what are yours. >> i don't think mike is embellishing what could happen. when we first invade iraq that saddam hussein had weapons of mass destruction one of the interesting tension points in foreign policy do you save the world and try to deliver justice to people who are, you know, living in inyou had minute conditions under tyrants like saddam hussein or remove saddam hussein and at the same time you open up a pandora's box for other nightmares. that's a story we're seeing repeating itself. that said we've also spent a couple of trillion dollars on the iraq war at a time when the united states economy is flat on its back. imagine what a trillion dollars could do back. or changing the american health

care system. those costs have had a tremendous effect on what the united states had -- so these are real debates but it doesn't diminish at all the kind of threat mike rogers said is there. it's why in my view maliki's duty in representing the people -- i disagree that leaving congressman rogers that leaving residual troops would have made a difference in this case. we have a very naïve sense that if we send troops in, that somehow the u.s. still plays parent that all of the other pactors in these complex regions with complex neighborhoods and neighbors that like to medal inside the countries, won't happen. that's simply not the case. we may need to i don't know how to put it but play with a little bit of humility in these cases and realize that what we need is to try to contain situations. try to figure out how to get

isis limits because i think what he's talking about reaching out to players inside english speaking countries like the united states and uk and elsewhere and try to activate terrorism inside other countries. this is a real threat. the terror within can be a real problem. it may not have the sophistication of al qaeda that we saw but it's a real risk. i think there are ways to contain the regional ambitions of some of these countries it doesn't mean you can inject yourself to become the arbiter of all of these currents. >> steve clemens with us. the first call is boston massachusetts. independent line. >> hi, i'd like to think you for your guest. he doesn't sound like a pr propaganda pusher. i that theory about this whole thing about the cia's policy about divide and conquer. i believe the reason ebalma doesn't want to bomb is because we're funding both sides of the aisle here. it's a perfect thing.

this is the policy you have everybody fighting and that makes us safer at home. i'd like a comment on that. >> well, thank you to the caller. i try not to push propaganda and appreciate that comment. i think that the truth of the matter is that in the best of all worlds rather than playing divide and conquer in this particular realm president obama would be thrilled if everybody could get along and we could get to what he really wants to focus on which is asia. defense secretary hagel, joe biden, john kerry always talk about the asia pivot. the middle east doesn't want to be left alone. problems keep emerginemerging. when you go back to what may have unfolded which may have upfolded despite the iraq war and interventions. perhaps the goal of obama bin laden was to open these global

rifts so nations become less significant and you have a regional rivalry where you got players like sawed yudi aabia a iran having a proxy conflict across other countries where horrible things are happening. when you look at syria and the refugee camps throughout the region. we know have more displaysed people than we did after world war ii. >> it may be a bit tongue in cheek but off the twitter he says that since isis is spreading from syria to ik iraq is assad holding his line against them. >> assad has been a resilient leader. as mike rogers laid out, isis

has become perhaps and probably the richest terrorist organizations in the world today by infusions of cash from like minded sunni extreme arabist shakes and picking up terror. they are getting quite a bit of wealth, money, cash, guns and oth weapon weaponry. i don't think it meeps that assad is safer but the chemical weapons deployments that assad used were a turning point that punctuated to a certain degree a confidence of assad that he was beating isis, and also the free syrian army. the fsa. so to some degree, i think the caller is in the right drift but they are not correlated. >> the new york times says estimated isis fighters equal

10,000. it's been able to cease stores of military equipment, plan small offensive missions. >> absolutely. so they are picking up more and more. one of the problems that's really an interesting dedebate,t sort of raises this question. it's not tough to be on john mccain and lindsey graham who have been calling on obama or criticizing the white house for not having adequately armed the opposition in syria. the qatarys sent a lot of time arm aing various components of the syrian rebel forces but perhaps tilting toward the more extremist elements of that. what we saw with a lot of money and arms that were going to the fsa was that the soldiers were selling them to nustra, and selling them to ice. you see basically a lot of

resources that were being channeled through a lot of different channels to those that were the most effective fighting force. there were not the warm and fuzzy moderates but the real extremists that we were concerned about. we had the white house really worried about arming rebels if we were going to see that. john mccain and others said let's do it. now we're paying a price for what prince bandar and the saudi's helped build up. to a certain degree, his patr patronage of isis and his direction to isis is now what we're paying a price for today. >> jerry is up from road island. democrats line. >> good morning. i have a question for steve. i don't completely understand isis. but i can't help but have a gut feeling also that we're fighting the wrong type of warment we're fighting more of a conventional war over there. i think that we have to be as under handed as they are and we

get the terrorists too much information. if we can use the shiites against them and that works, that's fine. my other thought is let them take over and after they take over then annihilates them. this is turning into a real -- bad situation with these people. we have to be hard on them. to me, in a real war, we're giving them too much information. they have taken our ammunition, everything that we've built up over there from our explosives that they have taken. some of our technology that we left over there. we've just fighting the war wrong. the united states has to wake up and we have to fight a more under handed war and be just as, you know, be like they are. be like these people are and think the same way because that's the only way we're going to win it.

