Sen. Stevens pushes for telecommunications reform
Published Sunday, April 27, 2008
Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, introduced legislation Thursday that would allow telecommunication companies to recoup the cost of so-called “phantom” traffic on their networks.
The legislation would require the Federal Communications Committee within a year put in place new rules mandating that all voice calls pay intercarrier compensation fees.
Current regulations require carriers to compensate each other for calls that use a competitor’s network. About 20 percent of calls, however, cannot be identified, either for technical reasons or because providers mask their origin.
The majority of those calls originate from wireless and VoIP (voice over Internet protocol) providers.
“It’s unfair to the system that some people disguise their traffic and not pay for it, as others do,” Stevens said at a hearing on the issue last week in Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee.
Stevens, the ranking member of the committee, said the problem is especially vexing for rural providers that do not have billing agreements with larger competitors. The lost revenue means smaller providers cannot expand their services, he said.
“This disturbing increase in ‘phantom traffic’ means that rural carriers are destined not to be in a position to do what we want them to do, which is to deploy broadband,” Sen. Stevens said.
Foreign fishing
Stevens unveiled a bill Thursday that would strengthen penalties for foreign vessels caught fishing illegally on the high seas.
The measure would improve coordination between U.S. law enforcement authorities and federal agencies, and create a program to assist developing countries with improving their own fisheries monitoring and enforcement.
Stevens called foreign boats involved in illegal, unregulated and underreported, or IUU, fishing the “menace of the high seas” and said illegal harvests outside of the nation’s 200-mile territorial regulatory zone poses a serious threat.
The bill seeks to reduce the amount of illegally caught foreign fish sold in the United States by increasing the penalties for vessels caught violating U.S. laws. Violators could face up to $500,000 in fines, five years in prison and could be forced to forfeit their boats and other assets.
“We are trying to establish a way to warn them that the world is upset with what they are doing,” Stevens said. “They will ruin the fisheries of the world if they continue.”
The bill, which was cosponsored by Senate commerce committee chairman Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii, calls for a registry of IUU vessels and tightens monitoring of them.
McCain leads
The latest Rasmussen survey shows Alaska voters favor Republican John McCain by 5 percentage points over Democrat Barack Obama in the presidential race.
In an April 7 telephone poll of 500 likely voters, 48 percent of Alaskans said they would vote for McCain, compared to 43 percent who said they preferred Obama. Hillary Clinton was a distant third.
However, Obama had a two-to-one lead over McCain among unaffiliated voters. McCain leads Clinton by eight percentage points among unaffiliated voters.
Asked who they viewed more favorably, Alaskans picked Clinton just 35 percent of the time, compared to 63 percent for McCain and 55 percent for Obama.
Meanwhile, some 38 percent of Alaskans said the economy was the top issue in this year’s presidential race. Twenty-five percent said the war in Iraq was the most important issue.
The poll has a 4.5 percent margin of error.
Alaska third in federal spending
A new report by the U.S. Census Bureau puts Alaska among the top three states receiving the greatest share of federal funding per capita in the 2006 fiscal year.
The census report shows Alaska received $13,805 per resident for the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, 2006.
Spending among states was highest for Louisiana at $16,263 per person, and Mississippi with $14,516.
The states that received the lowest per capita distribution of federal funds were Nevada at $5,852, Utah at $6,162, and Minnesota at $6,175.
Not so giddy about Liddy
Arctic Power’s controversial plan to bring conservative talk radio host and reformed burglar G. Gordon Liddy to the North Slope to promote oil and gas drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge won’t be paid for with state dollars.
John Katz, the governor’s man in Washington, did some checking and confirmed that none of the $120,000 the state appropriated for the lobbying group in fiscal year 2008 would be used to fund Liddy’s visit.
The lobbying group has hired Liddy to broadcast his talk radio show from Barrow and Kaktovik for five days in mid-July to boost support for opening ANWR.
Liddy was involved in the 1972 break-in of the Democratic National Committee headquarters here and served 4 1/2 years in prison.
The state has asked Arctic Power, which has lobbied on its behalf since 1992, to expand its message to promote Alaska as a secure national resource of domestic oil and natural gas.
And finally…
Post-Alaska pop star Jewel testified on Capitol Hill last year on youth homelessness and as an advocate for breast cancer patients. The singer recently told the Capitol Hill newspaper Politico she was surprised lawmakers would be interested in her opinion.
“I had a naïve belief that politicians were above being impressed by star status, and I was very disappointed,” Jewel said. “I was shocked — I thought they would weigh things based on facts, not lobbying.”
Comments
Good to see Ted's still on top of the internets! Better clear up all the phantom VOIP calls to make sure the tubes don't get clogged.
Does anyone else see a problem with Stevens pushing for any kind of "reform" or increasing penalities for anyone doing anything illegal. Glass houses, stones...? Ted, leave those things up to someone more lawful and quit embarassing us.
What is illegal about VOIP? The software merely converts sound waves into digital data at your computer and reverses it at the receiving end.
This is exactly what the phone companies do themselves at their switching stations allowing them to increase capacity. Since a person would have to be paying for internet service already to be able to do this, it is not free and there is no theft of services. Imagine you could write and mail a letter to your mother but could not include photos.
what a screw job. hopefully, ted will be indicted before this gets anywhere. no doubt VECO or a subsidiary is still paying his house raising and phone bills. Jack Ted.
If this is hurting rural alaskans, why don't they just do it also and save money? As usual, Ted is on the side of lobbyists, or whoever will benefit him or his son. There is a reason both of them are under investigation. I think Ted did alot of good for this state for many years, however, that time has passed. I see him now as out for himself and out of touch with alaskans. Its embarassing now to have people in the lower 48 ask me what I think of his actions or porkbarreling. Like anything, you can only abuse something for so long. Face it folks, if you don't like high taxes, how caqn you believe in Ted Stevens? He's part of the problem, not the solution. (By the way, I'm an independent voter so I don't say this out of party choice, I just want what makes sense for alaskans AND americans.)
Ah, ah, ah, wonder how much the telecommunications companies are paying Ted? Adios, Ted, we're tired of our politicians selling themselves out to special interests groups and big corporations....
This is the dawn of a new election cycle.
If elected as the incumbent, he will be 89 at the end of his term.
I am Independent and ? why now Ted.
Personally, I trust my fathers advice, God bless his soul @ 83.
Time to turn over the reins to some-one younger.
This is a hit a VOIP. VOIP providers can act as bridges to normal voice call, meaning that you can call someone's telephone from your computer. That telephone company isn't getting paid as they should be, because the VOIP provider is masking where the call is coming from. Thats not something they should do in good conscience. Telephone companies pay each other when a call travels network to network. Otherwise you have a situation such as in some other countries across the pond, where you pay a fee to receive a long distance call.
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