Bush Says Americans 'Ought to Have' Broadband and a Pony by 2007

wrttnwrd writes "George Bush is calling for universal broadband by 2007. He doesn't say how, or who's going to pay for it, or who's going to build it, but hey, isn't almost good enough? (for all of you Boondocks readers out there)" First step to universal broadband: don't have your Justice Department argue against communities providing their own broadband service. And don't forget the pony!

A pony indeed

Fetch the man his coffee, post haste!

Some Americans have yet to receive their forty acres and mules.

Re:A pony indeed

Actually I was trying to link directly to a funny Onion headline but slashcode wouldn't let me. Here's a link [theonion.com] that doesn't try to go straight to the pdf.

Re:A pony indeed

Here's the link [snopes.com]. The urban legend is the idea that there was a bill passed recently with this title that gave blacks credit on their income tax as a slavery reparation. The IRS claims to have gotten over 100k bogus tax returns claiming this refund (and apparently they mistakenly did send refunds to many of those). But the story of freed slaves being promised "40 Acres and a Mule" after the end of slavery is not really an urban legend, although the person promising had no authority to do so. And the phrase was used throughout the twentieth century as a symbol of America's failure to deal responsibly with the legacy of slavery.

Re:A pony indeed

"Some Americans have yet to receive their forty acres and mules."

This is not recorded anywhere in any historical document. This is a legend that has been passed on over the years.

Not quite. During the civil war, General William Tecumseh Sherman issued an order to provide some blacks with 40 acres, and for the army to loan them mules. However, he had no authority to do this, so his order (and promises) were worthless.

http://www.snopes.com/business/taxes/blacktax.as p

Re:A pony indeed

This is not recorded anywhere in any historical document. This is a legend that has been passed on over the years.

If it is a legend then I don't know what to make of this:

From Order by the Commander of the Military Division of the Mississippi, January 15, 1865 [umd.edu]:

"The three parties named will subdivide the land, under the supervision of the Inspector, among themselves and such others as may choose to settle near them, so that each family shall have a plot of not more than (40) forty acres of tillable ground, and when it borders on some water channel, with not more than 800 feet water front, in the possession of which land the military authorities will afford them protection, until such time as they can protect themselves, or until Congress shall regulate their title."

Nothing about mules, but still...

Re:A pony indeed

Some Americans have yet to receive their forty acres and mules.

Really? Then explain why there are so many asses everywhere.

Unfair

See how life is unfair: Al Gore invents the Internet, now Dubbya profit from it. The system should have some kind of protection to prevent people from stealing each other's ideas...

Hmmm

1. Anger most of the population
2. Attempt to win them over with cheap internet
3. ???
4. Pro...Re-election!

Re:Hmmm

1. Anger most of the population

I know you're just trying to be funny, but let's look at this a little more closely, hmm?

Newsweek, 3/26: 49% favorable job approval; 47% likely to vote for the president. The other polls are pretty close, within a percent or two. Given that the polls have margins of error of 3-5%, all we can conclude is that about half of the people in the country right now think the president is doing a good job and plan to vote to re-elect him.

Does that sound like "most of the population" is "angered" to you? Because it sounds more like a very small segment of the population is "angered" to me, that a larger segment is dissatisfied, and that about half are either satisfied or pleased.

How about a little honesty, huh?

Re:Hmmm

When Bush first ran for government in Texas, he ran as an educated person from a top notch school. He talked smart and he lost the election for being an "egg head".

Subsequently Bush ran as an average Southerner of an average intelligence who "knows what's best". He's done pretty well since then.

His persona of being a Southerner of average intelligence, average mannerisms, and average speaking has been a core part of getting him this far. I think it's because those are traits that people of average intelligence don't see as being the most important traits to have.

Instead of intelligence, he has "know how", he "gets things done". Those are the ideals of the common man.

I honestly have no idea how much of this is natural and how much of this is a show. I would guess that his true person is somewhere between the egghead and the arrogant ignoramus.

Grandiose vision (to be forgotten after Nov. 2)

Bush will have broadband in everyone's home about the same time he lands humans on Mars.

Re:Grandiose vision (to be forgotten after Nov. 2)

Don't you mean liberate mars?

Re:Grandiose vision (to be forgotten after Nov. 2)

The evil martian regime harbors weapons of mass destruction in the form of tremendous stockpiles of poison gas, and has even gone so far as to kill off large segments of its own population. Our weapons inspection teams are hampered at every turn, and the British inspection team hasn't been heard from in months, presumed dead.

We cannot ignore the martian threat any longer.

Re:Your Poll

Carter was a quite good person, and did as good a job at being president as the circumstances were likely to permit

The Iran hostage crisis got rid of him - he sent in the troops to deal with terrorists, it didn't work, and he lost the election.

Reagan then showed how he dealt with terrorists - in cold hard cash - with the biggest ransom deal ever made. With the later Iran-contra scandal some of that money came back to the USA to buy weapons.

As for the ecomomy under Reagan ...

Re:Your Poll

Besides, every American knows that Jimmy Carter was the worst President ever.

But, do you every wonder why [counterpunch.com] people think that (11th paragraph).

Yeah, it's OT but the parent was modded up, so what the hell.

In other news...

Presidential candidates say absolutely anything to get themselves elected. More on this at 10:00pm...

Re:In other news...

The story is a little onesided. Kerry thinks everybody should have broadband, too. Check the CBS article Bush, Kerry see broadband as election issue [marketwatch.com]. If it asks for a member ID and a password, use "memberid" and "password" respectively. Bush says he wants broadband for everybody by 2007, Kerry says he wants to spur technologies that will bring broadband to everybody. Same thing. However, on slashdot, we're only allowed to point out when Republicans say stupid things, not when Democrats do. Didn't you read the F.A.Q.?

Re:In other news...

> Bush says he wants broadband for everybody by 2007, Kerry
> says he wants to spur technologies that will bring broadband
> to everybody. Same thing. However, on slashdot, we're only
> allowed to point out when Republicans say stupid things, not
> when Democrats do. Didn't you read the F.A.Q.?

Simple. Challengers run on change. Incumbents run on their record.

The point is, Bush has been president for four years. He determines the budgets, the direction of Federal departments, and in general tax policy (with the help of the other Republican who have been in power for the past four years). And Bush has done absolutely nothing to make universal broadband a reality in America since he's been president. His FCC has worked to allow more media consolidation, he's cut taxes for the rich (thus reducing the amount of revenue available to fund a public works project), and he was so focused on going to war in Iraq, that his priorities haven't accommodated universal broadband, among other even more serious issues [cbsnews.com].

