November 2017

The Schools, Health & Libraries Broadband (SHLB) Coalition along with 35 health care providers and telehealth networks from across the country sent a letter to Congressional leaders today asking them to support an increase in funding for the Federal Communications Commission’s Rural Health Care (RHC) program. “This is a life and death issue for Rural America,” said John Windhausen, Executive Director of the SHLB Coalition.

On October 17, President Donald Trump launched a vague, yet ominous Twitter-driven attack on NBC, rhetorically asking, “With all of the Fake News coming out of NBC and the Networks, at what point is it appropriate to challenge their License?  Bad for country!” The short answer to the President’s question is “never.”  A slightly longer answer is that there is no license to challenge and, even if there were, no broadcaster should worry that its license would ever be in jeopardy because of disagreement with its programming. [Andrew Jay Schwartzman]

The House Antitrust Subcommittee took a whack at the Federal Communications Commission's network neutrality rules Nov 1, specifically the role of antitrust law in governing broadband access provider conduct. That came as FCC Chairman Ajit Pai is expected to circulate an order rolling back Title II classification of ISPs as early as later in Nov. It also came at about the same time that the FCC Democrats went to Capitol Hill to push back on that Pai proposal.