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>> sharon and golf now faces senate majority leader -- sharon angle now faces senate majority leader, harry reid. a look now at his new campaign ad. >> mr. president, on primary night, i was up very late expressing my gratitude to my supporters in nevada. i congratulated my opponent on the campaign that she ran. she actually came from nowhere to win this election. i extended my appreciation to

her in that regard. >> a few months ago i did not have a job. now all of that has changed. it was like a ton of bricks lifted off my shoulders. what you see your are hundreds of jobs. these solar jobs would not be here with out harry reid. is that simple. >> i am harry reid, and i approve this message. >> coming up on the "the communicators," a perspective on theesec's effort to regulate -- fcc's to regulate broadband services. [captioning erformed by national captiining institute] [captions copyright natiooal cable satellite ccrp. 2010]

>> tomorrow morning, a discussion of president obama's relationships with the progressive and liberal wings of the democratic party. then, what the recent sanctions against iran in for that country's nuclear program and its relations with the rest of the world. after that, the director of the pension benefit guaranty corp. will discuss the federal government's ability to offer federal protection for private plans. that is a 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. with the confirmation hearing for supreme court nominee an elena kagan coming up later this month, this sunday, c-span takes you inside the supreme courr to see public spaces and rarely seen places. hear from the justices as they describe the court, the building

and its history. that is this sunday at 6:30 p.m. eastern, on c-span. >> thursday, bp ceo tunny hayward is scceddled to testify on capitol hill. testify on capitol hill. that will be live at 10:00 a.m. perspectives on an effort by the fcc to regulate broadband services. our guests are walter mccormick and kathy sloan. >> well, as the federal communications commission moves closer to reclassifying

broadband as a telecommunications service, we are joined by two guests who will be discussing hat. walter mccormick is the presideet andcaeo -- and ceo of the telecommunications group. >> we represent the nation puts a broadband service providers. we provide service in urban areas -- nation's broadband service providers. areas and urban areas.rural >> is broadband is reclassified as title ii, what time do you perceive to your member companies? >> broadbent basically has been zoned for enterprise. it has been zoned for

development, and what we have seen our inside ordinary investment in innovation and jobs. -- what we have seen our extraordinary investment in innovation and jobs. this will create a pervasive, economic regulation type of structure that has never been designed in the united states. this was designnd for a monopoly era. it was applied to the old telephone industry when there provider. in return for that, the government per basically -- pervasively regulated the industry. >> but again, what is the harm to your industry? >> it impacts our ability to be able to move quickly and to innovate, and to be able to what t does is create great

regulatory uncertainty, and uncertainty for investors. we have seen that analysts on wall street have cautioned about investor resistance, because they are unsure of what services and businesses the industry will be able to offer or not offer going forward. >> cathy's loan is vice president of the computer information industry association. whattare the benefits in re- regulating broadband services to title ii? >> we represent a diverse array of companies in the cooputer communications industry. microsoft, yahoo.com, oracle, into it, t mobil, facebook.

>> what are the benefits that your member companies would seek broadband is reclassified? >> well, first of all, let me clarify that we are not looking for regulation. our association has been around for 40 years, as long as the internet itself, since before it the breakup of at&t. our members are all business members. they're not nonprofits. they want us to support open systems, open markets, open networks, and competition. i did not mention that we do have smaller companies like data foondry. what we want to see is protection for consummrs and small businesses and nonprofit.

that way they have nondiscriminatory access to the internet for their daily personal business activity. >> in the way that broadband is currentlyyregulated, is there harm to your member companies? >> it is not currently regulated our view is ttat the internet policy statement of 2005, which the former fcc put in place as a consensus move to replace title to let this legislation -- title ii legislation, is what needs to be maintained. used devices of the user's hoenig choosing. a very substantial consensus -- using devices of the user's own

choosing. a very substantial consensus was built around that. we view the telecommunications network that carries the traffi+ on a two weight basis, but the telephone company and the internet's cable companies offer two way access, yes, we do that as a common carrier. >> when mr. mccormick says that the structure is built from the 1930's and monopoly era, do you+ agree that it is outdated for world? >> title ii completely survived the massive update that was the communications act of 1996. at the signing, president

clinton and vice president gore talked about the information superhighway. everybody knew, the legislators knew, thaa advanced services was the way things were going. they were hoping that they would get more local competition. they were replacing anti-trust restrictions on the bell ccmpanies with regulatory provisions that would promote competition. the fact remains todayy that in most markets around the u.s., we monopoly, although some are, for march typically a duopoly -- but more typically a duopoly for wireless internet access. >> in 1934 the government decided to regulate the telephone industry.