Kerry is a senator, but he's not president. So he's saying that if he were president, this is a possible works project that would stimulate the economy, create jobs, and help broadband become universal like phone service. Kerry is the presidential challenger, so it's up to him to present his vision for America and explain why he's the right man for the job.

Bush is the presidential incumbent. It's up to him to explain his record for the past four years and explain why that record is good enough that he deserves another four years. If Bush really thought this was a good idea, well, he's been able to do it for four years. It makes no sense for the presidential incumbent to make vague promises about things he has not done anything about for the past four years. But when your record isn't good enough to run on, you avoid talking about it. You change the subject to talk about going to Mars, you make vague subjects about universal broadband, you resort to hateful language about constitutional amendments, etc.

Re:In other news...

However, on slashdot, we're only allowed to point out when Republicans say stupid things, not when Democrats do. Didn't you read the F.A.Q.?

I'm pretty certain that the most commonly reviled politician on Slashdot is Sen. Fritz Hollings ("The Senator from Disneyland"). He is a Democrat.

IMHO, the flak that Bush and Ashcroft get on Slashdot is very much well-deserved. It's often misdirected, as when Bush does something *stupid* or *wrong* ("Let's attack Iraq to fight terrorism!") and then gets complained at for the number of soldiers dying, when we are doing very well. Invading Iraq was the real problem, but deaths of soldiers is a current and ongoing issue that can be complained about. People didn't just randomly decide "hey, let's hate Bush!", though.

It's kind of like Microsoft. Microsoft frequently catches a huge amount of complaining on Slashdot for doing something incredibly minor. However, Microsoft *earned* a steady and widespread hatred from many Slashdotters from years of screwing customers and competitors alike over. They're simply paying for their original actions in installments.

Whoop-tee-doo.

Is this anything like a certain other organization stating that everyone "ought to have" universal health care, without saying how, or who's going to pay for it, etc? This is a normal function of politicians, folks, nothing to see here.

Re:Whoop-tee-doo.

Is this anything like a certain other organization stating that everyone "ought to have" universal health care, without saying how, or who's going to pay for it, etc? This is a normal function of politicians, folks, nothing to see here.

Exactly. There's a big difference between a "policy" and a "plan" coming out of a political type. Saying that you'd like to see something doesn't quite get as much done as proposing a specific law that would cause that something to get done.

And this is an equal opportunity problem that afflicts the left and right equally...

Re:Whoop-tee-doo.

Is this anything like a certain other organization stating that everyone "ought to have" universal health care, without saying how, or who's going to pay for it, etc?

Universal health care is a joke. It has to be. Just last week, the big news was that our existing medicare and social security programs are hanging on by a thread. They don't even know how to fund our existing programs when the baby boomers retire. Universal healthcare will be right beside our mars missions and universal broadband as things that are bankrupting the federal government.

Re:Whoop-tee-doo.

Canada, Germany, Britain, Italy, Spain, Denmark, Holland, Norway, Sweden, (gasp) France (gasp), Greece, AND MOST OF THE FUCKING CIVILIZED WORLD have single-payer medicine. And you know what? They live longer than we do. And they spend less per capita. There are parts of society where the profit motive just ain't quite the right way to do things.

Re:Whoop-tee-doo.

Of course they spend less per capita. They didn't sign away the ability to negotiate the price of the care given, or the medications prescribed.

It would not surprise me if the pharmacutical companies started petitioning the federal govornment to start extending the lifetime of pattents as well. Taking a page almost right out of the RIAA and MPAA. They have already gotten buy in from our govornment to prevent other countries from setting up their own drug manuracturing facilities to manufacture drugs for their own populations.

-Rusty

Not so says the CIA world fact book!

CANADA:

Life expectancy at birth:
Definition Field Listing Rank Order
total population: 79.83 years
female: 83.38 years (2003 est.)
male: 76.44 years

(http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/ge os /ca.html)

USA:

Life expectancy at birth:
Definition Field Listing Rank Order
total population: 77.14 years
female: 80.05 years (2003 est.)
male: 74.37 years

(http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/ge os /us.html)

Only a coincedence...

that this is an election year, right? Unemployment and gas prices are up, we are still killing off our soldiers in the Middle East, we are trying to amend the Constitution to ban gay marriages, we can't educate or feed our children....

But hey, wouldn't universal broadband be kewl!!!!????

Re:THEY ARE VOLUNTEERS

Good to see you have a solid grasp of personal responsability.

The US is not currently drafting civilians. You do not need to be wealthy to avoid military service, you just have to NOT voluntarily apply.

The military seems pretty straightforward about the "running risks, shooting people" part, they're not lying about it. They may not put it in the harshest light, but I don't see them selling the "Army of One" idea as "cushy job, easy salary". Rather, they try to sell it as heroism.

If you sign up for the military, you do it knowing the risks, regardless of your motivation.

While "I'll never see action" may be a "justifiable assumption", it is still a conscious risk to take based on the odds. You're still signing a contract that says you're willing to risk your life if necessary, and that's your part of the deal, regardless of how unlikely you think that necessity is.

If you wanted to take advantage of the deal and never pay up on your promise, we'll, it was your own bad decision.

Soldier is not the only profession that expects you to potentially risk your life in some undetermined future. We don't normally expect cops to say "well, I never really expected to deal with crime directly anyway" or national guards to neglect duty on the grounds that "I didn't expect to deal with REAL emergencies!".

We don't steal the responsability from their actions by assuming they don't know what they're signing for.

Instead, we expect them to be the proud professionals we need them to be; we're aware they'd rather not deal with the ugly side of things, but we hope they will rise to the needs of the situations they're trained for. We praise their outstanding character and do our best to make sure they can do their work as safely as possible.

In other words, we give them the benefit of the doubt of being decent people who can make their own decisions, good or bad. They can marry, they can have kids, they can join the circus or the military.

But since you, obviously, are wealthy enough to worry about the class issues and make the assumption their social disadvantage makes them defenseless children freeloading on the government, I'd suggest you use some of your ample free time to re-read the articles you link to, which do not support your argument and are actually orthogonal to the whole issue.

Re:Only a coincedence...

Except the AWOL aligations were false, and the White House proved otherwise.

What planet are you from? All that the White House did was show that Bush once took advantage of free dental work at the Air National Guard base in Alabama.

