This Just In! More Money, More Money – Yeah!

Ho! Ho! Ho! Ooops. I meant Happy Birthday! …to TOCC TV that is. I was gettin’ so busy with my write-in campaign for Senate, that I completely over-looked the 20th birthday of TOCC TV on October 22nd. Feel free to make a website donation in lieu of a regular birthday present. The donation button is in the sidebar at right.

TAX CUTS
And so, today’s composition is actually something of a wrap-up of recent events, especially noting today’s passage of the sweeping tax cuts bill. I already said, I want to believe, and I’m willing give Trump and the Republican’s some time and a wait and see attitude as to whether the cuts really will benefit the middle class and working people.

In truth, the tax cuts are monumental, and I think it is possible that they will transcend the anemic “trickle down” of Ronald Reagan. And the fact is, we’ve suffered enormously because of NAFTA and GAFTA with tons of American business going over seas for better deals. We can’t force business to do business in the United States. Bringing that business back to the shores of the United States should have an exponential effect on the so-called trickle down economics, creating more jobs and jobs competition and potentially raising wages in general, and then pumping even more discretionary spending into the economy. It can work. We will see. The bottom line is no jobs is no good for nobody.

NET NEUTRALITY
However, Trump has made a huge error, maybe his biggest and most telling, by allowing the FCC to abandon net neutrality. I think Trump may not realize how ingrained and essential an open Internet is in our economy. I’ve read the reports of worst case scenarios and, unfortunately, I come to the conclusion that they are not hypothetical but will actually come to fruition, if slowly, over time.

Ending net neutrality could be compared to allowing public utility companies to charge extra high rates in wealthy neighborhoods while denying electric service to poor neighborhoods who couldn’t afford to pay as much. Mr. Trump, the Internet is bigger than you think. It’s a grand scheme, it my opinion, that essentially is based on providing a monopoly to Mainstream Media. WTF Trump? Why are you rewarding purveyors of “fake news?”

SWINDLER’S LIST
It’s possible that 80% or more of all websites could be made to disappear as a result of what amounts to a state sponsored monopoly. The websites in that lower tier, like TOCC TV, don’t have much traffic compared to the big media guys, but if you eliminate 80% of “not much” it adds up to big gains for a few. It’s even possible that you could end up unable to access your own bank if it isn’t on the “Swindler’s List” for the Internet. And what about email that might not fly across provider demarcation lines? It could even be the beginning of the end for Fb & Twitter, because I assure you I will NEVER pay for either, and when you loose half your friends – the party is over.

It will cost the average American with defacto censorship of alternative news and views. And, what about education? Will poor school districts have to abandon Internet access because “bundled” information packages are too expensive – except for the kids in the district that can still afford the “electric lights?” Even if schools are able to access basic information, there won’t be a substitute for the wealth of information from a plethora of sources and perspectives on every subject imaginable. Do we really want to live with the draconian, unenlightened constraints of the dark ages?

I can even see back-peddling in several areas that might actually include shifting business back to the Post Office, brick and mortar bookstores, and brick and mortar record stores, and even brick and mortar video stores. (I can even envision a total collapse of the Internet.) There’s a lot of business now conveniently conducted on the Internet. The bottom line is that what might even benefit a few on the back on the back-end, would actually result in less, more clunky, and more expensive – whatever it is.

Methinks that we must, and we will, reconsider this foolish, shortsighted, mistake. Mr. Trump, 80% of American’s are in favor of net neutrality. Don’t you think it’s in your best interest, and the best interest of your second term, to reevaluate this mistake while it’s still on your watch? Methinks it is.