The Political Spectrum

[Commentary] It's deja voodoo all over again at the Federal Communications Commission, where Chairman Kevin Martin is poised to repeat mistakes he made less than six months ago. After trying to rig an auction so Frontline could win, you'd like Chairman Martin would have learned his lesson: It's not the role of regulators to pick winners and losers to achieve their preferred social outcomes. Private competition and the price mechanism can most fairly and efficiently find the best use for scarce spectrum. The FCC's clumsy attempt at social engineering resulted in a failed auction that has prevented otherwise desirable spectrum from being put to commercial use. Alas, Mr. Martin has now proposed another wireless auction for a separate piece of spectrum. And this time he wants to require the winner to offer free Internet access that filters out pornography – conditions that obviously would decrease the value of the license and turn off potential bidders. It just so happens that Mr. Martin's proposed auction seems tailor-made for the business plan put forward by M2Z, another politically connected Silicon Valley start-up looking to enter the wireless broadband telecom market. Martin is violating the public's trust and risking another Frontline fiasco. The FCC's goal should be to reallocate government spectrum for commercial use in the most efficient way possible and for the highest possible yield for taxpayers. Auctions are the best vehicle for achieving this objective, but only if they're open and unencumbered, not rigged to favor the politically connected.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121270792982850259.html?mod=todays_us_op...
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