The payroll records released by the White House show that Bush performed no guard duties at all for more than half a year in 1972. They also raise questions about how he could be credited with at least 14 days of duty during subsequent periods when his superior officers in two units said they had not seen him.

This was a blatent attempt of the Democrats to portray John Kerry as the "war hero" while Bush as a deserter. The attempt failed miserably. In fact, Bush spent more time training to be a pilot than Kerry spent in Vietnam.

What heroism! Flying a fighter jet around Texas at taxpayer expense. Think of the danger! What if the North Vietnamese had attacked Houston? Bush would have been on the front line. And to think that people portray Kerry, who was awarded a Silver Star, Bronze Star and three Purple Hearts, a war hero! Damn liberals.

Actually, most of the troops within Iraq understand and agree with the mission given to them. I know, personally, many marines who see that rescuing 25 million as a worthy cause, and one to risk their life for.

Give your chest pounding bravado a rest. Bush lied to the American people about "weapons of mass destruction", lied to the troops, and sent our troops to Iraq with no exit strategy and poorly equipped. I know troops who did not have enough rations, toilet paper, and whose parents had to buy them the body armor that Bush & Co. didn't supply. Maybe you think that it's okay to lie to our troops, but I don't. Quit with the ends justify the means crap. If Bush thinks that we should be engaged in "nation building", then he should say so instead of making up stories about imaginary weapons.

In closing, here are some things you have to believe to be a Republican today:

1. Being a drug addict is a moral failing and a crime, unless you're a conservative radio host. Then it's an illness and you need our prayers for your recovery.

2. The United States should get out of the United Nations, and our highest national priority is enforcing U.N. resolutions against Iraq.

3. Government should relax regulation of Big Business and Big Money but crack down on individuals who use marijuana to relieve the pain of illness.

4. "Standing Tall for America'" means firing your workers and moving their jobs to India.

5. A woman can't be trusted with decisions about her own body, but multi-national corporations can make decisions affecting all mankind without regulation.

6. Jesus loves you, and shares your hatred of homosexuals and Hillary Clinton.

7. The best way to improve military morale is to praise the troops in speeches while slashing veterans' benefits and combat pay.

8. Group sex and drug use are degenerate sins unless you someday run for governor of California as a Republican.

9. If condoms are kept out of schools, adolescents won't have sex.

10. A good way to fight terrorism is to belittle our long-time allies, then demand their cooperation and money.

11. HMOs and insurance companies have the interest of the public at heart.

12. Providing health care to all Iraqis is sound policy. Providing health care to all Americans is socialism.

13. Global warming and tobacco's link to cancer are junk science, but creationism should be taught in schools.

14. Saddam was a good guy when Reagan armed him, a bad guy when Bush's daddy made war on him, a good guy when Cheney did business with him and a bad guy when Bush needed a "we can't find Bin Laden" diversion.

15. A president lying about an extramarital affair is an impeachable offense.

Re:Only a coincedence...

1) Name one republican who has criticized people addicted to drugs. Show me proof, too.

Rush Limbaugh:

"[He's] another dead drug addict."
- Rush Limbaugh on Jerry Garcia, 8/11/95

"We have alcoholics and drug addicts in our society, don't we? And what do we say about them? Well, they can't help it. Why, it's genetic. Why, they have a disease. Why, put one thimbleful of scotch in front of them and they can die.' We totally exempt them from any control over their lives, do we not? Some athlete will spend two years snorting lines of coke. He can't help it.' You know, it's--it's just--it's not--it's--it's genetic. These people--they're predisposed to having this addictive syndrome. They--they can't help--yeah, like that line of cocaine just happened to march into the hotel, go up to the athlete's room and put itself right there in front of him on his blotter."
-- Rush Limbaugh how, December 16, 1994

5)I look at it this way: in order to be human you need to have 46 chromosomes, this is unique to the animal kingdom).

Now people with Down Syndrome [utah.edu], Klinefelter Syndrome [utah.edu], and Turner Syndrome [utah.edu] aren't human. Great going, Dr. Mengele.

Do you support killing humans?

No. I was against the war in Iraq.

Bush has nothing to do with sending jobs overseas. Businesses do, however... but in your little world, you believe they are one of the same.

When Republicans pass legislation that gives tax incentives to send jobs overseas, then, yes, they are responsible for the job losses.

Everyone makes mistakes. Bill Clinton did it too, but that's OK. That's "youthful discretion" as Mr. Clinton claimed.

So now that Clinton's out of office, you are willing to accept "youthful indiscretion" as an explanation, but when he was in office, you right-wingers wanted to hang him by his balls for those same indiscretions.

We did not "belittle" our allies, we had disagreements with them.

Donald Rumsfeld said "Germany has been a problem, and France has been a problem," but you look at vast numbers of other countries in Europe. They're not with France and Germany on this, they're with the United States."

That sounds like belittling them to my ears.

The difference is that in the US you have the opprotunity to get a job which provides health insurance.

Bulls***! There are people out there who lack the skills, advanced education, and intelligence to get a job at a firm that will provide health insurance. About 62% of uninsured people live in a household in which the head of the family works full-time for the full year, but is either not offered health insurance or cannot afford to pay the premiums to participate. Uninsured workers tend to be self-employed or work for smaller businesses. About 12% of the self-employed are uninsured, 36% of workers at businesses with less than 25 people are uninsured, and 13.7% of workers at businesses with 25 to 100 employees are uninsured.

No one has proposed censoring the internet, they have proposed stopping people from stealing from others.

Ever heard of the Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA), a federal law that requires public libraries that rely on federal funds for Internet use to install filtering software on library computers? That was Republican legislation.

Creationism, on the other hand, should be taught in school right next to evolution. They are both theories, neither of which is proven, and one should not be chosen above the other, but both should be taught.

The word "theory," as used in science, does not imply uncertainty. It means "a coherent group of genera

You, like Bush, are full of shit

Except the AWOL aligations were false, and the White House proved otherwise. This was a blatent attempt of the Democrats to portray John Kerry as the "war hero" while Bush as a deserter.

In fact, the White House didn't have a leg to stand on. They talked out their asses for a while until they convinced everyone who doesn't pay attention that they had a case. If you paid attention, like I did, you'd have a different view. To give you some documentation, I googled it. Here's a good article on the subject:

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2004-02-11 -bush-guard-usat_x.htm [usatoday.com]

It's from USA Today. A relevant excerpt (boldfaces mine):

In an interview that aired Sunday on NBC's Meet the Press, Bush said he fulfilled his Guard commitment and offered to make his records public. Host Tim Russert asked, "Would you authorize the release of everything to settle this?" Bush replied, "Yes, absolutely."

