Blaine Harden’s article in today’s Washington Post extolling the virtues of Japan’s broadband deployment reads like a bad knockoff of the 90’s thriller “Rising Sun”? The facts are muddled together in a way that suggests we should drop what we are doing and follow the Japanese model. Of course, they also suggested this in “Rising Sun”? Too bad the Japanese economy collapsed leaving us solely with a so-so action picture starring Sean Connery and Wesley Snipes.

Muddling together a different regulatory framework with different geographic and technological realities paints a picture of despair that will no doubt be used by sound bite opportunists to take cheap shots at America’s broadband deployment. The piece suggests that compelling phone and cable companies to open up their wires to Internet providers would lead to an explosion in broadband. But we’ve already seen an explosion in broadband in the U.S. triggered by government policies based on market-based competition.

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On May 9, I testified before the House Committee on Small Business’ Subcommittee on Rural and Urban Entrepreneurship regarding the disparity in broadband access between major metropolitan areas and rural communities.

Rural communities are missing the healthcare, education and economic improvements associated with broadband deployment. Not only is it critical that these opportunities be delivered to rural America, it’s the right thing to do.

Since 2000, when there were just over 4 million broadband lines in the U.S., the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has made a series of decisions that have guided the communications marketplace to market-based competition rather than a government-managed system. Because of the FCC’s leadership, there were almost 65 million broadband lines by 2006 — an increase of 61 million lines!

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