Of Course Verizon Wants Net Neutrality to Go Away

Ross Gianfortune | NextGov | July 5, 2012

One of the more controversial recent network neutrality rules, like campaign finance reform, seeks to balance free speech against fairness and access. On one side, those controlling the networks say that controlling what goes out over broadband is their right under the First Amendment's free speech clause, among other commercial problems. On the other, net neutrality advocates warn that those controlling networks will restrict free speech by suppressing outside voices.

One of those actors controlling broadband networks is Verizon, a company that sued the Federal Communications Commission in October after the agency approved net neutrality in late 2010. Verizon's 116-page brief was filed in federal court this week.

The brief is anything but and lays out the argument against nearly any Internet regulation. On the notion of free speech, Verizon says in its brief that it's been a benevolent ruler of its pipes, but it doesn't necessarily have to be so benevolent...