Since then, White House officials have released only documents concerning whether Bush fulfilled his service obligations. White House statements have not addressed the release of any papers that could show disciplinary actions, medical exams, legal scrapes and the like.

On Tuesday, the White House released pay records from a military archive in Denver that it said showed Bush was paid for at least the minimum training time he was obligated for in 1972 and 1973.

But the records showed only what days he was paid for, not where he was or what duty he performed. Neither did they address outstanding questions about why Bush missed a required physical in 1972, forcing him to stop flying, or what happened during a five-month gap in 1972 when Bush didn't show up for training.


Here [washingtonpost.com]'s another article for your perusal (boldfacing mine, again):

White House press secretary Scott McClellan said the records "show that he was paid for his service, and you get paid for the days on which you serve."

That's the proof the white house had, BTW. Pay records. I've heard members of the national guard at the time say that they had managed to get paid without even showing up for duty. We'll assume for the sake of argument that GWB was 'getting paid for the days on which he served,' though:

The records indicate that between May 1972 and May 1973, Bush served 14 days -- two days in October, four days in November, six days in January and two days in April. The White House offered no indication of why there was a gap in Bush's service from April to October, 1972.

That's a five month gap. Nobody knows where he was during those five months.

AWOL----absent for 30 days or less.
Desertion-----absent for more than 30 days with evidence of no intent to return to duty.
Five months-----150 days

Re:Only a coincedence...

A few points.

First, we're up to 591 [lunaville.org] now.

Second, America's large-scale deployment lasted from 1965-1973 [wikipedia.org]. So the 56,000 casualties were spread out over eight years. While I'm glad that we're only losing around 600 troops a year rather than 7000, "It's not as bad as Vietnam, so it must be okay" doesn't strike me as a healthy perspective.

Re:Unemployment

5.6% unemployment: Low for Clinton, High for Bush.

The Bureau of Labour Statistics doesn't agree with you [bls.gov].

During Clinton's term in office, the unemployment rate dropped from 7.5% to 4.0%. During the first three years of Bush's term, it rose from 4.0% to 6.0%.

Re:Unemployment

The economy was already getting weak when Bush took office.

I sure as hell don't support the republicans (or the democrats for that matter), but implying that the president has anything but a minor role in the immediate economy (especially during thier first term in office) is silly.

Re:Unemployment

You cannot deny that Clinton and Bush have very different takes on how to help the economy along.

You cannot deny that the economy did much better during Clinton than during Bush.

First term or not, it is hard to deny that the US economy would have looked very different if the country had continued Clinton's policies than Bush's. For one thing, the huge tax cuts for the rich would not have had happened. If these tax cuts are good or bad, we can discuss, but to say that Bush has had no influence on the current economy is plainly wrong.

Unemployment Rate is a BULLSHIT statistic...

5.6% unemployment: Low for Clinton, High for Bush.

The problem with unemployment stats is that they only tell the story of how many people applied and how many are still on unemployment rolls. The do not reflect those who have run out of unemployment, or took shit jobs asking if you want fries with that. The fact is, good jobs that pay a living wage are growing more and more scarce. Except, of course, unless you happen to be a CEO, in which case you are making more than ever!

Re:Only a coincedence...

While I will respectfully disagree with most of your opinions there and leave it at that, I'd like to see the reasoning that states preventing two loving people from gaining the social and legal rights equal to two other loving people is protecting the family. I'm genuinely interested as to why so many people think this way, so any sensible replys would be helpful.

Re:Only a coincedence...

In fact, since gay people CAN'T naturally have children, they very often ADOPT children who genuinely need it, so in fact, prohibiting gay marriage may well do more to harm "families" than help them. The notion that giving somebody else the same rights you have is somehow weakening yours is stupid and craven.

Re:Only a coincedence...

Let's be really honest, here; the whole 'ban gays' initiative is nothing more than extreme Christian fundamentalism. No amount of logic or moral appeal is every going to change what those who are intolerant to any other lifestyle but their own feel about it. This isn't exactly a new issue, either.

Myself, I'd go so far as to say that the whole fanatical dedication to the "nuclear" family has probably done more to harm it than just leaving the whole issue alone would have. The whole argument is just plain stupid. WTF business is it of ANYONE how two other people live, ESPECIALLY if they don't even know those people?

Oh, to head off the trolls:

1) No, I'm not homosexual. I have friends who are, tho, and I support them in living however they want to. I'm not religious, but I was raised so, and I seem to remember Jesus talking about tolerance towards those who don't live like you, but who are still moral.

2) No, I'm not some "family expert". I don't think one really needs the opinion of "experts" or government officials, or religious people, to raise good kids. Make of that what you will.

3) I'm seriously of the opinon that the whole concept of marriage should be a covenant between two (or three, or whatever) people and/or their church, and should not be any province of the government at any scale, federal, state, local - WHATEVER. It's none of their goddamned business. We have something called seperation of church and state in this country partially for this exact reason. (Yes, I know it can be argued that marriage is not primarily a Christian institution - but in this particular context, WRT to our administration, it is.) The only winners in the legal venue of marriage in this country have been the divorce lawyers.

Get the fucking government out of it. Completely.

End Rant.

SB

Re:Only a coincedence...

i suppose the same should be said about a group of 5 loving people, and yet I wouldn't be surprised if you were against polygamy

You say this like it's supposed to sound ridiculous. In fact, I for one have no problem with polygamy on moral grounds.

The major argument against polygamy is historical, it being the case that multi-partner marriages have seldom been wholly consensual. It is wrong for a man to keep five women as much as it is for him to keep one, if keeping is what he is doing. With two people the chances that the relationship is less harmful is greater. None of this says that polygamy should be illegal or is immoral. In todays world it might even be possible to have perfectly workable polygamous marriages, given our fairly good legal and social system. I think we could do it in this day and age without it being harmful.

And heck if you love your brother or sister?

In principle there is nothing wrong with sexual contact of some kind between siblings, but I agree that it should be generally illegal on genetic grounds. And again, the possability of abuse is rather greater with a member of ones own family. So, while it's possible to have a safe icestuous relationship, I don't think the practice should be legal as at this time I do not believe such a relationship has a good enough chance of being safe.

As for incestuous marriage... why not? Apart from the sex issue, it seems fine to me.

I mean you love each other, or your dog for that matter.

