TUESDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2010


Hands off tomorrow’s Internet


BY MEREDITH ATTWELL BAKER O


n Tuesday, in a party-line vote, the three Democratic commissioners of the Federal Communications Commis-


sion (FCC) will adopt “net neutrality” rules. The rules will give government, for the


first time, a substantive role in how the Internetwill be operated andmanaged, how broadband services will be priced and struc- tured, and potentially how broadband net- works will be financed. By replacingmarket forces and technological solutions with bu- reaucratic oversight, wemay see an Internet future not quite as bright as we need, with less investment, less innovation and more congestion. Discouragingly, the FCC is intervening to


regulate the Internet because itwants to, not because it needs to. Preserving the openness and freedom of the Internet is non-negotia- ble; it is a bedrock principle shared by all in the Internet economy. No government ac- tion is necessary to preserve it. Acting only on speculative concerns about network op- erators and contrary to a decade of industry practice, the FCC is moving forward aggres- sively without real evidence of systemic competitive harms to cure,markets to fix or consumers to help. Given these conditions, I do not believe it


is appropriate for unelected FCC officials to make a decision with such potential long- term consequences for the Internet econo- my, for high-paying jobs and for the nation’s global competitiveness without explicit di- rection fromCongress. One of my principal misgivings about the


FCC’s approach is that it fails to confront in a forthright manner the substantial risk that this action may distort the future of the Internet. The FCC is focused on how broad- band networks are managed and operated today. I am worried about the Internet of tomorrow. The Internet remains a very new technol-


ogy and economy.We are at the beginning of a period of dramatic technological change. Aswe increasingly rely upon the Internet for nearly everything we do, the exploding demands of consumers and businesses are challenging innovators and investors to


Whyis theFCCrushing to intervene in the one sector of the economy that is working so well?


respond with new technologies, products and services. A great amount of experimen- tation continueswith businessmodels, busi- ness relationships, customer usage patterns and expectations. By locking in today’s Internet, the FCC may inhibit the ability of networks to freely innovate and experiment, to seek out the differentiation that breeds opportunity and consumer choice. The risk of government censure will unmistakably chill new developments, including those developments that would be pro-consumer and pro-competition. All of this can have real consequences.


Efforts to ensure that all Americans have access to broadband service would be put at risk. Efforts to get the third of American households that do not subscribe to online broadband service to do so will be chal- lenged.Affordability concernswill bemagni- fied by forcing more of the network invest- ment cost onto consumers. And consumers and entrepreneurs will be affected if net- work upgrades and improvements are de- layed or forgone, aswill their ability to create or use the next great application or service. I keep returning to what should be a


threshold question: Why does the FCC plan to intervene in a rushedmanner, days before the year’s end, in the one sector of the economy that is working so well to create consumer choice, jobs and entrepreneurial opportunity? Until we can answer that, I hope my colleagues will stand down and allow Congress to take the lead on these issues. The Internetwill be open onWednes- day with or without our action; we have the time to do it right.


The writer, a Republican, is an FCC commissioner. MICHAELGERSON


Beyond Kissinger’s realism E


arly in his service as President Nix- on’s national security adviser,Henry Kissinger paid a visit to his home-


land. TheWest German government sug- gested to the press that Kissinger intend- ed to visit some relatives. “What the hell are they putting out?” Kissinger vented to his aides. “My relatives are soap.” Blunt, and true. Kissinger had left Ger-


many in August 1938 as a 15-year-old refugee, three months before Kristall- nacht. His granduncle, three aunts and other relatives were murdered in the Holocaust. So it is appalling to hear Kissinger, an


epic life later, telling Nixon on a scratchy recording from March 1, 1973: “Let’s face it: The emigration of Jews from the Soviet Union is not an objective of American foreign policy. And if they put Jews into gas chambers in the SovietUnion, it is not anAmerican concern. Itmay be a humani- tarian concern.” Some commentators have attempted to


provide a psychological explanation for this incident, having to do with the strug- gles of a Jew in an anti-Semitic White House. But this effort is not necessary. Kissinger’s words were not the expression of a quirk but of an argument. In 1969, he had publicly declared: “We will judge


other countries, including communist countries,onthe basis of their actions, not on the basis of their domestic ideologies.” This is a common assertion of a school of foreign policy called “realism” —that only the external behavior of regimes really matters, that their internal conduct does not concern American interests. It is a view currently popular, even ascendant, among foreign-policy thinkers. Kissinger was merely being unsentimental in its application. In response to the recent release of the recording, Kissinger said his words “must be viewed in the context of the time.” That context was a debate over the Jackson- Vanik Amendment of 1974. The Soviet government—which both practiced anti- Semitism and resented the brain drain of Jewish departures — had imposed heavy fines on emigres. Sen.Henry Jackson and Rep. Charles Vanik, supported by Ameri- can Jewish groups, responded with legis- lation that linked normal trade relations with the Soviet Union (and other “non- market” economies) to the freedom to emigrate. Kissinger believedthatdetente with the


