[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 20]
[House]
[Pages 29585-29586]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]


[[Page 29585]]

  THE COMING REVOLUTION IN AMERICA WITH HIGHSPEED BROAD BAND INTERNET 
                                SERVICES

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 6, 1999, the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
  Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight in special order to begin 
what will become in the next year, the year 2000, one of the most 
serious debates that I think this House will ever engage in. As we meet 
here in this Chamber, an historic revolution is occurring, as silently 
as the day, perhaps, when the United States produced more plastic than 
it did steel.
  As we speak today, a revolution in our economy, in our 
communications, in our whole international social structure, is 
happening all around us. It is a revolution called the Internet, and it 
is about to explode upon the world in a new and faster form called 
broad band Internet.
  Just recently one of the groups here in Washington, Legg-Mason, did a 
study to indicate how fast would this new broad band high-speed 
Internet be deployed in our great country, how soon would citizens have 
access to this amazing new system by which we will not only conduct our 
business, but entertain one another and learn from one another, and 
eventually even deliver medical services to one another?
  Legg-Mason indicated that 3 years from now they anticipate that 
approximately half of Americans will have access to high-speed broad 
band Internet services. At the same time, they indicate that half of 
America will have access through two, three, or even four or more 
different providers.
  Then they look at the other half of America. The other half of 
America they looked at 3 years from now they estimate will only have 
access to a single provider, in some cases, and for a full fourth of 
Americans, there will be no provider of Internet high-speed broad band 
services.
  What does that mean in a real sense? It means that for one-fourth of 
America there will be no chance to access high-speed digital broad band 
Internet services. It means that for that one-fourth of America, they 
will be left out of this high-speed electronic commerce revolution. It 
means for that one-fourth of America, that children will grow up in an 
educationally and informationally deprived society.
  It means that new high-speed electronic commerce services will not be 
available to those businesses. It means that citizens will not have 
access to all of the long-distance learning and telemedicine that the 
high-speed broad band services will bring.
  In short, it means that as this incredible fast train of broad band 
services is leaving the station, that some Americans are going to be 
left in its dust, and will have no access to the incredible 
opportunities the new millenium will bring in the digital age.
  Who are those one-quarter of Americans who will have no access? 
Members probably can guess who they are. They are going to be the 
citizens in the most poverty-ridden sectors of our country, the 
minority centers of our country, the poor rural minority and poor rural 
sectors of America, the poorest and most sparsely populated parts of 
the West, and some parts of the South.
  A good way to see that one-quarter of America is to look at a map 
that shows where the high-speed hubs are, where the backbones for these 
new systems are currently deployed.
  We will see, for example, that California has 177 of these high-speed 
hubs, and in Louisiana we have two. We have one in Baton Rouge and one 
in New Orleans. California has more of these high-speed hubs, in fact, 
than does 31 other States combined. Most of the States of the West and 
the rural parts of our country have no such high-speed hubs. That is 
where we will find that part of America that is going to get left 
behind in this incredible information revolution.
  Look to the inner cities, look to the poverty, the minority centers 
of our country, and we will again see a lack of high-speed deployment 
of broad band services. We will see again a sector of our country that 
will be left out.
  For a full quarter of America who will have at least one Internet 
broad band provider, we will see a part of America that unfortunately 
will have to deal with a monopoly, a single provider of these immense 
services. So for one-half of our country 3 years from now, Americans 
will either have none of these services or, unfortunately, have a 
service that is provided by a single monopoly player.
  Yesterday this House took dramatic action to provide a new form of 
law to give to the satellite television companies new rights to compete 
against the monopoly cable companies in our communities. That is pretty 
important. A monopoly cable company can charge what it wants, can lump 
as much programming into a package as they want, and we have to take it 
or leave it.
  When the satellite company can offer a full component of packaged 
products that includes local signals as well as cable broadcast 
programming, all of a sudden consumers have a choice. All of a sudden 
television services become much better for consumers. As choice and 
competition comes to the marketplace, better prices, better terms, 
better conditions.
  The gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey) and I just talked about 
another bill to free up international satellite communications in order 
to create competition, lower prices, choice for consumers, not only 
here in America but across the world.
  What I am speaking of tonight is a situation that is about to develop 
in this incredible world of Internet services where television, 
telephones, data will all combine in a digital stream that will arrive 
at our homes or not arrive in our homes, depending upon whether or not 
we are connected to broad band and to broad band networks.
  Let me just give an idea of about how important this is. In just 5 
years, since the first introduction of the World Wide Web, the Internet 
economy, which is now $301 billion, already rivals old economy sectors 
like energy, at $223 billion, and autos, at $350 billion, and Telecom 
at $270 billion. It is already, in 5 years, as big as some of these 
century-old economy sectors that took hundreds of years, literally, to 
get as big as they are.
  The Internet spread to 25 percent of our population in just 7 years. 
By contrast, electricity reached 25 percent of Americans in 46 years. 
Telephone took 35 years.