The only reason to ban beastiality is health reasons, both yours and the animal's. Thereis some chance of disease, for one. And I have heard of reports of harming the animal by means of the act itself. The major argument against it is that there are curently no laws of enough specificity on any books (of which I am aware) to protect the animal in such situations.

As for marriage... you can already leave posessions to pets, and you can already sleep with them (more or less). While it may be necessary to exclude such unions from certain aspects of marriage (how would health benefits work?) and thus make the process more of a legal fiction than anything else, I see no problem with it.

The problem is you have no objective morality

I've got news for you, in case you slept through your philosophy classes: There is no objective morality. A few people have tried to define objective morality, and "community standards" are about as close as you can come.

Give me one reason I should trust your judgment?

Give me one reason you need to trust my moral judgements. If I married (say) a goat, it would in no way involve you and thus your moral perspective would be irrelevent.

Why is your view more right than mine?

Why is your view more right than mine? I know, majority opinion, right? Well anyone can see how quickly majority rule gets screwed up. "It's always been that way!"? This veneration of the past, while amusing, does not hold any moral weight. We don't keep slaves any longer, though it is a venerable practice. Give me some real argument as to why your opinion on marriage has any impact on anyone other than yourself and your spous (if any).

Why should any of this be illegal or legal? What buisness does the government have telling anybody what they can and can not do.

None at all, insofar as what people do does not cause particular harm to other people or the government. And maybe not even then.

How does a government decide wht is moral or immoral if the electrical impulses going through their brains are nothing more than chance?

Ah, that's jsut it, y'see.You've hit the nail on the head: The government doesn't decide what is moral, the government decides what is /legal/. Government should prohibit only minimally, as necessary, and let churches wring their hands over whether things are moral.

Your views of right and wrong are abitrary and have no

Re:Only a coincedence...

I dare to say that doing more to increase wages where both parents do not have to work to provide for their kids would do more to help the family than baning gay marriage.

Also, if Bush was as Christian as everyone of the right thought he was he would do something about the treatment of Christians in China, yet he doesn't.

Lastly, if he isn't doing what is necessary to protect our borders how can he say he is protecting us from terrorists? If you can just drive/walk across the border with a bomb/SAM all the antiterror checks at airports will not do a damn bit of good.

Re:Only a coincedence...

"What you mean is the lazy still won't work."

Yeah, in about 2 weeks me and 400 other people will be laid off. My friend just got laid off a week ago with 200 other employees.
Yeah, I'm sure there are oodles of places that need employees.

What is with all these "everything is peachy, there are no problems" AC republicans?

Re:Only a coincedence...

We're trying to amend the Constitution to allow states to define marriage however they choose. Right now, the definition of marriage is in the hands of three old white men sitting behind a bench. The amendment will put that decision back in the hands of the people.

If anyone is likely to react incorrectly and ban gay marriage, it is old white men. The only reason they wouldn't do that is if it were (gasp!) illegal to ban it.

As for why states shouldn't be allowed to define it seperately: What part of FULL faith and credit do you not understand?

I'm so terribly sorry that you don't appreciate democracy.

The old white men are part of our democratic system. One of those brilliant checks and balances: They'll follow the law, regardless of popular opinion. This makes nasty things hard to do quickly, thus making it less likely that wrong things will be done in haste. If they're right things, eventually they will be done.

People complain about judges only when the check/balance is not working for them. Guns would be illegal by now if not for old white men.

Read my lips, no slow connections?

If we're going to have "Universial Service" for Internet access, we first need to determine what level of service is going to be considered the universial level.

For example, lets consider phones... The USF for telephone service assures that everybody can get access to POTS. But, it's exactly Plain Old Telephone Service, a dialtone. Any advanced services are not included in the subsidized rates, so customers are on their own if they want Caller ID, Call Waiting, or Three Way Calling to work. Cellular customers have to pay into the USF fund because they are connecting to the phone network, but they get no subsidies out because cell service is most definitely above the universial level of service. However, this also means that cell network operators are not responsible for getting their networks extended into areas where they don't think it would be profitable to operate.

The other key thing about phone service is that it only costs about $5 to get the hardware you need to fully enjoy all of the features of Plain Old Telephone Service. Sure, there are more expensive telephones are the market, but those all ofter additional features beyond what it takes to interface with the telephone network. It's not an unfair burden to expect somebody to be able to afford to buy their own phone hardware. But, just what is the minimum feature set of a computer to enjoy the Internet? Is Lynx a good enough browser, or do we have to assure that the subsidized level of service can deliver Mozilla?

And, just what technical definition of "broadband" will the subsidized service use? Afterall, DSL and Cable Models come in various speeds of upload and download last-mile links, and how congested the network is after you get off the last mile is also variable and hard-to-quantify. The debate as to what would be defined as "Plain Old Broadband Internet Service" is far from settled.

Bush is giving off a nice thought for an election year proposal... but it seems like this is so lacking in details it can't exactly be taken seriously yet.

Re:Read my lips, no slow connections?

Well, even though the article title and the /. write up say broadband, the only actual statement they provide from GWB is for 'high speed internet' (unless I missed something). Keep in mind that earthlink considers themselves high speed internet. Heck, I think even some aol commercials boast being high speed.

I haven't read the actual speech, so I could be wrong, but I think he called for something even more loosely defined than 'broadband'. He could just be talking about some kind of nationwide 56k dialup scheme. It is unlikely he actually knows, or that any of the people adivising him actually know (and I'm not just saying that because it is Bush-- there are very few technically saavy politicians at all). They probably just took a poll and said, "Gee, people want faster internet. I wonder how we can make this work for us."

Re:Read my lips, no slow connections?

It's not an unfair burden to expect somebody to be able to afford to buy their own phone hardware. But, just what is the minimum feature set of a computer to enjoy the Internet? Is Lynx a good enough browser, or do we have to assure that the subsidized level of service can deliver Mozilla?

Your post was intelligent and well thought-out overall, but I'd like to point out that at the time the rural telephone access was an issue, telephones were actually quite expensive. Even in the early 80's a basic telephone would run 30 dollars, and that is in the dollars of the time. My mother was leasing a telephone in the 70's, because leasing was cheaper than owning. If we assume a phone in the 50's was 50 dollars (someone who remembers/has data from that time please chime in), and the median income was 5,000 dollars, then that creates an income/cost ratio of 100 to 1. If the median US income (for 2002) was 43,000 dollars, that would imply an access burden of 430 dollars. Cheap computers can be had inside of Wallmart for that much money, including monitor, and everywhere else for not significantly more.

