of the cost of the telecommunications backbone from me, another 100% of that cost from Google et al, another 100% from the separate ISPs (my ISP is a telecom - why go to a middleman), and a final 100% in tax subsidies.
Yes, they have the fixed land line business, and that is government regulated, but one cannot say that that is such a great boon at this time, because Wireless, Cable and VOIP service competition with land-line services have cut the prices, and profits in those land line services; and yet it is those land line services that are subsidizing the cost of maintaining the telecom-Internet backbone.
http://www.networkworld.com/columnists/2005/100305johnson.html?vo&code=nlvoice8016
At present one would not call the telecoms extremely profitable, with the top four (2005) getting average profit margins of 6.7 cents on the dollar, and median profits of just 7.4 cents on the dollar. Meanwwile Google, whose packets flood the backbone with their highly profitable "product" is earning 23.8 cents on the dollar and Yahoo rakes in 36 cents on the dollar.
So yes, it is from those commerical content providers that the telecoms should be looking to charge more for the vastness of the backbone that makes the products of those commercial content providers possible.
If Google does not like it, they can build their own backbone.