Soviet Union was of overriding impor- tanceandthathumanrights issues should only be raised quietly, on an unrelated


KLMNO RICHARDCOHEN Not his corps competency


calledPreacherandanother calledBrooklyn(whowaskilled shortly after receiving a salami fromhome), no blacks and, of course, an officer who was good-looking and clearly a white Anglo-Saxon Prot- estant of the JohnWayne variety. Now, of course, we would have to add a gay soldier. I fear for him.He’ll need someone towatch his back. The repeal of the odi-


I


ous “don’t ask, don’t tell” law has been 17 years in the making. It could have been done much sooner had it not been for the political coward- ice and/or ignorance of much of Congress and some of themilitary. The nation as a whole was way out in front of these institutions, having learned from their own kids and society in gen- eral that gays and lesbi- ans were not drooling pervertsbuthumanbeingswithadifferent— notbetterand notworse—sexuality.Most of us knowthis now. There’s good reason to believe, however, that this lesson


ama fanof the oldWorldWar IImovies, the oneswhere


the platoon was composed of typical Americans,Holly- wood-style. There was a guy named Farmer and one


harassmentwill occur, abuseswill be committed and,more innocently, plain hooking up is going to happen.We know this. Butwe knowalso that this can bemanaged—contained,


limited. It takes education. It takes training. It takes leadership.This iswhat concernsme aboutAmos.His views are on the record. He sees gays as somewhat out of control, possibly holding hands in com- bat, sneaking into one another’s bunks at night, being distracted just as the enemy is coming over the hill. Not only is this silly and based on an ignorant misconception of who most gays are, but it can be dealtwith. Amos, though, is the


CHIP SOMODEVILLA/GETTY IMAGES


Marine Corps CommandantGen. James Amos testifies before a Senate panel this month.


wrongman to dealwith it. His subordinates know what he thinks of gays. They know he has not an iota of sympathy for what might be their difficulties or any toler- ance for their lifestyle. If Iweregay, Iwouldnot


want to work for the man — or serve under him. He is one step short of being a bigot. The racial desegregation of the military in 1948 also


hasnotbeenuniversally learned. Inthe run-upto the vote in the Senate, Gen. James Amos, the Marine Corps comman- dant, showed how he felt about the prospect of open homosexuals serving in the Marines. He was particularly concerned about combat situationswhere, he thought, gays might be “a distraction.” “Mistakes and inattention or distractions costMarines’ lives,”Amos said.Thiswasnot the first time the general had expressed his doubts. Earlier, he hadtalkedaboutwhatmighthappenwhenhisMarineswere “laying out, sleeping alongside of one another and sharing death, fear and loss of brothers. I don’t knowwhat the effect of thatwill be oncohesion. Imean, that’swhatwe’re looking at. It’s unit cohesion. It’s combat effectiveness.” It’s easy to dismiss Amos, but his concerns fallwithin the


realmofpossibility.Afterall,beinggayisasexualmatterand young people are nothing if not sexual. This is the way it is supposedto be.This is also theproblemwithhavingwomen in the armed services or, if you are a radical feminist, having men. Sooner or later, a certain amount of unacceptable


EUGENEROBINSON Obama’s victory lap P


residentObamamust be tempted to respond to his progressive crit- ics with a quote from the old-


school rapper Kool Moe Dee: “How ya likemenow?” Repeal of the military’s bigoted and


anachronistic“don’task,don’t tell”poli- cy on gays in themilitary—a campaign promise that seemed to be slipping out of reach — doesn’t fullymend the rela- tionship betweenObama and theDem- ocratic Party’s liberal wing. But it’s a pretty terrific start. Progressives needed a clear, unam-


biguousvictorytoeasethestingof those extended tax cuts for the rich. They got one Saturday with the Senate’s historic vote to end “don’t ask, don’t tell”—and Obama won vindication for the slow, patient, step-by-step approach that drovegayandlesbianactivists crazybut ultimatelyproduceda stunning result. Administration officials believed


from the beginning that getting the discriminatory policy repealed, and al- lowing homosexuals to serve openly in the armed forces,would require getting the Pentagon brass on board. Themili- tary leadership had to support the change, or at least accept it. Otherwise, repeal-minded members of Congress might balk at casting a vote that could be portrayed as somehow weakening America’sdefense. So the White House spent months


demonstrating that Defense Secretary Robert Gates fully endorsed the end of “don’t ask, don’t tell” and that the ser- vice chiefs would implement the change. A key part of this painstaking strategy was the Pentagon’s 10-month study of the impact of eliminating the