So yes, while the concept of rural broadbandization seems laughable, the cost to the end user doesn't seem that out of line with previous similar programs.

I advise all slashdot readers

I advise all slashdot readers to vote for this patriot on the upcoming election!

Bush is all about freedom, has been and always will be.

This man knows every american has a universal right; and that is to download pornography at high speeds.

no no

the reason the Justice department is arguing against co-op broadband systems is then his big business buddies in the telecom and cable industry don't get paid....see, he wants to get a spending bill passed that will subsidize the expansion of DSL and Cable, but if co-ops form, that means less money for his porky friends.

Not against co-ops. Against runaway GOVERNMENTS.

the reason the Justice department is arguing against co-op broadband systems is then his big business buddies in the telecom and cable industry don't get paid...

That's an interesting interpretation.

Especially given that they're NOT arguing aginst broadband operated by co-ops. (Which, by the way, the explicitly support, along with broadband supplied by other little companies, even if it competes with their "big business buddies".)

They're arguing against broadband companies run by county and local GOVERNMENTS. And even then they're only arguing against them when they're implemented in violation of the objections of the STATE governments from which the smaller governments derive their powers and mandates.

The issue was STRICTLY whether an FCC regulation allowing "any entity" to operate a broadband company free of state regulation could be used by cities, counties, and the like, as arms of their state, to escape control by their state legislatures and constitutions.

But of course certain rabid Bush-haters just LOVE to lie about it, claiming that the Bush administration is trying to block small broadband carriers, rather than to block governments from squeezing them out, with tax-subsidized unfair competition and conflict-of-interest driven regulatory roadblocks against any little guy that wants to compete with THEIR operation.

The much despised "tax and spend" policy...

...has been replaced by a bold new "don't tax, and spend" policy.

Re:The much despised "tax and spend" policy...

The words you're after are "borrow and spend Republican".

What good will universal broadband be for Americans when Michael Powell is given juristiction over it and shuts down teh b00bi3z?

Broads Banned

What he meant is that he wants broads banned, universally.

What a sexist pig!

Impact of universal broadband

Although I am in favor of broader adoption of broadband, I do see a couple of downsides:

1. More telecom taxes to support universal service (including taxes on VoIP)
2. more zombie boxen and virus datastorms from clueless broadband users

We shall see if universal service improves the economies of scale enough to cover the increased costs of taxes and AV/firewall.

Porn for the people

Has there ever been a stronger cause for Americans to unite behind?

Bah who needs broadband

Who needs broadband when you have AOL with TOPSPEED technology?

oh wait...

That's just wrong

GWB did not propose spending one dime on universal broadband. All he said is that all Americans "ought to have it."

I agree. All Americans ought to have it.

When GWB proposes spending government money on this, please get back to me.

Re:That's just wrong

GWB did not propose spending one dime on universal broadband. All he said is that all Americans "ought to have it."

To paraphrase, when it comes to jobs all Americans "ought to have one" too.

He has the exact same plan for that too, thas is do nothing at all.

I guess that is what he means by "strong leadership."

Good plan. really.

Ok, great. so he's proposing all these programs, like hte Mars mission, ubiquitous broadband-- the thing is, he doesn't actually plan on coming through on any of them. It's called "starving the beast".

In bold print on the first page of the long-term conservative playbook is a tactic called "Starving The Beast". It goes like this:

* lower taxes (especially for your friends) to the point where a fiscal train wreck finally ensues.

*declare that "raising" taxes (returning them to a prior level) would destroy the economy, and that the only solution is to gut Social Security and other unwanted New Deal programs.

"Starving the beast" is no longer a hypothetical scenario -- it's happening as we speak. For decades, conservatives have sought tax cuts, not because they're affordable, but because they aren't. Tax cuts lead to budget deficits, and deficits offer an excuse to squeeze government spending.

Second, squeezing spending doesn't mean cutting back on wasteful programs nobody wants, like missile defense.

Finally, the right-wing corruption of our government system -- the partisan takeover of institutions that are supposed to be nonpolitical -- continues, and even extends to the Federal Reserve.

But yeah, ubiquitous broadband is a great idea, if he actually meant it.

Your mistake.

You made a mistake. The mistake is you made the assumption that Bush is a conservative. He says he is, but his actions prove otherwise. (But he sure has fooled a bunch of people)

He just wishes to be stay in power and will damn near say anyting to stay in the whitehouse.

Re:Your mistake.

>The mistake is you made the assumption that Bush is a conservative.

Conservatives want to limit the size and power of government, even (especially?) when the expansion looks like it's being done for good reasons.

Conservatives like to balance budgets.

Conservatives believe in military action but only when it's supporting US interests.

Conservatives, like Bob Barr and Newt Gingrich, are speaking out against the "USA PATRIOT" Act.

This is going to be a tough election for conservative voters. Both candidates are far from conservative.

You're no FDR

I am sorry, but broadband in the household is not like FDR's Public Works Proejcts [nps.gov] of the 1930's. Roosevelt used such initiatives to give work to those hammered by the Great Depression while simultaneously modernizing the US infrastructure - electricity for rural communities and the like.

I agree people should have broadband, but Bush needs to let ECONOMICS drive that, not legislation. When demand is high enough, providers will answer. Until then, there are plenty of other issues our government needs to take a look at.

Here's a hint, turn your head East.

Re:You're no FDR

Bush is complaining about a lack of jobs, but he's failing to connect the homeland issues that are painfully understaffed to the funding that allows peopel to be hired. For example, more effective security barriers could be built along the Mexican border to help make sure everybody who wants to enter the USA is going through a checkpoint like they're supposed to, but Bush doesn't exactly seem like he's interested in even trying to solve that issue. In fact, MSNBC reported last week that the all three parts of the Dept. of Homeland Security are presently in a hiring freeze... it's not like there's a lack of work in that department, just a lack of funding to pay people to do that work.

If the Iraq war is the only government-funded project he can come up with, we've got a serious problem...

Re:You're no FDR

A large part of why Bush isn't interested in that issue is that he's driving hard to win Hispanic voters (along with Jeb) in Flordia, which for both parties is a key battleground state.

cf Rural Electrification Administration

Bush is probably looking to propose a plan comparable to FDR's REA (Rural Electrification Administration) which funded power lines to rural developments and encouraged rural businesses to adopt newer technologies. I hope Bush will take a lesson from FDR and not only extend BB access to rural homes and businesses but to give funding to poorer families and rural businesses to help close the "digital divide". For more information on the REA, see http://history.sandiego.edu/gen/20th/1930s/newdeal .html

Phone service first

Before we get all excited about universal broadband, we should consider parts of the country that haven't even received narrow-band telephone lines.

