Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., thinks there’s something wrong with the way the Internet works.

And it’s not that people can politically organize and donate online for things like the campaign for President Barack Obama.

The Federal Communications Commission opened up its rulemaking process on net neutrality on Oct. 22. It proposed to allow Web users to access all the legal applications and Web sites they want, while prohibiting broadband Internet Service Providers from blocking or slowing certain content. And if there is a need to limit bandwidth, they don’t disclose the reasons why.

But that isn’t how McCain thinks the Internet should work.

He countered the FCC’s proposal, which supports consumer freedom, with the Internet Freedom Act, which would provide ISPs the freedom to screw consumers.

If this legislation succeeds, your Internet service could look more like your cable service. Instead of just letting you use the Internet at a certain speed, customers may have to choose which packages of content to access. And, like cable companies, the price of access to those packages would be based on the ISP’s business partnerships.

At the very least, the total time you have on the Internet could be restricted like it used to be. But instead of 1,000 minutes, you would have 1,000 megabytes.

According to a report by the Sunlight Foundation and the Center for Responsive Politics, McCain took more money from the telecom interests and their lobbyists than any other legislator.

Even if we were to assume his intentions are pure, who in the blue-screen hell is McCain to head technological legislation?

He even said he was computer “illiterate” and has to rely on his wife for computer assistance. So now we’re supposed to follow his advice on how to restructure the Internet?

The sudden-tech-guru McCain stated in an op-ed that net neutrality was a “government takeover of the Internet.”

The FCC isn’t trying to control the Internet to brainwash us all into worshipping Obama. The FCC wants to maintain the way people use the Internet now.

Isn’t that what the party of conservatives would want? It is the very definition of conservative: preserving the status quo.

Conservatives always hail the free market. But even if it’s Time Warner Inc. limiting access to an eBay Inc. business selling Warner Bros.
memorabilia, is that market really free?

Should Comcast be allowed to stifle access to college sports blogs because they have a deal with ESPN360?

The ISPs are trying to control your access to content they didn’t create. Time Warner Inc. might own Time.com, but it shouldn’t be allowed to limit your access to YouTube videos of kittens in boxes simply because they’re video.

There must be something more important than letting communications companies make more money at our expense.

The Internet is the last place where everyone is on equal footing. It is the most democratic form of mass communication ever devised. It has given birth to Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Dramatica. It contains both incredible amounts of information about the world and Charlie the Unicorn.

Right now, we can access all those things without worrying about additional fees and restrictions for content that does not serve our ISPs’ business interests. And that is a freedom worth protecting.

If your ISP will let you use e-mail, contact Chris at cogino@asu.edu.