                              {time}  1915

  Television took 26 years. The Internet took 7 years to reach a 
quarter of America. Commercial activity on the Internet is expected to 
be $100 billion by the end of 1999, and double that in the year 2000. 
By 2002, on-line business-to-business transactions will total a 
whopping $842 billion. MCI/WorldCom, for example, said that net income 
nearly tripled to $1 billion for the third quarter in 1999, and 40 
percent of their company revenues are now in Internet and data 
services.
  What I am saying is that the Internet has arrived. It created 1.2 
million jobs in the U.S. in 1998. Ten percent of the United States 
adults, 19.7 million persons, are now telecommuters. They work from 
home and they save employers $10,000 per employee because they 
telecommute, reducing absenteeism, lowering job retention costs. I 
could go on and on, I think my colleagues get my drift.
  Mr. Speaker, the Internet is upon us, but if my colleagues think this 
old slow Internet has made a difference in this economy and is 
currently making a huge difference in the success of the American 
economy and freeing up economies across the world, they ain't seen 
nothing yet. Wait until they see high-speed broadband.
  People have asked what is the difference? Internet has to be turned 
on. One has to dial it up, have to wait for it to warm up and heat up 
and compete with more and more traffic on the slow system. Sometimes 
the traffic gets so heavy as new customers come on line that it is 
difficult to get service.
  High speed Internet is like that refrigerator. It is always on, 
always chilled, always ready to go and it is hot and it is fast and it 
is full of information. It will contain real-time video. High-speed 
broadband digital services means on television direct telephone calls 
where we can see one another. It means on television all the Internet 
commerce services which are growing and growing in the economic sectors 
of

[[Page 29586]]

America. Business-to-consumer commerce totaled $8 billion. That is 
huge. Business-to-business commerce totaled $43 billion last year, and 
we are told by 2003 it will become $1.3 trillion.
  Mr. Speaker, all of that business happening on high speed networks, 
but some people will be left out. In this coming year, we will begin 
debating whether or not it is time in America for this House, this 
Congress, to declare broadband Internet policy. To make sure, as we 
have tried to do with cable, as we have tried to do with satellites, as 
we have tried to do with so many of our economic sectors, that no 
longer will some people be left out, caught on the wrong side of the 
wire, caught in this great digital divide, left out as this fast, high-
speed train leaves the station. Deprived and depressed and left behind 
in a faster and faster world, or whether we will have a policy in 
America that says to broadband Internet providers, ``Here is your 
chance to serve every American.'' And every American is entitled to a 
choice of different providers, so that every American has a chance to 
be on that system.
  I recently had a high-tech conference in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, 
where we explored that whole set of issues in my home State of 
Louisiana. We were recently ranked in Louisiana as 47th in the Nation 
in terms of Internet connection. That is not good. That is awful. We 
need to be way up there.
  Why? Because Louisiana has a huge problem of adult illiteracy and an 
education system that cannot seem to cure it. We have one of the 
highest uninsured populations in America per capita. We need some help. 
High-speed, broadband Internet can solve so many of those problems.
  We learned at that conference that there are children in my home 
State who start first grade with a 50-word vocabulary. Who go to school 
in the first grade knowing what a tomato looks like, but not knowing 
the word ``tomato.'' Who know what a wagon does, but ``wagon'' is not 
in their vocabulary. Imagine those children connected to the Internet 
at home and all the sudden exposed to a worldwide view of information 
and learning. Connected to their teachers's web site at night to get 
help with homework and enlarge that vocabulary and give themselves a 
chance in the world.
  Imagine if we do connect and we get high-speed services to a State 
like Louisiana what a difference it can make for the people of our 
State. And yet, those children today start with a 50-word vocabulary. 
Most children in America start with at least a 500-word vocabulary. 
Now, imagine if my State, or many parts of it, are left out of this 
high-speed digital revolution. Imagine if our children still start with 
that 50-word vocabulary and other kids in America connected to the 
broadband start instead with a 5,000-word vocabulary or 10,000-word 
vocabulary. Imagine how much further behind those kids become.
  Imagine a small business in a rural town that is told because they do 
not have high-speed broadband Internet connectivity to the rest of the 
economy that their customers will not do business with them anymore. 
They are out of business unless they move to a high-speed Internet 
center somewhere. Imagine what it does to rural America, to poverty 
America, to minority centers in this country when they are told 
businesses cannot operate here because they are not connected and 
Washington never created a policy to ensure that they would be 
connected.
  Imagine our company, our town, our school, our city, our hospital 
connected to a single monopoly provider unregulated by government. 
Imagine those conditions. We are not much better off than the one who 
is not connected at all. That is the world Legg Mason predicted for 
America in 3 years if we do not soon declare a new broadband policy for 
this country.
  Mr. Speaker, when we come back to session early next year, I will be 
joined by the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell), former chairman of 
the Committee on Commerce and now ranking minority member. I will be 
joined by the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte), and the 
gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Boucher). The gentleman from Virginia (Mr. 
Boucher) who serves on both the Committee on the Judiciary and the 
Committee on Commerce and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte) 
who is an esteemed and honorable member of the Committee on the 
Judiciary.
  We will be joined on the floor by many other Members who will begin 
talking about this issue and begin trying to elicit the help of 
Americans in create an interest here in Congress toward building a 
broadband Internet policy for this country that says no child will be 
left out, no one will be caught outside the digital divide, no one will 
be left behind as the high speed train leaves the station.
  Recently, a book was published by a fellow named Tom Friedman called 
``The Lexus and the Olive Tree.'' In it he says in this new millennium 
there will not be a First World and Third World anymore. There will not 
be First World economies and Third World economies anymore. There will 
either be a fast world, part of this incredible high speed electronic 
commerce world where we all are connected and we all can reach each 
other and communicate and teach and learn and commerce with one 
another, or the slow world, left out, left behind.
  Mr. Speaker, I am trying to say tonight, and we will try to say next 
year in special order after special order, that America could not and 
should not let that happen to any citizen of our country. We cannot 
have half of America left behind. We cannot have a fourth of America 
totally locked out of this digital revolution. We cannot say that this 
is the land of opportunity for some but not for others.
  Mr. Speaker, I will be back on the floor with my colleagues when we 
come back in January and we will burden you night after night because 
we will be on this floor talking about this digital divide, talking 
about the necessity to have real competition and real delivery of 
services to every citizen of this country in broadband Internet digital 
commerce, teaching, learning, medicine, and all the wonderful 
opportunities that those systems will bring.

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