policy — which concluded, essentially, that there was likely to be no adverse impact. The study included a military-wide


survey, which found that two-thirds of service members believed ending the policy would have positive, mixed or neutral effects. Perhaps more signifi- cant was the study’s description of the experience of theBritish,Canadian and Australian militaries, which changed their rules and allowed gays and lesbi- ans to serve openly. What happened? Nothing at all. “Uniformly, these nations reported


that they were aware of no units that had a degradation of cohesion or com- bat effectiveness, and that the presence ofgaymenandlesbians incombatunits hadnotbeenraisedasanissuebyanyof their units deployed in Iraq orAfghani- stan,” the study reports. None of those other nations had problems with re- cruitingor retention,either.Thechange turnedout to be anon-issue. Opponents of ending “don’t ask,


don’t tell,” including Sen. JohnMcCain, had insisted that Congress not act until the Pentagon study was completed. Whenit finally cameout, theypromptly began moving the goal posts, demand- ing yetmore hearings and testimony. It looked as if they were going to run out the clockandleave the issue for thenew Congress, which will be far more con- servative. But then Joe Lieberman and Susan


Collins came to the rescue. I’ve been sharply critical of Lieber-


man in the past, and I suspect I’ll have occasion to be equally critical in the future. But on “don’t ask, don’t tell,” he


was pure gold. Sometimes it seems as if Lieberman, who serves as an indepen- dent, delights in driving liberal Demo- crats crazy, but on social issues he still has a righteous sense of fairness and justice.Hiswell-established record as a hawk onmilitarymatters gave himthe credibility to push this change — and push it he did, even when all seemed lost. AndasforCollins, I’vewonderedhow


shecanbecalleda“moderate”whenshe reliably stands with the archconserva- tive, down-with-the-president GOP leadership in the Senate, especially on important procedural votes. But she wasbrave andprincipledon“don’t ask,” and by linking arms with Lieberman she allowed seven otherRepublicans to cast their votes on the correct side of history. Now that Congress has acted, the


military will move with caution to im- plement the change. Judging by what has happened in other countries that took this step, however, the processwill probably move much faster than any- oneexpects.Ayear fromnow,we’llallbe wonderingwhat the bigdealwas. For gays and lesbians currently serv-


ing in the military, this doesn’t mean they necessarily have to make public their sexuality. It just means that soon theywon’thavetofearbeingdischarged for beingwho they are. And for President Obama and the


left, this is an importantmilestone—a reminder that even in dysfunctional Washington, what Sarah Palin derided as “that hopey-changey stuff” can still produce realhope andchange. eugenerobinson@washpost.com


produced much blather about unit cohesion. It is true, of course, that race isnot about behavior, but it is also true that race is obvious, spottedclear across a room—or adancehall or a noncommissioned officers club — and can produce a violent reaction. (Remember, the South was still an apart- heidnationbackthen.)Themilitarymanagedbecauseitwas commandedtocomply.The leadershipcame fromPresident Truman.He liked to have his orders followed. The Marines of today know that virtually the entire


RepublicanParty stoodupforbigotry.TheCorpsknows that some important senators — John McCain and Jon Kyl, to name two—furiously fought toretainthe statusquo, always in the sainted cause of unit cohesion. (Kyl said repeal could “cost lives.”)Marines know, too, that insurveys, those onthe front lines are least supportive of having gays among them, andthey are alsoaware that theirbrass fought tokeep“don’t ask, don’t tell.” The issue for me, as for Gen. Amos, is unit cohesion. That’swhy he has to go.


cohenr@washpost.com


EZ RE


A19 ANNEAPPLEBAUM


Belarus, careening to the East


O


n Sunday, the nation of Belarus held presidential elections. On Sunday evening, the police offi-


cers of Belarus handed out their verdict. By midnight, tens of thou- sands of people had been chased out of the main square in central Minsk, hundredshadbeen arrestedandhun- dreds more severely beaten. Young people limped away from demonstra- tions with broken arms, bloody heads. Seven out of nine Belarusan presidential candidates were in jail. One of them, Vladimir Neklyayev, was beaten unconscious and then dragged away from the hospital, wrapped in blankets. As of this writ- ing, he is still missing, locked up in an unknown location. Police arrested journalists, too, breaking into offices and shutting down their operations. Later, they also arrested artists and actors at home. Just for good measure, cyber police also shut down Web sites and social networking sites — Twitter, Facebookandtheir Belarusan equiva- lents—and blocked access to foreign sites that carriednewsof the events in Minsk. Borrowing tactics from their counterparts down the road in Mol- dova, Belarusan special forces — still known, creepily, as theKGB—appar- ently sent in thugs to join the Election Day demonstrations, break windows in the parliament and throw stones, the better to justify the crackdown. All in all, it was a stunning display


