'We don't need the FCC': A Trump advisor's proposal to dissolve America's telecom watchdog

The L.A. Times reports:

A top advisor to Donald Trump on tech policy matters proposed all but abolishing the nation's telecom regulator last month, foreshadowing possible moves by the president-elect to sharply reduce the Federal Communications Commission's role as a consumer protection watchdog.

In an Oct. 21 blog post, Mark Jamison, who on Monday was named one of two members of Trump's tech policy transition team, laid out his ideal vision for the government's role in telecommunications, concluding there is little need for the agency to exist.

"Most of the original motivations for having an FCC have gone away," Jamison wrote. "Telecommunications network providers and [Internet service providers] are rarely, if ever, monopolies."

The FCC declined to comment for this story, but its current leadership has disagreed strongly with that analysis. Its Democratic chairman, Tom Wheeler, has spoken of an Internet service "duopoly" in much of the country that limits competition. And he has compared telecommunications to the rail and telegraph networks of the 19th century, calling for new rules of the road as the Internet becomes the dominant communications platform of the 21st century.

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