We could start by

He doesn't say how, or who's going to pay for it, or who's going to build it

massmailing free AOL for Broadband [aol.com] CDs to every known address in the US.

AOL for broadband - It's faster! It's smarter! It's included!
On dial-up surf the web upto 5x times faster than a standard dial-up connection with AOL TopSpeed(TM) technology all through your existing phone jack at no additional charge!

That could work.

I Don't Get It

Bush doesn't mention a Pony in the article or anywhere else I've seen this article. Where did michael get that information from?

I mean, this is a news site, right? We just wouldn't make things up out of thin air to push our agenda here, would we?

I ask this because the Pony part seems unbelievable to me.

Re:I Don't Get It

The statement of "and a Pony too" is usually tacked on to make fun of an outragious request being made... as this "proposal" by Bush seems to be at this point. He's not saying all Americans will have broadband by 2007, he's just saying they should. He's also not giving out any plan for just how more Americans will get broadband, or promising to see to it that more Americans get access to broadband.

So, making a statement that "All Americans ought to have broadband." is something that nobody's goign to disagree with, and is not something he can be called for not following through on. More or less, he's said nothing newsworthy at all... he's just trying to get the geek vote without offering much in return.

Why do I suspect that if...

Howard Dean had proposed this, we'd be seeing tons of posts on how visionary it was.

I loved "independent" thinkers.

Re:Why do I suspect that if...

George Bush is this thing we call the President. That means, that when he says, "I'll create more jobs", you ask yourself, "Why isn't he doing that right now?"

If Howard Dean said it, we could bitch about how that it would mean more taxes regardless of whether he made mention of it. With Bush, this is the nth package he's talked about which would involve a good deal of spending without raising taxes. Given that eventually we can't load ourselves enough money to allow for all the programs required with the current tax level, there seems no indication that taxes will go up, and no indication that current programs will be cutback, all of the above either leads to George Bush being a huge liar about really supporting all the programs he talks about or he's setting up for rampant inflation/a recession.

Personally, though, I wouldn't believe any presidential candidate who was offering such things, nor do I think it's the government's business to fund such. Ie, I'd be just as much against Howard Dean if he supported it. (The only way I can take exception to that is if there was good proof that the telecommunication conglomerates were unfairly holding back broadband to cause intentional overpricing in which case there might be a basis for an anti-trust case which *might* eventually lead to ubiquitous broadband, and the would-be President could push towards such a case.)

This is as out there as the Mars plan

This is just nuts, both technologically, and unprofitable wise, as going to Mars by 2020.

The amount of switches needed to put everyone on ground based broadband is nuts. I live out in an area where there is no cable TV, and a sparse population, so there is no highspeed option. And you can't consider Satellite an option yet, because 2 way is too expensive for a single household, and one way you still need the expensive dialup account.

Canada promised to give highspeed access to everyone by about this time, and the project just needs technology to catch up with consumer will.

I also don't think it is a good idea to give everyone and their dog access to highspeed Internet. With the inherent insecurities in the Internet's design, it is stupid to give attack capabilities to people who are unable and unwilling to keep their computers free of worms and trojans. The very safety of the Internet relies on some people not having quick service to the net.

Phoneless in America

Before that, maybe the U.S. should first tackle the phoneless problem, seeing that there are 5 million households(5%) without a phone [census.gov](pdf.

Did you read it?

If you actually read the report you will find that the majority of the "Phoneless" is young single men.

Even though this is from 1994 let me guess that the survey asked for landlines and the increase is due to switch to mobile. Second I did a little googeling and it seems the the Phone question was one of the ones targeted as a NOSY question and a few groups were advocating "Just say no" to that one.

Young men even in the lower income bracket is the one with the most discretionary money.

Meaning most likely wrong and the portion that is "right" it is of Choice not Necessity

Prepping for deregulation?

Choice quote: "make sure that as soon as possible thereafter [that] consumers have plenty of choices" What do you think that means? I can tell you.

In Kentucky, they are pushing state deregulation of telcos to encourage new investment in broadband in new areas.

The result? They will charge competitors more thus pricing out competition allowing them to charge exhuberant prices to consumers.

I expect this is an announcement of similar steps on the federal level.

In the end, these are attacks on small startups and consumers in the form of ruthless monopolistic practices on the part of telcos and high prices for consumers.

But this is what big business is all about and Bush is a big business kind of guy. Thus I am perplexed why the common man would be so in favor of him but that is another discussion altogether.

Re:This article is flamebait

first, you sound like someone who is going to believe Bush is the best, no matter what, and not bother to think about it.

Second, it's not flaimbait, bacasue the JD did argue against people owning their own broadband service.

"But by that same token: why on earth should we simply to assume that the government is totally free of corruption?"

we never should. However you say it like it's perfectly OK for Bush to be corrupt.

Before you start labeling, my opinion is based on action Bush has done, and has nothing to do with my political beliefs.

They Lie.

This is the same group of people that think it would be a 'good idea' to reclassify fastfood workers as manufacturers because they 'make things'.

This, much like the Bush anti-terror policies are all about getting Bush a win in 2004. They are not about solving they problems at hand

How about jobs to pay for the broadband

While its a nice political gesture to want everyone to have broadband ( its not a necessity, but its nice to have ), how about everyone having a job to pay for it?

That would be much more useful, with how jobs are flying out of the country at a frightening pace.

What President Bush ought to do

if this trial ballon of his goes anywhere:

1) Ban all granting of monopolies to broadband service companies. This does mean pulling rank over state and local governments, but the Democrats have tortured the Interstate Commerce Clause a lot worse than this.

2) Stop forcing the telcos to share their networks, but mandate network interoperability. The latter is redundant since it's part of the definition of the Internet, but the average journalist and politician doesn't know that so it's best to specify. After this, the telcos will have to put up or shut up about building proper broadband networks, and if they don't, someone else will hopefully come in and kick their ass.

3) Put the DOJ on the short leash over their trying to block community-run broadband. So long as local governments don't grant themselves a monopoly or do anything else blatantly anticompetitive, leave them alone.

Basically, get the frickin' lawyers out of the way and let the usual process of Darwinian natural selection begin.

...and a Pony.

I thought most communities don't allow ponies for pets these days. Couldn't imagine what all those apartment dwellers with ponies anyways.

Hmmm....