of the regime’s weakness: Indeed, the violence that unfolded in the wake of Alexander Lukashenko’s fourth presi- dential election “victory” can only be explained as a sign of the Belarusan dictator’s failure. After the polls closed, Lukashenko claimed to have received nearly80percent of the vote. But politicians who are that popular have no need to beat, arrest and harass their opponents, send provo- cateurs into a crowd or shut down Web sites. And indeed, Lukashenko’s true


support is thought to be rather lower than 80 percent. Belsat — a Polish- based television station that broad- casts into Belarus—reckons Lukash- enko’s actual support is closer to 30 percent, based on polls taken over several months.Someother outsiders put the number at 38 percent, but either number explains why reports of electoral fraud are widespread, why observers were not allowed to observe the counting, why the state- runmediaconcentrated90percent of its attention on Lukashenko and why Radio Free Europe began to collect reports of discrepancies so early in the day. It also explains why truck- loads of riot police were sent out to wait for demonstrators in central Minsk before they even arrived. Under these circumstances, Lu- kashenko’s “victory” also means that — after a long flirtation with the liberal West and the authoritarian East — the Belarusan dictator has made his choice. Last month, the foreign ministers of Germany and Poland (yes, I am married to the latter) went toMinsk with an offer: In exchange for free elections, the Euro- peanUnion offered a major aid pack- age, more open borders, and the potential for a deeper economic and political relationship. Since then, however, Lukashenko has repaired his skittish relationship with the Kremlin and signed a oil deal with Moscow, ensuring that his country’s old economic model remains at least partly intact. For much of the past decade, Belarus has imported cheap oil from Russia, exported more ex- pensive oil and oil products else- where, and has thus kept its budget balanced and its politicians rich.Now the deal is less favorable, but it’s still better than anything Belarus could get on the open market. And that, for the moment, is it.


diplomatic track. “The Jewish community in this country, on that issue,” he told Nixon, “is behaving unconscionably. It’s behaving traitorously.” But Jackson-Vanik turned out to be a


pivot point in the ColdWar. Afteraninitial drop in emigration, the legislation exerted two decades of pressure on Soviet leaders, eventually resulting in higher emigration levels. It pressed one of the West’s most powerful ideological advantages against the Soviet Union by demonstrating the weakness of a system that must build walls to keep its people from fleeing. This emphasis on human rights inspired not only Jewish refuseniks but other groups andnationalities that inhabited the Soviet prison. Jackson-Vanik was both a rejection of


Kissinger’s realism and a preview of Rea- ganism. It asserted that oppressive re- gimes are more likely to threaten their neighbors, placing human rights nearer the center of American interests. It elevat- ed standards of human dignity that were direct threats to regimes premised on their denial. Henry Kissinger is not a simple villain,


because he is not a simple anything. Complexity is his creed. In other circum- stances, he was a friend to the state of


Israel. He skillfully navigated a difficult patch in the ColdWar. In later writings, he has recognized the role of idealism in sustaining American global engagement. This 37-year-old quote does not charac-


terize an entire career. But it illustrates the narrowness of foreign policy realism. It has a sadly limited view of power, discounting American ideological advan- tages in global ideological struggles. Realists often hold a simplistic view of


great-power relations, asserting that any humanitarian pressure on Russia or Chi- na will cause the whole edifice of global order to crumble. This precludes the pos- sibility ofamature relationship with other nations in which America both stands for its values and pursues common interests. And from this historical episode, it is


clear that repeated doses of foreign policy realism can deaden the conscience. In President Nixon’s office, a lack of human sentiment was viewed as proof of mental toughness — an atmosphere that dimin- ished the office itself. Realists are often dismissive of Manichean distinctions be- tween good and evil, light and darkness. But in the world beyond good and evil, some may be lightly consigned to the gas chambers.


michaelgerson@washpost.com


Statements will be issued, sanctions might be declared. Lukashenko could have a hard time getting a visa to Berlin or London. But in truth, the West has fewcarrots to offer unpopu- lar dictators—even unpopular dicta- tors who share borders with Europe — other than free trade and the long-term possibility of integration and economic growth. European for- eign ministers cannot guarantee Lu- kashenko personal wealth. They can- not offer corrupt oil deals. They can talk about “freedom” — and they did — but they have to compete with others who talk about “the Chinese model,” who offer more predictable forms of job security and who aren’t bothered by a few arrests. On the Monday morning after the police attack on the opposition, the Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev, de- clared that the elections were Belar- us’s “internal affair.” This, then, is what the “decline of


the West” looks like in the eastern half of Europe: TheUnited States and Europe, out of money and out of ideas, scarcely fund the Belarusan opposition. Russia, flush with oil money once again, has agreed to back Lukashenko and fund his regime. Let’s hope it costs them a lot more than they expect. applebaumletters@washpost.com


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