that's my comment. >> well i appreciate the perspective. he wouldn't frame it as conventional because u.s. forcing aren't fighting this war. what happened and started in syria was that you had the russians and iranians helping assad's regime and you had the uae, qatar, united states, france, turkey trying to help the syrian rebel forces. it has been an utter mess. so you don't have the direct involvement of all of these countries. you have money. you have intelligence, you have battle plan ideas. you have various degrees of weaponry that are provided but none of the outside powers are directly on the line with the extension of perhaps iran who did send some revolutionary guard into syria to haep saweel. it's not conventional in that sense. the question of it being under handed. if you look at gorilla tactics, very frequently what we see with

isis is a worrysome organization but it's not classic -- there are chechen. some of people have been outrageously brutal and vicious frustrated chechen militants who became tired of the fight inside russia and have come here. so you've got a kind of roving band if you will that extends far beyond the middle east north africa region but up into asia and others of people who have been trained over the last 15 years fundamentally and even before that when you go back to the afghanistan war that the soviets were involved with, is you've got a roving class of people that are out there to fight a war. the saudis are very worried about it. the government for instance has outlawed participating in a number of these terror groups because they are worried that eventually these saudis will

come home and work at trying to topple their own government. it's not conventional in that sense. i think when it comes to u.s. involvement, one of the debates here is you have some people like ann maria slaughter who have been looking at a higher degree of interventionalism to try to save people. you've had 170,000 people killed inside syria. you're going to see a lot of bloodshed. allegedly 1,700 iraqi troops executed. you see horrors that you haven't seen in generations occurring in real time. maybe they occurred in africa and we took no action. people say we must take action now versus others who are saying the currents that are evolving and the battle between two islamist secretaislam ist sects are nothing for americans to interject themselves into.

>> there's a map in the washington post that shows the territories that show isis's operational presence, cities controlled by them. is baghdad a tipping point. >> it is a tipping point. i think one of the interesting elements that everyone is watching is should they try and take baghdad. should they really try and destroy as they want to two of the most holy shiite holy sites. that then many people say is a suicidal act by isis and it basically awakeneds a storm in the region that will be hard to shut down because it basically puts them at the tip of a population. they are winning right now because they are running into territories that are overwhelmingly sunni and they are throwing off the governorsance that has been tilted since maliki.

those two things are working together. we had, think in the washington post yesterday, discussion of some of the brigade kmaft comma group who know at some point will have to turn their guns on isis but right now isis is their ally. if they go into baghdad and this is where the white house has come in, i think the pentagon, what i don't know exactly what options the white house is talking about. what military option that if he would take if baghdad were there. the white house has intimated to some of us in the media that they wouldn't just stand by that their actions they could take to ramp up america's protection of baghdad and what it represents. >> the los angeles times reporting that secretary of state kerry now in baghdad to talk with the prime minister there over the situation going on. i know you're not there but what's the message possibly that the united states through secretary kerry might be delivering now. >> i think john kerry is telling

maliki move fast. demonstrate by bringing in people who are your political rivals in the government now. develop -- that's his only chance. we've also as you intimated earlier have told malyiki that e would be open to alternative leadership. if maliki felt he had the u.s. strongly in his camp is not there. >> all of these issues are not silos that you can neatly look at. the problem is that you've got players outside trying to affect the internal equation. in this case, iran is satisfied with maliki who they look at as a dependable ally if you will inside iraq not wanting to see him go and trying to rebuff the united states in doing this even though both are concerned. both the u.s. and iran are worried about the massive expansion of isis and the sunni

groups inside iraq very quickly. so i think he's basically saying you've got one chance, one hail mary pass and that is to do some very demonstrable strategic leaps with your rivals in the country and show them that you are going to change the resource equation because that's the only way that you can get some of these sunni leaders. that time may have passed. you mention you have 10,000 isis forces. that's not a large number of people for the amount of territory that they've taken. so it's not the whole story. something else is going on. if you feel as if you're a sunni leader. who grare you going to trust mo, prime minister maliki who has sort of ridden rough shot over your aspirations and opportunities and resources or do you think you're going to have a greater chance because you now have greater control at least for self determination of some sort and that you feel in the long run isis is only as strong as sunni leadership in

