Internet Freedom Goes to the House Floor *ALERT*
by Matt Stoller, Thu Jun 08, 2006 at 10:38:15 AM EDT
The COPE Act vote is probably happening tonight. I say 'probably' because the Republican leadership controls scheduling, and while they've implied there will be a vote tomorrow, it's more likely that members won't want to stick around for a Friday vote.
Last night in the Rules Committee, the Markey amendment was put on the floor and the Sensenbrenner-Conyers amendment was not. This was an explicit move by the telecom companies to induce partisanship in the issue. The Sensenbrenner-Conyers Bill was a bipartisan approach to ensuring net neutrality, while the Markey Amendment comes from the Democratic side of the aisle. By striking down the Sensenbrenner-Conyers amendment, the Rules Committee wants to ensure that the Markey amendment gets voted down by a larger margin than the Sensenbrenner-Conyers amendment. We're going to get lots of Democrats on the record on this bill.
This whole fiasco has been a massive PR loss for the telecom giants. They have had to strong-arm the bill through the Republican-controlled House, using deceptive tactics.
Now's the time to call in to the House and ask your member to vote for the Markey Amendment and against the COPE Act if it does not include network neutrality.
In other news...
Save the Internet reached 10,000 friends on MySpace.
The CEO of Google issues this open letter.
The Agonist is going to have updates on the floor fight.
Tags: net neutrality (all tags)
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