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I find the arguments against not to be persuasive

Apart from the people who promote this venture, what is wrong with it? As a goal, "neutrality" is laudable and in itself offers nothing to be against. It's proponents define it thus: "...a network-neutrality regime. In its strictest form, such a regime would require every bit that travels over a network to be treated the same way." So far, so good.

The author quotes the founders of the Internet as being opposed to mandates because they, "could" hamper innovation. But the author does not favor us with an explanation of why that should be so and does not quote Robert Kahn, the "father of the Internet," as to why the "could" should be thought of as " would" stifle innovation. Evidently, the "grandfather of the Internet", David Farber "has urged Congress not to enact net-neutrality mandates that would prevent significant improvements to the Internet." But the author does not tell us how Mr. Farber feels about that neutrality mandates which would not prevent significant improvements to the Internet. In other words, the reader is left with an argument that is not persuasive because of its vagueness and incompleteness.

The author moves on to quoting a proponent of net neutrality, a college professor and therefore admittedly suspect, who predicts that that neutrality will discourage private investment and therefore promote government investment. Again, the "why" is not explained.

Next, the other cites Google's "propagandist" who the author says calls for the nationalization of the Internet because it will make it, "essentially open to all." What is wrong with that?-not the nationalization part, the open access part? Does the author mean to leave it to us to infer from the very fact of nationalization that the government will impose invidious discriminations?

Again, the readers entitled to ask, what evidence is the author reduces support of his contention that government nationalization will lead to government censorship? Again, the author quotes a professor, this time a truly nutty one, who wants to censor opponents of global warming on the Internet. From this we are to infer that all free speech will be censored by the government.

The author concludes:

Supporters of network neutrality won’t admit to any of this. In fact, they’ll tell you the opposite — that network neutrality will preserve your freedoms. In an ironic twist, one of the scare tactics they use is the idea that phone and cable companies may start blocking access to political websites. Of course, this is exceedingly unlikely in a competitive marketplace where customers can take their business elsewhere. But it is very possible in a world of government monopoly.

How persuasive are these arguments going to be when directed to an electorate which has just overwhelmingly elected a proponent of government intervention and regulation of the economy? His Republican opponent, anyway, campaigned on the dangers of unbridled, unregulated capitalists running amok. Are the author' s arguments going to change the minds of voters who accepted pro-government intervention arguments from both candidates? Will they do so in the teeth of demands of private industry, i.e. Google, for regulation? What do we have besides the ad hominem and the provenance of the supporters of net neutrality?

I am not unaware of what we are up against in this administration. Long before the election I had repeatedly posted that America is unwittingly accepting the risk that it may be putting an ideological tyrant in the White House. Couple that with the coming assault on talk radio, on Joe The Plumber, the threats of the prosecutors in Ohio, hate crime legislation, and the disposition of the established media to approve all of this, and we have the real potential for tyranny.

I want to see more intellectual rigor and better and more persuasive arguments.

I would be embarrassed to send this article to my techno-geek friend who is a libertarian at heart but who voted against Republicans this time because of the Iraq war. He already thinks that the arguments about the provenance of Obama's citizenship and the ad hominem which I've directed against Obama's radical associations, are not only unpersuasive but bordering on the paranoid. I have tried to react to this article, line by line, the same way my friend would. We lost the last election this way. Let us do better next time.

"The concept of Network Neutrality has unfortunately been misunderstood by many conservatives, libertarians, and other champions of the free market. That's too bad, because the free market essence of the Internet is exactly what would be lost without Network Neutrality.
"The large telecoms, some politicians and a number of conservative pundits have characterized the push for Network Neutrality as a left-wing attempt to stifle innovation and put government bureaucrats in control of the Internet. Well, it's not. Through my work with Gun Owners of America, I am demonstratively a lot further to the right than they are.
It is true that the largest member of the coalition looking to regain Network Neutrality is MoveOn.org – and they are usually my political enemies. But Gun Owners and groups like Brent Bozell's Parents Television Council have done did what many on the right don't seem to have: our homework.
One of the most telling points is that what the coalition is trying to get codified is what we have had all along as the Internet was developed. In all of those years, Network Neutrality was policy… until August of 2005, when the FCC changed the rules. How can this policy stifle innovation and competition when the Internet has been a roaring success in those areas for decades?
The real problem is that we are under a distorted market from the get-go. Government is setting the rules. The result has been a government-supported oligopoly. We are lucky that those controlling physical access to the Internet have been forced to give every purchaser of bandwidth equal access – it doesn't matter whether Gun Owners or the Brady Center is purchasing a T-1: all T-1 purchasers pay the same for the same level of service. And moreover, the phone company has to tough it if they don't like what is being done with that bandwidth (such as this column).
This goes all the way back to Ma Bell – after all, the physical infrastructure of the Internet is the nation's phone lines. And just as I-95 is the only Interstate we have between Richmond and the Beltway, no one is going to build a competing physical Internet.
But people are going to build new Burger Kings along the highways. Suppose, however, that AT&T owned I-95. And that they inked an exclusive deal with Wendy's. Or bowed to pressure from food Nazis and said no burgers at all from Florida to Maine.
What we think of as the free market nature of the Internet is only possible because the oligopoly has been forced to keep its hands off of what actually gets done with the infrastructure they control.
In a truly free market, Network Neutrality would not be necessary, as good old American competition would drive the very best service up the ladder of success. But as long as government is setting the rules for a handful of companies, the rules have to include statutory Network Neutrality to ensure those companies can't unilaterally shut down what the innovators are doing. If they had any choice, telephone companies would not have allowed Instant Messaging or Voice over Internet – those things directly compete with their largest moneymaking service!
But it can be worse than that. Large telecoms have internal anti-gun policies. If they were allowed to, what's to stop them from slowing or blocking content they disagree with?
Another wrong argument made by the misguided is that the leftists are trying to institute price controls, forcing companies to charge the same for high bandwidth video as for quick-flying e-mail. Or as one writer put it, charge the same for a golf ball and a marble being sent through garden hoses. Nope. That bigger, more expensive hose required to deliver the golf ball? Network Neutrality merely means that all who buy that particular hose get the same hose at the same price and can't be denied the chance to lawfully use it.
It's a funny way to have to think of it, true, but as long as Congress is making the rules for a handful of major companies in providing the infrastructure, it has to make certain those companies give equal access to all comers. That's the way it has been for the very lifetime of the free and open Internet we're all interested in maintaining.
--Craig Fields, Gun Owners of America