iraq alolows it to be. >> kyle from new hampshire, independent line. hi, there. >> how are you. i think everything is going perfectly. think george bush had it right. destabilize the area. let all the bad guys fight among themselves and get out of there and let it happen and let the chinese worry about their fuel instead of us. enough is enough. >> we go next to mary ann pittsburgh, pennsylvania republican line. you're on with steve clemens. >> hi, mr. clemens. >> hi, i just wanted you to comment on isis finding sarin gas and nuclear materials which i dote think -- i don't believe they know how to use nuclear materials -- >> well, thank you. i don't know. i haven't seen the reports about isis finding sarin gas and

nuclear weapons but it wouldn't surprise me that isis has found or worked with various forms of stashes because one of the interesting debates that began to evolve inside syria which very clearly the syrian government deployed chemical agents against certain portions of the population, there was also some debate at the time and a un investigation that actually saw that there's the possibility that some of the opposition troops, didn't specify isis, and defecting general, may have also come by some caches. there was an effort for some time to get various of the defecting units from the syrian army to ally with other some of the affected brigades. this is one of the tasks that the prince of saudi arabia who was then the previous head of saudi intelligence had which was to organize a large fighting

source, possibly assemble them in jordan and then try to take this unit and fight damascus. in this process there were a number of commanders from the syrian regime who had defected and there was roreports that th had access to some of these agents. this is very, very murky. i should emif assiphasize that a lot we don't know but these are the things that have come out by way of the u.n. nation and to some degree relatively dependable rumors. >> how is howard from leesberg, virginia independent line. thank you for covering this. >> go ahead, please. >> my question is what part of this equation does china or could china play in all of this? the other question is why is it

costing us when we should be paid back for the funds and the costing that we spent over there? that's the root of my questions. thank you. >> great questions. rule of thumb in military deploy. s is count on a million to million and a half dollars a person per year for an individual deployed. so 300 deployed advisors, automatically minimum $300 million for a year term cost of deployment and that doesn't include costs for veterans and other sorts of support that we provide those who serve in our armed forces over a period time. so that's the rough cost. what was happening in places like afghanistan is america was spending about $120 billion a year with a country with a $14 gdp so you sort of get these inequities and look at the cost thing. on the issue of china, china is

remaining a strong distance way from most of this, viewing these issues of internal instabilities of not of its concern. china has not yet said or acted that areas beyond its immediate border territories are those that it would engage in the kind of adoption of problems that the united states has or russia has for that matter. russia and the united states are more similarly behaved in global affairs than china. china sends to look at these questions in terms of what will it do to their long term energy supplies. their concerns are being able to maintain stability while trying to grow and raise another 300 million people out of poverty. what's going on in iraq only matters to it in terms of whether it impacts its long turmoil and energy surprise. i think the cynical calculation

was that they will be sold to someone in the future. they will be there no matter who is running the governments. china will be a buyer. >> scongress and the president will both wrong if they think that the consultation consists of congress being told and not asked what should happen next. whether we believe the founding fathers were fight or not to give responsibility for war and piece to the congress. they did. >> rachel madow has written a piece saying you can't continue to band wagon on these things. the white house has powwowed with both chambers of congress. leaders have intimated that the president doesn't need to seek a new authorization for deploying forces and maintaining a kind of combat stance if needed inside iraq if needed. those authorizations had expired. the president punctured the

expiration had on that date when we removed combat troops. rachel is saying you can't go back and rewrite that history because she would like to see a vote in congress among those people. we saw in syria when members of the house and senate were home on labor day weekends and news had been reached about the syria chemical weapons attacks, there was a lot of effort and very quickly congress heard from constituents all over the country we do not want to go to war. the initial steps to basically begin being taken to strike syria were walked back because the american public just said no. rachel is basically saying you can't do this as a parlor room deal without coming back for the authorization. it's a powerful article. i think it will be tough because ultimately if you got a unique moment of bipartisan support in leadership in both houses of congress, they will not constrain the white house if the white house decides to go

forward. >> senator finestein was on the shows yesterday talking about intelligence and if there are was enough intelligence put into place to spot the problems with isis. we will get the response and get your response to it. >> right. >> well, obviously we know about isis. we have seen the developments in syria. we're aware of the fact that they are recruiting fighters in europe. there have been arrests in spain, france, germany. they've tried to assassinate the head of security in bay route. they were responsible for the killing of three and four people at a brussels synagog. they are vicious. hef killed thousands of people. they have cut off heads. they are a major. did we know that a third of iraq could be taken over so quickly? did we see that coming? >> i would have to say no. i think it's a real wake up call for the united states because they do want to develop the

calafate. >> mr. clemens when she says that intelligence probably wasn't at the peek when it comes to isis, what does that suggest to you? >> well, i think it suggests that we have a model and sometimes it is very, very hard. i mean to a certain degree, a lot of us, including myself and rachel madow are saying a lot of us for a long time has looked for vietnam where we are injected into civil wars. we try and prop up the side that we like but ultimately once you replmove yourself or take off t training wheels, the other side proves to be pretty resilient as well and pretty strong. i think that has been the case inside syria. with regard to isis, i think i would disagree with senator finestein that earlier this week susan rice, our national

