The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) today voted to stop Comcast from blocking legal file-sharing activities on its network as a violation of the FCC's net neutrality principles.

The fact that the FCC felt they had sufficient grounds to hold Comcast accountable shows how egregious the violation was, as the FCC's principles are weak and it has given itself limited enforcement capacity.

It is unclear at this time if Comcast will be fined, but at the very least they must stop blocking peer-to-peer traffic and disclose the methods it uses for "network management."

Last week, Matt Stoller posted a blog at Open Left that made the rounds far and wide announcing that every major Democratic challenger candidate for the US Senate supports net neutrality. He also posted statements from many other players in the political arena supporting net neutrality, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Adam Green of MoveOn.org, labor leaders and others.

But before this gets framed as a "lefty" issue, I would like to take some time to point out supporters of net neutrality who are NOT Democrats or liberals.

A newly-released survey from the non-partisan Pew Internet & American Life Project indicates that Americans are using the internet more than ever before to get diverse sources of information to make political decisions.

The article on Wired notes, "The survey found that the internet is becoming an increasing part of the norm of political participation -- people are  using it to read the news, share their views, or to participate in some  other process to get others to take political action. "

But how would this be impacted by the loss of net neutrality?

Common Cause continues its efforts to hold power accountable.

Abuse of Power: Forging the Path to Recovery

Common Cause hosted a distinguished panel on June 10 to discuss the widespread abuse of power engaged in by the current Administration. The Administration has disregarded the rule of law through over-broad assertions of executive power, abuse of signing statements, and policies that arguably flout the Constitution regarding interrogation, detention, and intelligence gathering. The Congress has repeatedly failed to perform its constitutionally mandated oversight duties in each of these areas.

The panelists were charged with examining these disturbing trends and with considering how best to restore the constitutional constraints that have served our country well since its inception.

It's Saturday morning in Minneapolis at the National Conference for  Media Reform. I am sitting in a large auditorium as our President, Bob Edgar moderates a panel about privacy in the digital age.

One of the key issues we are discussing is the domestic wiretapping program by the Bush administration. One of the things to know is that the government using private companies to spy on the public is nothing new. Lillie Coney of the Electronic Privacy Information Center pointed out that the government worked with Western Union to spy on telegraph communications as far back as the US Civil War.

Just because it has been done before, doesn't mean it's ok.

In today's world, so much more information is available to those who would keep tabs on us. Because of the internet, phones, credit cards, grocery store cards and other things we use every day, the government and corporations can amass information about our daily activities in ways they never before could.

This means it is all the more important today to fight for our right of privacy.

Common Cause will continue to fight against the abuse of power and violations of our rights as citizens.

It's Friday morning at the National Conference for Media Reform and I have just set up the info table we are sharing with LCCR. Free Press has done a wonderful job getting people to this event, and they expect over 3000 attendees over the weekend.

This has drawn the interest of Bill O'Reilly, who thinks everyone here is a kook, and has dispatched a film crew to try to find a few kooks and then air them on his show to say that everyone who cares about media reform is a kook. Cute.

There are a lot of Common Cause folks here at the conference. Staff, volunteers, state board members, and Bob Edgar.

Last night, Bob gave a rousing speech at the Claim Democracy event at the Hilton, reminding all the 400 or so people in attendance that we are now all part of a movement with different elements. It's no longer good enough to be just a member of an organization, but we all need to be part of a broader movement that organizations are one element of. After he was done, Democracy Now's Amy Goodman gave a fantastic and inspiring speech about the role of the media in our democracy (among other things).

Well, now I have to go network and learn a few things. more to come.

I am currently in the land of 10,000 lakes (Minnesota) for the National Conference for Media Reform.

I will be moderating a breakout session on regional organizing. Several other Common Cause staff and volunteers will be doing the same for other regions. Bob Edgar will be moderating a panel discussion on privacy in the digital age. This panel will enlighten audience members about numerous issues with technological infringements of our privacy, but in particular the issue of the Bush administration's domestic spying program and telecom immunity. This is just one more piece of why Common Cause is developing an "Abuse of Power" campaign.

The conference is going to cover scores of issues around media justice, and I will try to report back regularly with what I have learned and experienced here.

Today there is a pre-conference event we have helped organize called "Democracy Day". I will attend at least part of this event and possibly more of the pre-conference events.

So stay tuned! More to come. Film at 11. (not really, but there might be some photos).

Today in Congress, the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet held a hearing on HR 5353, the "Internet Freedom Preservation Act". This is the bill that would make Net Neutrality the law in America.

Network Neutrality -- or "Net Neutrality" for short -- is the guiding principle that preserves the free and open Internet.

Put simply, Net Neutrality means no discrimination. Net Neutrality prevents Internet providers from speeding up or slowing down Web content based on its source, ownership or destination.

Net Neutrality is the reason why the Internet has driven economic innovation, democratic participation, and free speech online. It protects the consumer's right to use any equipment, content, application or service on a non-discriminatory basis without interference from the network provider. With Net Neutrality, the network's only job is to move data -- not choose which data to privilege with higher quality service.