SandersForPresident

https://berniesanders.com/issues/high-speed-internet-all/

The Sanders internet policy statement starts with a strong statement about creating publicly owned and operated internet services:

• Provide $150 billion through the Green New Deal in infrastructure grants and technical assistance for municipalities and/or states to build publicly owned and democratically controlled, co-operative, or open access broadband networks.

Then, there is discussion about regulating the private ISPs:

• Appoint members of the FCC who will use Title II authority to promote competition, choice, and affordability for broadband service.

The ideas seem conflicting. Is that because there must be a transition from private control to public control?

"Bernie will provide the necessary funding for states, cities, and co-ops to build out their own broadband networks, and ensure all households are connected by the end of his first term."  

Ultimately, the only competition would be between co-ops and the respective state or municipality, and that would probably be low intensity. Doesn't the funding effort preclude all the points about regulating the private interests? Is it difficult to close all loopholes for private interests to block federal funding and dominate public interests? Can this Sanders policy be highjacked and "public" internet providers made subservient to private interests? I'm thinking of how USPS has been under attack, made to fund pensions 75 years in advance, and rendered as an asset to Amazon, while expanding opportunity for private couriers.

Maybe provisions to promote, protect, and sustain co-ops should be written-in to this and other policies at this point. I hope so, and I hope many will help develop co-op related policies for progressive campaigns going forward.