Here's my quick reaction to the introduction of Senator Ensign's Broadband Investment and Consumer Choice Act.
While Seantor Ensign's bill takes a somewhat different conceptual approach than the proposal set forth by PFF's Release 1.0 of the Regulatory Framework Working Group, it is based on the same fundamental premise and understanding: Today's increasingly competitive marketplace demands a very different regulatory framework than the one that exists today, one that is much less regulatory and much more market-oriented. Both Sen. Ensign's bill and the PFF proposal have in common an appreciation that it is time for much of the existing regulation of the communications to go away. (As noted, Senator Ensign's bill doesn't deal with USF, and in our DACA project, PFF will be dealing with that subject, as well as spectrum reform and institutional agency transformation.)
But today, what's most important to say is that Sen. Ensign has laid down a deregulatory marker that, along with PFF's own DACA releases, are likely to be counted as important steps on the road to reform.