security advisor convened a group and basically said this expanding islamic militancy insi inside syria but we had the same purpose which was to trople assad. rather than foeran focusing on had to say our alleged partners look pretty awful. we had been -- as finestein said we had been watching isis. we had been seeing it grow. it was one of the projects of a lot of saudi money. it's no -- it was no coincidence that after president obama' trip to saudi arabia at the end of

march and his meeting with the king, two weeks later, the prince no longer held his post as head of saudi intelligence. it was because in part of the concern about the cunurturing o this isis group. when you think about february, end of march, now april, now mid-june, the speed and rep ied it with which isis has struck back and taken advantage of conditions inside of iraq to sort of move is something we didn't ant icipate in intelligence services. i'm not sure that we might have. there's been a band wagon of people saying let's arm the syrian rebels. let's do that. that money and resistance much of it has been flowing into isis whether formally or informally. >> next up is gayle from new jersey. independent line. >> i just wanted to go back to the syrian thing like we are not

responsible for giving syria help when we left our planes, military equipment, billions of dollars in iraq. we will probably do the same thing with afghanistan when we are there. this is taken over by the terrorists. when is our country going to grow up and not leave our equipment there. >> well the suts not leaving equipment in syria because we don't have equipment in syria. we haven't been fighting in syria. we have been helping at a low level to provide low level and what we call other capabilities which means intelligence. >> we haven't been leaving had a material. what has been happening is the money that has been used to buy other weapon systems. the french were one of the providers of choice where frank systems are being bought by saudi and other gulf money and

being shipped inside syria. those have been taken over by isis or other elements of the syrian opposition which will be fighting assad and his regime who have been very adequately bank rolled and supported with weapons by russia and iran. so you do have different sources of supply coming in but it's not u.s. forces leaving deployments. in the case of iraq, you had the united states spending an awful lot of money, a huge amount of money training iraqi forces. helping to arm those forces. we saw four divisions just collapse in the early stages of the take over by isis. a lot of those weapons caches were left behind by the iraqi forces. >> last call from minneapolis.

>> two points quickly if you could verify them for us. is it true that turkey is allowing a lot of isis fighters to come in to syria? also, the nationality of the isis fighters, is it true that they are saudis and kuwaitys. people we consider our friends and defend them. thank you very much. >> thank you very much. the two questions on turkey. i believe that we are tightly coordinated with turkey, the united states, france, turkey, and others are working together formally. that said when you look at the border towns in turkey, it's complete chaos. we've had journalists that had been kid nap inside turkey and brought in syria by isis. we've got about 34 declared journalists who had been held and kidnapped. i mention that because when you -- anybody who has been in those areas know it's kind of as close to the old wild west as

you can imagine. very little governments. a lot of confusion. i would say no, i would be very surprised that turkey was allowing easy quick access one way or another. there's an awful lot of corruption at these borders. so what governments are doing as opposed to what the behaviors are there is sometimes a gap unfortunately but i think at a formal level turkey has been quite supportive. in terms of the composite isis it's an amalgamation of syrians, jordanians, sunni cousins. there's an element -- a rainbow if you will of perspectives on what's happened. you have -- i was with a senior iraqi official the other day who says one of our big problems is that we have a revenge culture. so when people, relatives killed and then the call to others to relatives, to other members of the related tribes to come in,

that they can be part of that. so by -- absolutely, i believe saudis and kuwaitys are certainly part of the mix. that doesn't mean that saudi arabia formally is supporting it. the real problem with this conflict, i don't think it's defined as it can be in our media is the very informal yet effective dimensions of these civil conflicts that you've got a lot of people being prompted together, armed to the teeth and got incredible military experience and they are essentially have aing abo, vagas and not attached to the political structures of their names. >> do you think that violence could eventually decrease in the country? >> yes, i do. i think that that is the only hope at this point. it's got to be real and genuine and it's when al hashami, an

important sunni leader in iraq was run out of the country and not replaced in a viable way, that experiment was at least put on hiatus if not ended. i believe that's the only choice. we shouldn't be naïve that trust can be built at this point. trust has been completely collapsed. to achieve it it will take time and transcendent leadership. >> we started talking about mission creek. what dictates if we go any further than we are already doing. >> dbaghdad may be a tripping point. i think one of the things to be worried about is if baghdad were to be attacked and you continue to see the quick expansion of other places outside this sphere. if we continue to see -- we saw a video from isis in english language that was trying to reach out. we saw that kind of thing.

it may change of cal culus. about we begin to see a resurgents in the united states, attacks on other facilities, another embassy attacks, other ship attack, that would really scare us. steve clemens is the washington editor at large for the atlantic. you can find his writings at atlantic.com. thanks. >> thank you so much. >> on the next washington journal u.s. options in iraq as the violence increases. daniel pletka of the american surprise tut. and then politico talks about the creation of superpacts and his book, big money. washington jurnlal is live at 7:00 eastern and you can join the conversation on facebook and twitter.

