[pp.int.general] how do you feel about net neutrality?

[Valentin Villenave]

Greetings everybody,

I've just stumbled upon this article, that raises a number of
objections *against* the principle of Internet neutrality (i.e.
non-filtered communications); I'd like to know how you guys feel about
it.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig8/swanson7.html

Basically, his points are:
- most of the Internet traffic nowadays are spams and P2P exchanges

- filtering data is good to guarantee that real-time communications
(VoIP, telemedicine, gaming etc) are given a low-latency priority over
non-critical communications (e.g. BitTorrent)

- non-filtered data is bad for capitalism and networks development,
since the major infrastructures, backbones, optic fibers etc. will no
longer interest compagnies and will instead be controlled by
governments only

- "The internet is not a public utility, nor should it be treated as such."

This guy is (as far as I can tell) involved with the Republican Party
(he reminds that Obama supports the principle of Net neutrality,
whereas McCain does not).

As a leftist myself, I strongly disagree with most of his points (the
French left wing has a strong and historical commitment to the "public
service" notion); however my question is:

  - how do we, as a non-right-or-left party, deal with such issues?
  - Shall we, for instance, support one of the two USA candidates on this?
  - Does supporting the principle of net neutrality bring us closer to
(e.g.) Obama than McCain?

Just in case you have a minute to think about it... :-)

Cheers,
Valentin