it said to the telephone industry, you shall have a monopoly. in return for that, you shall not have competition, but you shall have regulation. later, congress said, you shall no longer have a monopoly, but you will be freed froo regulation since there will be competition. that has resulted in enormous consumer choice. 95% is covered in america with broadband ccess. no company in the industry has 3 our entire industry has only a 43% share internet access market.

typically, antitrust standards are when companies reached 70%- 80% share, they are a monopoly. our whole industry has share. microsoft, one company, has over 90% internet share. google has a 7% share of search the most competitive part of the eco system, the place where the consumer has the greatest joys is with regard to internet access. -- greatest choice is with regard to internet access. what we are suggesting is that there is no problem that requires a kind of pervasive

regulation that was aimed at a time when our industry was insulated from competition, because what we have our statistics showing that 91% of consumers are satisfied with their internet access. the consumers have -- 80% of consumers can choose between six providers, and 90% can choose from among five wireless providers. at this time we think, do not oppose stifling regulations on an area of the economy that ii creating jobs and providing innovation for the united states economy. >> fcc chairman has says that he only wants to use six of the regulations under title ii. that is all he is proposing to impose on broadband providers.

>> the first of those regulations in 201 section, that says -- first of those regulations is section 201, which is the most pervasive grant of economic regulatory authority that has ever been granted in the united states, monopoly environment. do you see broadband as a common carrier? >> know. no. >> why? >> because broadband is designed as a competittve business. a broad band offering involves a combination of the transmission

components, the address abilitt function, and a variety of other services such as fire walls and protection frommviruses. this is a different animal than the kind of components that were available for voice telephone services. >> most consumers and small businesses today look to their cable or telephone internet access provider for connection to the internet. once online, we can select forum -- we can select from a multitude of services. it is true that the cable and telephone companies provide some of theirs of their own, which is another competitive auction, but we cannot get to all of the other application services and content except by using a cable

or telephone internet access provider. with the exception of wireless. but even though a lot of american households have dumped their wireline and telephones, nobody has dumped their wireline internet connections in favor of mobile. in fact, in the future that may be the case. the thing about section 201, in fact, many of the smaller rural telephone companies operate under title ii today, even though they also offer broadband. many cellular providers are title ii carriers. back to your question, what ii the big problem?

>> we are not opposed to anyone choosing to operate under whatever regulatory environment they want to. in a competitive market, people should be able to choose their wireless service offering. but what we have here is a lack of any ssstem that requires this kind of government intervention. we have a variety of interest saying that the fcc is pursuing the wrong approach. theemajority of the congress has said nottto do it. the opinion on wall street is not to do this. as "the washington post," the chicago tribune and," and "the wall street journal," are saying that this is a bad idea.

we are driving the kind of gdp growth that the nation needs, and we now have the fcc coming forward with a proposal to create such uncertainty, that it throws a chill over a lot of economic activity. >> the comcast case ruled that the fcc approach to enforcing policy does not fly from a legal standpoint. we are in a situation now where consumers are without recourse if their internet access provider should slow, block or degrade their service or intrude on their privacy, or charged double what their neighbor pays for the same service, even cuts of their service entirely. they are without any basic rules

of the road over provisioning that telecommunications link on a nondiscriminatory basis. internet users have no with title i, and part of tttled ii, so the consumers have some reassurance that they can continue their online activity without regard to the preferencee of their provider. >> does your association think that broadband services should be priced reeulated? >> and no, we do not. there are some public service organizations that believe there should be rate regulation as well as wholesale internet requirement like they have in france and the united kingdom.

