Virus Lockdowns: Speeds Up – Prices Down. Government Should Leave the Internet Alone

Seton Motley | Less Government | LessGovernment.org
Seton Motley | Less Government | LessGovernment.org
Truth

The perpetual pattern:

Government gets a little involved in the private sector – and screws things up a little.  Government then lies – and says the private sector screwed things up.  Allegedly justifying the government getting more involved.  Which screws things up more.  Government then says the private sector screwed things up….

Lather, rinse, repeat….

Government failing – is just the way things are.  It is immutable fact.  People running their own lives – are better at it than other people running their lives for them.

Once government gets its giant proboscis into anything – everything quickly spirals downward and out of control.

We are only now emerging from the year-plus of titanic stupidity that was our government murdering our economy in fear of a flu.  One of the sectors most tested by the artificial life circumstances government imposed – was the Internet.

Everyone was mandated to do much less in real life – so we all did much more in digital life. Internet traffic massively surged.

And the US Internet networks did better than…everyone else’s on the planet.

Nothing currently consumes more Internet bandwidth than video.  When the lockdowns began, the European Union had to immediately downgrade all video from High Definition (HD) to Standard Definition (SD) – to prevent their networks from collapsing in a smoldering heap.  The US had to downgrade…nothing at all.

Our networks being better than Europe’s – is more than a mite interesting.  We have much greater connectivity challenges than they do.  Their countries are tiny.  Our land mass is titanic.  We have 3,537,438 square miles – 97% of which is rural.  Which means we have millions-of-square-miles of emptiness – which we must nevertheless fill with connecting cables and wires.

Yet our Internet crushed the virus lockdowns – and Europe’s got crushed.  Why?  Because they have much more government involvement than do we.

Stupid, all-encompassing regulations like Network Neutrality tighten the screws on their networks – strangling the speed and capacity out of them.  Which means Europeans pay more – for less speed and capacity.  Not just during the lockdowns – but each and every day.

Meanwhile, in the less-government-US….

U.S. Sees Average Internet Speed Rise During The Covid-19 Pandemic

Decreasing Prices and Increasing Value for U.S. Broadband Service Over Time

During the lockdowns, the US didn’t have to degrade Internet video quality – or diminish services in any other way.  And despite the massive increases in traffic, we increased speeds – while lowering prices.

Again: Our Internet is better than Europe’s – because our Internet has less government jammed down its throats.

Enter the Joe Biden Administration.  Which is filled to the rafters with people who either do not know – or do not understand – history.  Or simply do not care what history teaches us – which is to NOT massively expand government.

Net Neutrality Will Make a Comeback Under Biden

Biden Kicks Municipal Broadband Dead Horse

“Municipal broadband” – is government-run Internet.  What’s worse than government over-regulating the Internet?  Government BEING the Internet.

Nothing says “First Amendment” and “free speech” – like government being the Internet.

Speaking of history, we’ve already tried government broadband.  A LOT.  Government broadband is such a dead horse – it is a Hyracotherium.  Which was extinct 50 million years ago.

More than 450 different US government entities – state governments, county governments, city governments,… – have tried being the Internet.  They have all been disastrous failures.

Biden is ignoring the fabulous lockdown success of our less-government-Internet.  And is instead going to massively increase the government imposed upon our Internet.

And not just that.  Biden is going to ignore history, bypass all the intermediate steps – and massively increase government BEING the Internet.

Which is exactly for what our domestic Marxists have long been plotting:

“At the moment, the battle over network neutrality is not to completely eliminate the telephone and cable companies. We are not at that point yet. But the ultimate goal is to get rid of the media capitalists in the phone and cable companies and to divest them from control.”

Why is Biden giving Marxists exactly what they’ve long wanted?

Because Biden is such a moderate.

This first appeared in Red State.