The FCC is holding an open commission meeting today, so let's all call them up 1.888.CALL.FCC to tell them not to junk net neutrality regulations that let us, and not some corporation, decide where we want to go on the internet. The FCC's new Chair, Ajit Pai, has said that net neutrality's "days are numbered," and when good Americans across the political spectrum would rather have their internet the way it is than have it be like cable TV, you have to wonder why he says that like it's a good thing. Nah, just kidding: he says it like that because he only talks to other corporatists, and not to regular Americans. That's why we're calling, because we're regular Americans, and we don't want an internet so full of pop-up ads we stop using the internet. Now that I think of it, that's probably a good way to put it to the FCC: the more they try to "monetize" the internet, by letting corporations determine where we go and what we do, the less we'll use the internet, and the less money they'll all make. And we'll all be less free, of course.
Meanwhile, the Tennessee state Senate has now postponed its vote on SB 127 -- called the "License to Discriminate" bill by the Tennessee Equality Project -- three times, and has also offered to amend the bill to answer some of our objections. However, SB 127 still allows corporations and non-profit organizations to receive public finds and discriminate against good Tennesseeans merely because of those organizations' "religious beliefs" -- corporations will still be allowed to deny birth control coverage to women, and will still be able to deny spousal coverage to gay employees even though gay marriage is the law of the land now. Really, it's simple: if you take public money, you follow public rules, including the ones you fear will give you the gay cooties. The state Senate has scheduled the vote for today; I wouldn't lay money that they'll actually go through with the vote, but you should still allow the Tennessee Equality Project to helps you tell the Tennessee state legislature to reject SB 127.
In other news, Florida Power and Light (or FPL) has come up with a plan to store radioactive nuclear waste underneath the Biscayne Aquifer, which provides clean water to millions of South Floridians. Why would FPL need to store nuclear waste? Because they're planning to build two new nuclear reactors at its rather controversial Turkey Point plant, which they hope will be operational by 2030. Given that taxpayers have historically gotten less bang for their buck by subsidizing nuclear power than just about any other power source, one has to figure the chances of getting those reactors running by then is actually very small. And leaking carcinogens into the drinking water in the meantime is a terrible idea. But big corporations and their lackeys in government apparently don't agree with us, so Urban Paradise of South Florida has begun a petition on Change.org with which you may tell nearly three dozen Florida state legislators to prevent FPL from putting nuclear waste underneath the Biscayne Aquifer.
Finally, if you've missed previous opportunities to tell your Congressfolk to reject any effort to defund the National Endowment for the Arts (or NEA) and the National Endowment for the Humanities (or NEH), then Sign Here Now helps you do that. The only negative response I've received about this effort (on this blog's Facebook page) to stop Mr. Trump from zeroing out funding for the NEA and the NEH proceeded thusly: "fuck the NEA." Sadly, that is about the level of discourse I've come to expect from the right about this matter, and it isn't lost on me that I was talking about the NEA and the NEH and the commenter had nothing at all to say about the NEH. Back when I found right-wingers who sounded more reasonable, they used to ask me why should the government pay for art? Of course, the more pertinent question is why it shouldn't, and the answer I usually get, unfortunately, is that government shouldn't pay for anything, unless, of course, it makes money for some rich donor or other. But civilized people know better than to make everything about money.
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