we are an open system with open government, free competition and a little red -- nd as little regulation as possible, but we believe that title ii of-light would be the best solution. i have described the problem of consumers aving absoluteey no recourses under current law. the internet policy statement is unenforceable, and there is -pnothing else. , the oneof wall street' area where the telephone companies have the greatest certainty is that there is no their massive market dominance. now, it is true, they do not have nationwide market shares, carved up. at&t do -- at&t and a rise and

do not challenge each other in their wireline services and -- at&t and verizon do not challenge each other in their wireline serviceeareas. companies like t mobil and sprint have to rely on networks from their largest competitors for a lot of their transport. mark my words, no third network is going to be built. it has not happened anywhere in+ the world because of economics. >> i would say that there is no problem at this time there reqqires government intervention. we believe peopll should continue to have the freedom to access and the website, run any application, run any lawful device. there is no complaint today that

would bar any of that. the only real complaints relate to google, facebooo, the dominant market shares that those companies enjoy in the market, and under this proposal, there is absolutely no authority being granted to regulate the prrvacy concerns of the consumers have bout those kind3 we hhve been supportiie of congress updating the law, taking a look at this air net ecosystem, making sure that the fcc has the authority to guarantee consumers the freedom that they want to use, but to do it in a way that empowers the consumer. make sure the consumer is safe when he or she loses the internet -- uses the internet, and that the consumer has the ability to decide what information will be shared with >> our guest represents the

telecom corp. our other guest represents companies such as google, facebook, microsoft. you mentioned congress. do you see a vacuum right now in telecommunications law or regulation, and do you think it is time to update the 1996 telecommunications act, the 1930's telecommunications act for the current environment? >> yes, we support an updating of the law. the internet was not really the subject of the 1996 act. that was largely about competition in voice communications. as i said before, to use the internet, you need to have an operating system, a processor, a browser, a search engine.

the concerned consumers today have a really relate to their freedoms on the internet, their safety in using the internet, and the protection of their privacy rights with regard to the internet. the fcc does not have authority in those areas. they have not been approaching the internet as an ecosystem. their authority relates commletely to communication by radio or wire. it does not relate to these larger issues that are now involved. communications by wire or radial includes regulation on such things, historically, as customer proprietary network information. those are rules having to do with what information about the customer, a telephone customer's conversations or whatever, could

be used by the telephone companies. it issa fallacy to say that only website like google and facebook -- it is a fallacy to say that those are the only businesses about which consumers are concerned about their privacy. it is the fact that%internet access providers, be they telephone or cable, have access to information about every activity that a consumer pursues on line, whether it is their e-mail or if they're searching or whatever. the fcc does have the jurisdiction over network-level privacy.. there are all kinds of other rules that apply to what privacy rights users have, and how much

government has access to that information. >> in fact, in your brief to the ftc, you said that the commission should require that all two-way communications services must be made available on a stand-alone basis. why do you include that? >> because the dominant market position that the internet access providers have, which affects individual geographic markets when you're choosing your cable company or your telephone company for your wireless internet access, because of that duopoly market power, it is too likely that a company well bart video -- moreau video content with their own internet access, and difficult to reach competing

access. if your internet access provider is comcast, there is no law preventing them from prioritizing nbc programming and making it difficult for you to access other content. >> dooyou think there is a vacuum in telecommunications regulation, and should congress a step in at this point? >> yes, there is a vacuum, caused by the comcast case. and yes, the f c s. c needs to deal with at -- the fcc needs to deal with that, because consumers and small businesses have no recourse. but congress should update the telecommunications act again. we know from experience that does not happen overnight. it doesn't happen in two years. so, they need to get going, because right now there are no legislative proposals out there that would comprehensively%+

-pupdate the policy. >> how does a net neutrality play into this scheme? >> network neutrality is a different animal with different people. in europe, it sometimes has a little bit more to do with whether the monopoly telecom's want to let the government get into the act of regulating content. but our overarching principle and belief, both for the united states and internationallyy is that no government or private company should be a gatekeeper for its citizens or its customers, in terms of their online activity.3 anybody having the ability to be a gatekeeper. i think the solution basically is regulate you, but do not regulate me. we believe, that as the fcc