>> the supreme court monday released its decision on a case involving the epa's regulating authority. a 5-4 decision, the court limited the epa's ability to regulate greenhouse gases by declaring the agency exceeded its power when changing the emissions threshold under the clean air act. the court did however rule that the epa could regulate emissions from industries like coal and refineries and other eemissions. you can listen to the entire argument. >> former fcc regulator called it the latest deregulation in the history also known as the open internet policy. it's a subject of a proposal moved forward by the fcc that

would create a teared internet. the hearing also almosts the impact of antitrust laws. this is an 1.4 minutes. we will come to order. with that objection, the chairs are authorized to declare recess at any time. at this time, we will have our opening statements. does the chairman of the full committee -- would you like to go first. >> if you like, mr. chairman, i'd be happy to. >> mr. chairman, thank you for holding this hearing. regulation and antitrust law have long had an uneasy relationship. antitrust law serves to protect a competitive process by prosecuting ra prosecuting anti-kpetive conduct if and when it occurs. regulation dilutes and casts aside reliance on antitrust enforcement and attempts to

constrain market forces by imposing new rules of conduct. these approaches generally are at odds with each other and a natural tension has arisen between the two. there are few more important issues that will impact the future of the internet than the question of whether to apply antitrust law or regulation to protect the internet from anti-competitive and zrem inn zrdiscriminatory conduct. propose ents of posing additional regulation argue that it is needed to encourage competition and motivation. i am deeply skeptical of these claims. in my experience, regulation generally stiefales rather than facilitates competition and innovation. it is my belief that the internet has flewiourished beca it is a deregulated market. that is not to say that we

should allow companies to engage in anti-competitive activities. furthermore, antitrust laws can be applied uniformally to all market participants not just internet service provider to ensure that improper behavior is prevented and prosecuted. in 2007 the department of justice expressed its enforce of regulation whether wh it warned that the fcc should be highly substitute to calls of regulation of the internet for free and open competition enforced by the antitrust laws. doj further states that regulation could rather than promote investment with significant negative effects for the economy and consumers. i understand the nature of the

internet and the speed at which the market evolves could prevent challenges to enforcing the existing antitrust laws in the current context. the judiciary committee has long played a role in ensuring that anti trust laws are properly equipped april can be applied effectively in the telecommunications industry. this committee will continue to play a key role advocating for long antitrust enforcement and certainly will examine these issues closely to the extent telecommunication laws are rewritten over the coming years. i look forward to hearing from today's witnesses on this important debate and i yield back the balance of my time. >> now, i recognize the ranking member mr. hank johnson of georgia for his opening statement. >> thank you mr. chairman. the modern internet is a

powerful engine for social enrichment. i would argue for basic freedom in america and perhaps in other locations throughout the world where the culture has attained this degree of intellect and innovation. whether it's educational opportunities on youtube, star bucks, recent announcement to offer its employees a free college education on line through arizona state university or online hack athons that equip young minorities with tools to thrive in the innovation economy. consumers everywhere benefit from content services that educate, enrich and connect us together. it's no mystery why the united nations lists internet

penetration as a key metric in reducing poverty. we all succeed when more members of society have access to such important tools on line for productivity, education, and indeed, personal well being. that's why today's hearing is such an important opportunity to discuss the best path forward to advance an open internet. i stronglyoinekwifically believe in an open internet which goes beyond economic concerns of growth and competition. openness embraces of our very core values as americans. equality of opportunity. if our ideas are good enough, they should have a chance. openness also separates us from closed autocratic societies that limit the educational and social opportunities of their people. look no further than the great

fire wall of china which has established barriers to free expression, education, and cultural enrichment and stunted the opportunity and growth of china's people. undoubtedly, antitrust agencies have certain advantages like a prosecutoral mind set and a removal from political influence that make they will attractive as regulatory watch dogs but as tim wu will testify later in today's hearing, the current framework for antitrust law is designed for every kind of business in the world but is a poor fit for noneconomic values like openness, freedom of expression, and indeed, equality. it is also -- and freedom. it is also abundantly clear that the remarkable success stories of the first large internet start ups, ghouoogle, amazon, yo

were not written that regulatory vacuum rather these companies benefitted from a regulatory eco system that encourages the wide spread dough ployment and adoption of the internet. with 80 years of expertise in telecommunication services and more recently information services like the internet, the federal communication's commission has been at the forefront of crafting regulations that not only encourage growth and competition, but also noneconomic values like equality of opportunity and fairness. indeed as the d.c. circuit recognized earlier this year in verizon versus fcc, regulations that ensure internet openness have fostered a quote, virtuous circle -- excuse me virtuous

