FCC’s ‘fairly sweeping reforms’ reduce need for Congress to legis...

FCC’s “fairly sweeping reforms” reduce need for Congress to legislate in telecom, Libertarian think tank scholar said Fri., but Congress could be building up to major overhaul of Communications Act. At Cato Institute briefing for Capitol Hill staff, Telecommunications Studies Dir. Adam Thierer offered support for FCC actions on Bell deregulation and spectrum reform, suggesting agency’s likely action Feb. 13 “lessens the need for Tauzin-Dingell” but that Spectrum Policy Task Force and recent deal with Dept. of Defense on 5 GHz “doesn’t mean the Hill can take a pass.” Thierer said he could envision effort to completely overhaul telecom regulation in 2005 leading to “clean-up in 2006, a Telecom Act of 2006.” He urged Hill staff to “beware of pork-barrel approaches on broadband,” with subsidies not answer. Assn. for Competitive Technology Vp-Corp. Affairs Steve DelBianco, also participating in briefing, said high-tech companies weren’t pursuing “a New Deal. That brings to mind the telecom industry, and that’s not a model we want to follow.” Other issues: (1) Thierer said media ownership would be “red-hot this year” with bills anticipated from both sides after FCC acted. (2) Senate Commerce Committee Chmn. McCain (R-Ariz.) is likely to offer free air time bill, Thierer said, what’s being called McCain-Feingold II. Thierer said that would violate First Amendment and be unfair punishment for broadcasters vs. other media. He said issue could lead to debate on perhaps forcing broadcasters to give up some DTV spectrum, calling DTV “a misguided policy going nowhere.” (3) Intellectual property debate will be big, Cato Technology Studies Dir. Clyde Crews said. He urged Congress not to ban file sharing but to permit content owners to protect content as long as it didn’t involve being free of liability on hacking. DelBianco said Congress should “avoid any quick fixes” in intellectual property protection. Hands-off approach advocated by Cato and ACT wasn’t surprising, and Crews best summed up attitude of panelists by referring to “one kind of government action I can get behind” -- creation last year by FTC of cybersecurity mascot, Dewey the Turtle.