Obama farms out wealth redistribution to Comcast

Herman Cain isn't the only guy with a 9-9-9 plan. Barack Obama has one too. The only difference is, Obama's plan is a government mandate that we'll end up paying for — Comcast's $9.99 Internet for low-income families goes nationwide.

Any family with at least one child who qualifies for the free lunch program at public schools can subscribe to a low-speed (1.5Mbps) Comcast Internet connection for $9.99 a month. Comcast guarantees that it won't raise the price and offers the plan without equipment rental or activation fees. Comcast has agreed to sign up families to the program for at least three years, and it also promises to provide free Internet and computer training to those who need it.

Is that a great deal or what? Normally you can't get dialup for $9.99 a month. But the FCC is just giddy with delight that Comcast is bridging the "digital divide."

"Students increasingly need to go online to complete their homework assignments," FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said. "But one-third of all students and a majority of low-income children can't. It's not because there aren't countless kids trying to do their very best. We heard about a high school girl in Florida who does her homework in the parking lot of the local library each night, because the library's wifi hot spot is the only way she can get online."

Hey, wouldn't lots of families be interested in a low-cost student internet plan? Sure! But Comcast isn't making money off of the $9.99 guys. It's being subsidized by the rest of the paying customers who fork out $99.99 each month for Triple Play. Not that Comcast is being altruistic or anything. The $9.99 plan was mandated by the Feds in exchange for approving their merger with NBC last year.

And when everybody else's cable bill goes up just a little bit extra to keep subsidizing the $9.99 guys, well that's not really a tax, right? Not in the usual sense anyway. But it still reeks of "From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs." I'd say it was socialism, imposed on a private business by an all too powerful government bureaucracy, except it's more like crony capitalism. Comcast got what it wanted, the bureaucrats got what they wanted, that poor little girl from Florida doesn't have to keep hanging around the library at night, and the rest of us schlubs get stuck with the bill.

Is this a great country or what?

Posted at 12:42 by Chris Wysocki   [/tech]   Comments | Perm Link |
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