circle of both social and economic fruit although the court ultimately vacated the open internet order in verizon, the d.c. circuit strongly upheld the commission's basis for net neutrality rules under section 706 of the telecommunications act precisely because congress issued brand bad deployment for this growni this growth. >> the commission shouldn't have to apply on this authority alone to uphold a common goal and countless americans share -- excuse me. but the commission shouldn't have to rely on this authority

alone to uphold a common goal that countless americans share. there is wie wide bipartisan agreement that uphelding the telecommunications act of 19 schi76 is long overdo. yes all we enjoyed the thrill of logging onto aol in the 1990s but the internet has changed since then. so should our laws. in closing, i thank the chair for holding too's hearing. as the soul kmiet ee wicommitte antitrust law, i look forward to working with my republican colleagues to make sure that the next act upholds its principals of competition of equality and freedom. these being things that we all

share. i look forward to today's testimony and i yield back. >> i thank you the gentleman from georgia. want to overwhelm come you to the hearing today. the hearing today is entitled, net neutrality is antitrust law more effective than regulation and protecting consumers and innovation. so we're not deealing with the whole subject of net neutrality or sometime maybe more descriptive network neutrality. a lot of people dote though what the net is but i think it refers to the network. let me say from the onset, that our focus of the hearing is not on any specific agency proposals or any regulatory -- regulatory proposals. although there are undoubtedly be referred to during the hearing. rather than the interest of the judiciary committee is whether the application of antitrust law would be more effective approach

to protecting consume he's and pro promoting innovation in this arena than the long frequently contentious and sometimes arbitrary federal regulatory process. it is becoming increasingly hard to recall when the internet was not a big part of our lives. it spurred new technologies, created jobs, established dynamic marketplaces for goods and do ideas. it's a wonderful education tool. fast spreading technologies have always attracted significant interests because of public policy issues they raise. as a railroad attorney, i've studied the history of the railroads. that was always a struggle between development of the rails and regulation. many of you who know that indust industry, overregulation almost

killed the industry from the stagers act. it revived itself only because of a scaling down of regulation but even today, there are tremendous issues in that industry as well as this industry on public, interest, public safety, et cetera. these issues with the netwo dea with issues including access, competitive balance and the tension between private interest, public interest between regulation and innovation. so it's always a balancing act. on may the 15th, the federal communication's commission proposed a rule market its they'reed tempt third attempt to address the issue of net neutrality. the two previous attempts were struck down by the courts. as regulatory proceedings

continue to stretch on, the question i have is whether there may be a more efficient and effective way to safe guard against potential discriminatory behavior than federal rule making. that is where antitrust law comes in. antitrust law has a number of benefits to consider and the standards applied by the courts have developed, evolved and have been refined over decades. this stands in contrast to newly proposed regulations that include untested definitions and approaches which would be interneted and enforced by constantly rotating commission and the courts on many occasions would be dealing with cases of first impression as opposed to established case law. antitrust law uniformly applies to all participants in the internet marketplace. recent fcc regulations by comparison would only apply to

smaller group of internet service providers. antitrust law prosecutes conduct once it occurs and determines on a case by case basis whether violations have occurred. regulation is a one size fits all approach and imposes a burden on all regulated parties, regardless of whether the parties actually engaged in improper conduct. these regulations could also stifle legitimate necessary innovation before it happens. and you have the different approaches that different countries take although the network or the internet is a world wide system. antitrust law violations may be brought by both private actors and enforcement agencies equipped with lawyers, economists, technician, who have decades of experience policing anti-kpcompetitive conduct. regulatory violations typically may be pursued ohm by a select

group of defined parties and the regulatory agency. notably, the fcc only has one single administrative law judge. that's something that i was unaware of before this hearing. these are only some of factors that we will consider -- that should be considered when determining whether antitrust or regulatory approach should be taken to protect internet users from anti-competitive conduct. today's witnesses are very distinguished and have perspectives from each of the relevant agencies. the fcc, the federal trade commission, the department of justice. i know commissioner writing ght. we actually have one of our sitting commissioners. i look forward to hearing their testimony on the benefits and limitations of using antitrust law to protect kpconsumers and

innovation. at this time i would like to recognize our panelists. i recognize the gentleman from mi michigan mr. conyers, the ranking member for his opening statement. >> thank you so much, chairman spencer bachus for holding what i consider an important hearing on net neutrality and the role of antitrust in ensuring a free and open internet. this should be a very interesting hearing to say the least. this committee has a central role in studying the issue of net neutrality and more generally, competition on the internet. i appreciate the chairman's decision to assert our jurisdiction.

