Motherboard Vice – January 10, 2017
by Sam Gustin & Jason Koebler
Big Telecom’s best friend in Congress just got a very big promotion.
Rep. Marsha Blackburn, the arch-conservative Tennessee Republican who has received mountains of campaign cash from the telecom industry, has been chosen by the GOP to lead a key Congressional subcommittee with broad jurisdiction over cable, phone, and internet issues.
For years, Blackburn has worked tirelessly to undermine pro-consumer policies advanced by the Federal Communications Commission—policies that have invariably been opposed by the very corporate giants that have poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into her campaign coffers. …
“With Blackburn, the myth of Sisyphus comes to mind,” said Christopher Mitchell, Director for Community Broadband Networks at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance and a longtime open internet advocate. “It feels like every time you get used to the challenges we have ahead of us, it gets harder. She’ll do what AT&T and Comcast want, and I’m guessing it’ll be a disaster, and then she’ll have to own it.”
Blackburn’s coziness with the telecom and media industry interests has been well documented.
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