Re: OT: Politics [Was:Social Contract]
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On Tuesday 02 May 2006 21:26, Paul Johnson <baloo@ursine.ca> was heard
to say:
> Deregulating the telco industry and breaking up Bell was the worst
> thing we could have done in this case.
There was no "de"-regulation. The "baby" bells retained their locally
mandated monopolies. New tiers of service were set by regulations,
different players had to deal with new and different rules in
different physical areas.
Worst is the requirement that all carriers have to provide remote
wiretap ability for any call, anywhere, to be piped to the FBI or
whoever it is who wants to listen. Hardly a "de"-regulation.
Actual de-regulation would be a godsend compared to the mess created
by the regulatory environment. I couldn't agree with you more that
the new regulations caused problems, but don't confuse government
merchantilist intervention with the "free-market". Us free-market
advocates just _hate_ that.
However, considering just the price drop since "de"-regulation, it's a
rousing endorsement of what is possible just by allowing a little bit
more competition in only one area (long distance). We freedom types
would like to suggest that such would be the case in spades if real
competition were allowed in all areas, just like happened with IP
service prior to the DMCA and other regulations on that.
California discovered the same thing when their state
government "de"-regulated their power industry. There was no "de" at
all, just a new spider-web of regulations that made it impossible to
buy enough power to deliver to customers.
Curt-
- --
September 11th, 2001
The proudest day for gun control and central
planning advocates in American history
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