I submitted this story 3 days ago. I guess my post wasn't Anti-Bush enough to be accepted.

You just know

If they pay for it, they'll want to be able to control it, too. That means DRM and trusted computing, and Carnivore too.

Why?

I'm not a Republican, but how come no one ever asks "how much" when Democrats proposed essentually the same thing?

Politics blows. I really wish we could evolve beyond it, but some structure (read: flaw) in the human mind just won't allow it.

Damn these simian brains!

Leap of Technological Faith

"He doesn't say how, or who's going to pay for it, or who's going to build it, but hey, isn't almost good enough?"

I'm noticing a lot of people don't seem to have a problem believing we'll all be watching hi-def TV's by 2005, but somehow this is beyond the realm of possibility. Not that buying a new hi-def TV will cost you any, right? Ask yourself the same damn questions posed here about Hi-def and you'll probably get answers that can easily be applied to braodband here. I mean, is it really such a leap, or does somebody bare a political grudge???

Yeah, thought so.

Lower satellite internet connection cost

We can have broadband in every home now w/o stringing more wires. We would have to launch more satellites. Do the same for satellite connnected Internet service through the FCC, as the FCC did for satellite based television. Allow for up to a 1 meter dish (actually make it 1.5 meters since this is an uplink as well) in the 48 "lower states" and give AK and HI up to 6 feet, preempting any restrictive covenents, local ordances, homeowners agreements, etc. in the name of fostering competition. Then lower the barrier to entry for getting a licensed satellite in orbit for the purpose of delivering Internet service to foster competition on that side. So lower taxes on Internet distribution companies, etc. to allow builduout of the infrastructure to keep the rates on par with cable modem delivered Internet. And allow up to 2 meters for combined two-way satellite and DBS dishes if it is a single combined dish installation (that lets one install the more compact higher gain double reflector "orange peel" elliptical dishes.

The short side is, I'd rather see tax breaks for companies that deliver phone and network services to the rural areas on par with the suburban and urban prices rather than have my bills go up (or have me raise my ISP customers bills) to pay for the rural service areas.

Just like I feel for individual taxes, we ought have a uniform flat rate for corporate taxes with a single small/new business deduction (no taxes for the first $50,000 earned, flat rate above that would be nice but you'd have to work out the level of the deduction to encourage and support new and small businesses). Then give limited targeted tax breaks for the areas you want to encourage. Capitalism will then take over and do the heavy lifting.

If it did not cost anything to get the license for a satellite for dedicated Internet two-way service and the launch was done at cost (or subsidized if you were flexible about the launch timing) if all the technical and saftey details were met, etc. We'd have multiple folks offering cheap internet service from space at that point.

Free to the community to use. Launch a constellation of satellites (similar to the GPS ones) that all communicat with each other and communicate with ground stations that use GPS-like control to find the satellites and track them. When traffic drops on the connection to a low level, change the connection point. Put a radome 1.5 meters in diameter on your roof that covers the antenna and if in an area with snow or ice, steal exhaust air from the house and blow it through the radome before doing further heat recovery or flusing it to the outside world. Equipment could be subsidized through the length of the contract for service (just like free cell phones) to reduce the initial sticker shock.

Or, subsidze research to limit or elliminate the nasty side affects of interference from powerline distribution of Internet service. For example they would be greatly reduced if during routine powerline maintenance they replaced the ground wire of the high tension line with "fog wire" (fiberoptic core with a copper / steel reinforced wrap/cover). One could allow for limited powerline distribution for 5-10 years to be gradually replaced by "fog wire" style distribution (require all new or repaired rural power grid systems to use fogwire?).

Goverment program - Fiber to homes

Situations like this reiterate the need for the government to subsidize fiber to every home. We could put phone service, cable television, and internet access on the 1 fiber line going into each home.

The technology is available, why don't we embrace it?

It shouldn't be that hard, here is how

Obviously we can count cable modems out. Cable television isn't generally availible to those people in the fringes that receive service subsidized by the USF.

The biggest issue is those customers that are "on fiber." DSL works by transporting the data signals alongside the analog phone calls. In rural areas, they use multiplexors to provide service. This means there is no way to colocate the DSL equipment at the central office and extend service, since the layout is more distributed and connected by fiber.

If the multiplexors were upgraded, or new cards developed there shouldn't be much of a problem pushing the speed of the fiber up and then using that excess bandwidth to provide DSL service. In the remote multiplexor you could house new circuit cards that provide DSL + Analog capability.

There are plenty of companies out there working in this market, and this type of solution probably already exists. If nothing else, they could buy DSLAMS from eBay and rack them out remotely.

It might even be possible to exted ISDN (64k channels) off of the multiplexors.

Phone companies don't seem to want to do things until shoved. Bell Atlantic (now Verizon) kept the prices of ISDN at $250 a month well into the day of cable modem deployment.

My parents retired to an area that lacks broadband. It isn't that it would be hard to do, it is just the telcos don't seem to care. And there would easily be enough subscribers to support racking out a DSLAM in a cabinet next to the fiber mux that is servicing the community. If I lived closer, I would probably try to do it.

In Other News...

Bush says Americans 'Ought to Be Working' and the working, homeless 'Ought to buy a House'. Get out your bootstraps and pull man, PULL.

Next Campaign Ad

Can you ping me now? Good.

Want broadband? It's easy

abolish the FCC.

It's already happening. Bush need do nothing.

Broadband in the US is doing just fine. See the Nielsen/Netratings stats [websiteoptimization.com] (which that site probably shouldn't be publishing, but so be it.) "As of February 2004 broadband penetration was at 45.15% ... we estimate that broadband share in the US should exceed 50% by June of 2004". Comscore [comscore.com] shows roughly comparable numbers. Broadband penetration is currently increasing at about 10-12% per year.

For comparison, only about 40% of US households bought a book in the last year. So broadband has already passed books. Only 21% of US households subscribe to a newspaper, while about 75% of Americans with a phone line have Internet access. Only 66% of US households subscribe to cable TV, so the Internet has already passed cable TV. Cable TV isn't growing, so, if you take the trends seriously, broadband Internet will pass cable TV within two years.

What's the problem?

The details:

The contract to build the monster has been given to Haliburton.

Mishead what Bush said

Actually what Bush said was, "All Americans should pony up for broadband."

Re:We have universal phone service

yeah, but check your phone bill. you probably pay $10 or more a month in gov't fees and taxes to help pay for internet access in school and making sure phone service is available everywhere (as if it isn't).

Broadband for everyone probably means broadband taxes for everyone.