Why Is The White House Ignoring Broadband?

I try not to be too alarmist in my proclamations about the state of broadband policy in DC, but sometimes I can't help but get piqued when it feels like broadband's being ignored by the very people who we so desperately need to make it a top priority.

To that end, I have to get this off my chest: I think the White House is ignoring broadband.

Now I don't mean the entire White House. For example, I've had a chance to meet Susan Crawford, President Obama's broadband adviser, and I know for a fact that she's not ignoring broadband.

But when I look at some of what's coming out of other parts of the White House, I get the sense that broadband just isn't that important to this administration, or if it is, then they're not showing it enough by their actions.

Take this quote I came across yesterday:

"A top White House economist says spending from the $787 billion economic stimulus has already had its biggest impact on economic growth and will likely not contribute to significant expansion next year."

It's important to note that this isn't just any White House economist who said this, this came from Christina Romer, the chair of President Obama's Council of Economic Advisers.

Why did this make me so upset? Because it completely discounts the impact of the broadband stimulus!

As I just said Wednesday, no broadband dollars have gone out yet. So they're basically saying that stimulating the deployment of broadband isn't included in having the biggest impact on economic growth.

I read this as meaning one of two things. Either they're saying that deploying broadband doesn't positively impact the economy in a big way, or they're admitting in a roundabout way that the amount of money set aside in the stimulus for broadband isn't enough to have a significant impact.

If it's the former, then that's terrifying as that means they still don't understand that broadband is the key infrastructure that will drive economic growth in the 21st century.

If it's the latter, then I'm even more confused.

Why wouldn't you allocate enough money to the drive the deployment of the key infrastructure of the 21st century when you had the chance to do so?

Or if this is as many have described it as, merely a downpayment on our broadband future, then why not be talking about how allocating more money in the future to broadband needs to be a top priority for Congress?

Instead, there's talk of no more money from Congress for broadband, of the fact that we're likely to get a poor-man's national broadband plan.

Yet does this mean the White House has stopped asking Congress for money? Nope. In fact, just in the last few days the President has been asking for more money. But for what? What could be more important than investing in our broadband infrastructure?

Sending every senior in America a $250 check. Total bill for doing this? $13 billion. Or put another way, nearly twice as much money as was allocated to broadband in the stimulus.

Don't get me wrong. I'm all for helping out our seniors as I totally respect the service that they've done for our country. But I'm having a hard time understanding how sending them all $250 checks will have a greater economic impact than investing in our country's broadband infrastructure.

What this demonstrates to me is that the issue isn't that there's no more money, it's that there's not enough will to rearrange our priorities so that broadband's at the top of any list when it comes to what we should be investing taxpayer dollars in. I get the sense that if the President really wants something, he can get it. Yet with trends like this I can't help but question how important broadband really is to him.

Making this even more flabbergasting is that this President came into office elected on a platform where broadband was supposed to be a significant plank. There were claims that this administration truly understood the importance of broadband and that they were going to make it a top priority.

Still today you'll hear the White House pay lip service to the benefits of broadband in various speeches. But actions speak much louder than words. And so far, based on those actions, it seems like the White House is ignoring broadband.

The ramifications of this are more than a little troubling. Let us not mince words: without strong leadership and commitment from the White House, we can't make significant progress forward into our broadband future. And if we don't start making more significant progress to bolster our broadband infrastructure, America won't be a leader in the 21st century digital economy. It's that simple.

So now the ball's in the White House's court. Will they continue to ignore broadband? To not make it a top priority? To talk more than act? To not acknowledge its importance spurring economic growth? Will they continue to put it on the backburner?

I sincerely hope that I am being overly alarmist in this post. That great things are in the works behind the scenes that I'm not privy to. But until I see more real progress than mere rhetoric, I can't help but worry that the White House is not paying enough attention to our country's most important 21st century infrastructure.