turning to the specific question of whether antitrust is more affective than regulation in addressing net neutrality. we should keep in mind that we need a regulatory solution to address potential threats to net neutrality and must allow the federal communication's commission to do its job. congress created the fcc to develop expertise so that it could probable regulate the complex tellecommunicationtelec industry. any fcc rules to address net neutrality would have the benefit of addressing some potential threats to net neutral before they fully materialize. it could do so in a manner that within more comprehensive than the piece meal approach of antitrust enforcement.

additionally, having a set of best practices enshrined in rules would provide certainty for the industry. the fcc's efforts therefore must be given the opportunity to develop it. in developing its rules to ensure a free and open internet, the fcc should incorporate the following principles. broad bad network providers should be prohibits for failing to provide access to the broad band network for any provider o services on reasonable and nondiscriminatory terms. broad band network providers should be prohibited from blocking, impairing, or discriminating against or

otherwise interfering with the ability of anyone to use a broad band service to use or access lawful content applications or service on the internet. there should be strong transparency requirements regarding clear disclosure to users of information concerning any terms, conditions, or lim limitations on the broad band service. the fcc began its rule making process only a month ago. we must give time to allow this process to proceed. to the extent that we do look to antitrust law as a way of ensuring net neutrality enforcement of existing antitrust law would be

insufficient. under current antitrust law, there is relatively little that antitrust enforcers can do outside the marterger review context to address the conduct of a regulated industry like broad band internet service with respect to enforcing net neutrality principals. through a series of decisions, the supreme hacourt has limited the potential to suction is hce pursue claims under the sherman antitrust act arising in the net neutrality context. more over, exclusive reliance on antitrust enforcement while having the benefit of a more nuanced and fact specific approach to the problem would also be a cumbersome more limited, more resource intensive and after the fact way to

develop a regulatory regime for net neutrality. another potential approach would be for the federal trade commission to use its authority under section 5 of the federal trade commission act to stop unfair methods of competition. while i skplasive view of section 5 so this view goes beyond the scope of the sherm april act and other antitrust laws. it would be very controversial as some of my friends on the other side of the aisle would be the first to note. more over, antitrust law is not sufficiently broad in scope as it does not address the noneconomic goals of net neutrality including the protection of free speech and potential debate.

our former chairman of judiciary, introduced bipartisan legislation in 2006 to strengthen antitrust law to address net neutrality in part because the fcc was doing too little at that time in my view. i certainly am open to suggestions on how antitrust law can be better tailors to address net neutrality concerns if we go down to path, current law must be modified to codify net neutrality principals so whether one supports a more antitrust approach or regulatory approach, inaction by congress and regulators is not an option as potential threats to net

neutrality remain present. in my opening statements in 2008 and 2011 on this very same issue, i noted that many parts of our country, in many parts of our country consumers have the choice of only one or two broad band internet service providers that effectively function as monopolies or dew . i noted thet the market power that they enjoyed could lead to differential treatment of content carried by the provider depending on how much accustomer pays or the financial incentives for discriminating for or against given content. the concerns i noted may have only grown since then, particularly in light of

increasing consolidation in the te telecommunications industry that may result in even less choice, less innovation, higher cost and more power in the hands of the fewer broad band providers. having given you that impartial view of my position on this matter, i yield back the balance of my time and thank the chairman of the subcommittee. >> thank you very much. i've taken the chair for mr. bachus who was called away for votes in another committee that he served on. with that objection other members opening statements will be made part of the record. we really got a great panel today. i would like to begin wi introducing our witnesses. commissioner josh ride is a sitting commissioner at federal trade commission. he was sworn in january 1st, 2013 to a term that expires in semt of 2019.

prior he was a professor at the georgia school of law and is a leading scholar in antitrust law, economics and consumer protebs and has published more than 60 articles focusing on these issues. he also served as coedettor of the supreme court economic preview and was a senior editor of the antitrust law jurn journal. he previously served in the bureau of competition at its inaugural scholar and residents from 2007 to 2008. he's focused on policy. prior to his tenure at george mason, commissioner right

clerked for justice james celna at u.s. district court at the central of california. he graduated with honors from the university of california san diego and received his jd and ph.d. from ucla. mr. robert mcdonald is former commissioner of the federal communication's commission. he was appointed by president's bush in 2006 and obama in 2009. unanimously confirmed both times. during his tenure at the fcc, commissioner mcdowell worked continuously to forge bipartisan concensus in adopting policies to promote commission expansion, and consumer choice. the washington post called him an independent force at the fcc while broadcasting and cable

magazine described his tenure as states man like. prior to joining the fcc, commissioner mcdowel worked in a senior position in the mill aacommunications industry for 16 years. he graduated from duke university and received his law degree from the college of william mary school of law. professor bruce owens is a morris m. doil centennial professor at stanford university and a senior fellow for economic research. professor owens was the chief economist in the office of telecommunications policy at the white house under press nixon as well as the chief economist in

the antitrust division under president carter. following his public post he caught economics at both duke and stanford. he has publiced numerous articles on telecommunications, regulatory policy among other topics. he received his b.a. from williams college and earned his ph.d. from stanford. >> professor tim wu is a professor of law at columbia. professor woou has also taught at the lau schools of harvard, stanford, university of chicago and the university of virginia. he recently served as a senior advisor in the competition in consumer protection division at the federal trade division. he's also widely credited with coining the term net neutrality through the publication of his pub paper. he clerked for george richard possen at the 7th court after

peels. he received a bachelor of science degree and law degree from harvard. >> even of the witnesses statements will be entered into the record in its entirety. i ask that each witness please summarize your testimony in five minutes or less. you have some indicators in front of you much like the traffic signal green means go, yellow means hurry-up and red means stop. so we will get going. we will start with commissioner ride. you're recognized for five minutes. >> chairman, bachus, ranking members and members of the subcommit eye. thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today. my name is josh wrrks josh wrig. i am pleased to join you and more specifically the ish usues

surrounding net neutrality. the views i express today are my own. today t i will focus my comments upon competition policy and regulation broad band markets from a consumer well fair perspective. that is the load star of competition policy in antitrust it guides decision making at the ftc. the approach harnesses the power of rigorous economic analysises to inform policy and antitrust. this emphasis makes antitrust particularly well suited for tackling complex issues and questions relating to broad band competition and more addressing the important issues raised in the net neutrality debate. more specifically, the rule of reason analytical framework that lies at the core can be deployed effectively to analyze business practices in the broad band sector and to separate conduct that increases consumer well fair from those biusiness practices that make consumers

worse off. i would like to begin by discussing it from an economic perspective. net neutrality is about the fear that broad band providers will enter into business arrangements that disadvantage certain consent providers, harm competition and tle by leave consumingers and internet users worse off. for example, a broad band provider might enter into an exclusive contact with an online video site to foreclose a rival video site access. this type of potential competitive concern is grounded in antitrust economics and more specifically in the raising rivals cost literature familiar to all students of antitrust. proponents have traditionally standed by favoring a ridge it categorical stand or other

restrictions about their ability to enter into vertical contractual relationships. fearing any they've often argued for a one size fits all approach prohibiting such arrangements this approach hour fails to recognize the fundamental economic point that most vertical contractual relationships benefit consumers. the commission literature is replete with examples and empirical evidence that vertical contracts consumer benefits by preventing free riding. facilitating new business models and aligning manufacturer and consumer incentives. they are passed onto them in the form of lower prices, increases output, higher quality and greater innovation. more over, empeer iskal evidence further supports the view that vertical contracts are more often thanprocompetitive.

the marketplace experience in learning also demonstrates that so called nonneutral business models deployed by providers have proven highly benefital to consumers. in 2002 google was able to achieve economies of scale in a bid to become the default search engine in aol by offering a financial guarantee. to be clear, the evidence does not claim that vertical contracts never create competitive concerns. the correct question is not whether vertical contracts can harm consumers but rather what regulatory structure and legal rules will best promote consumer well fair in contest. any answer to that question must begin with the fundamental observation and market experience that the business practices at the heart of the net neutrality debate have generally been procompetitive. in light of the economic theory

and evidence, antitrusts offers a superior analytical framework one that focuses on consumer well fair to address any concerns in the broad band sector. over the past century antitrust jurisprudence has evolved sophisticated reason when investigating whether rules are anti-competitive in practice. also creating a mean grounded in sound economics and evidence for identifying those contracts that harm consooumers. in closing it's my belief that antitrust offers a superior protection to consumers. thank you. >> thank you. we will now go to consumer mcdowel. >> thank you mr. chair. >> can you turn your microphone on. >> thank you mr. chairman. it's an honor to be back here before your committee here

today. at the outset, i should make clear that diit is my hope that the internet remain open and freedom enhancing since it was privatized in the mid-1990s. as the internet migrated further away from government control, it proliferated beautifully going from just under 90,000 users in the 1980s to 3 billion users today. it is the fastest change in human history was the result of clinton administration's bipartisan policy to keep the government's hands off of the internet sector. in short, the internet is the greatest deregulatory success story of all time in my view. when it comes to the net neutrali neutrality debate, it is important to remember that nothing is broken that needs fixing. the f krshs c cc is pursuing ne

without a comprehensive peer reviewed economic study. if there is systemic market failure, let's discover that through a data driven process. in 2007, federal trade commission examined the market and in an unanimous and bipartisan fashion sound there was no market failure while warning against creating new rules that would produce harmful unintended consequences. instead of making new and untested body of law that would produce uncertainty and potentially