Pete Ashdown

Don’t miss these great films and speakers, sponsored by the Salt Lake Film Center, this Friday through Sunday! It is free and open to the public. The Raucus Caucus.

This Sunday, at 8am, I will be appearing on Chris Vanocur’s show “On the Record” on KTVX, channel 4. The topic will be the use of the Internet in this political season.

Please join me next Tuesday, the 21st in welcoming Senator Jon Tester from Montana for a reception benefiting the Obama Victory Fund.

This last Sunday, Senator Hatch had yet another opinion piece published attempting to define his energy policy. This comes a few weeks after his rebuttal to what I wrote. There is so much spinning going on in Hatch’s office these days, it should be considered an alternative energy source on its own.

I wrote a response to Senator Hatch’s first rebuttal, but the Tribune chose not to publish it. Here it is.

Mike Strizki is the future of energy production in the United States. His entire energy consumption, whether it be electricity for his big-screen TV, heat and cooling for his sizable house with swimming pool and hot-tub, or fuel for his car sources entirely from the sun that falls on his garage. What southern paradise does he live in to make this possible? Why New Jersey of course.

Mr. Strizki’s solar and hydrogen farm wasn’t cheap, at $500,000 it doesn’t make economic sense for the average American to do the same thing, but at one time, the “horseless carriage” was only for the affluent. Tax breaks, federal incentives, and loosing regulation on the oil industry has made it choice number one for transportation and energy in America. Although Senator Hatch claims he has sought a “balanced” energy policy, the attention he and congress has given oil over the past 30 years has dwarfed any viable alternative. Legislative lip-service to alternatives has made 50% of our trade deficit oil-based. Final proof is in the pudding we pour into our cars at $4.00 a gallon.

Hatch deemed President Carter’s proposed tariffs against imported oil as disastrous for the market, but who is to blame for the greatest exportation of wealth in American history? What motivation does congress have for continuing to enrich the greatest tyrannies on this planet? Robotic dinosaurs roaming artificial islands in Dubai are pretty neat, but wouldn’t you rather have excellent schools and advanced infrastructure right here at home?

Solar, wind, geothermal, and biofuels are treated as science fiction by their critics. Yet other countries are using these realities to become entirely self sufficient. America is unable to duplicate these feats because our leadership sees alternatives to oil in the same way whalers viewed the light-bulb. It is always a matter of hauling in more whales rather than utilizing better technologies.

Senator Hatch recently declared that cars, trains, and airplanes can only run on oil. Is he completely ignorant of electric, hybrid, biodiesel and natural-gas cars? Most European and Asian trains run on electricity because it is more efficient and powerful than diesel. Granted, airplane fuel alternatives are in the experimental stage, but if we offset gasoline consumption on the road and rails, wouldn’t there be plenty left over for flight?

Entrepreneurs have been trying to squeeze oil from shale for the past century. Although President Carter had oil shale on the table, it has never displayed any financial or environmental success. Other schemes for oil or coal expansion do nothing to make our air safer to breath, our food safer to eat, or cut our imports by any significant amount.

If Hatch’s favored nuclear power is to come into play again, let the investors buy water at market rates, pay for the clean-up of of the waste and the mining, insure against lawsuits, and hire their own private guard and air-force for plant protection. Nuclear energy companies can start by cleaning up the billion-dollar pile of uranium tailings left behind by industry in Moab.

Oil shale and nuclear power are considered the primary domestic alternatives to imported oil by Senator Hatch and our Republican delegation. Unfortunately, history shows these are failed alternatives.

Congressional efforts for clean, domestic, renewable energy are appreciated. Yet they need to be exponentially increased if they are ever going to match historic support for oil. True American freedom and independence exists in technologies that Mike Strizki is using today. A colossal lack of imagination is responsible for the failure of so-called “balanced” energy policy this country has had since 1976.

The Salt Lake Tribune published an opinion piece today that I wrote on our Republican congressional delegation’s recent grandstanding on behalf of the oil, gas, and coal industries.

Come celebrate Senator Hatch’s latest reassurance that the government is fully trustworthy and always does the right thing at Salt Lake Acting Company’s “Nutcake Night” on July 16th. I have 10 tickets at a discounted rate of $35 available. Please email if you are interested in attending with me, my wife Robin and fellow nutcakes.

Over a year ago, Provo City put out an RFP titled, “Request for Proposals for Partnership Opportunities with Telecommunication Service Providers on the iProvo Network”. This was a public invitation to companies like XMission to provide services to the citizens of Provo over the fiber network installed by the city. You can read the full text of the RFP on the Provo city website.

XMission was excited to respond to Provo’s request. This was in fact, the first time we had been invited to participate at all. The process that Provo originally engaged in to select their disastrous first Internet provider, HomeNet, and then subsequent providers was never extended to XMission. This in spite of the consistent calls from Provo residents to iProvo to allow us to participate on their network.

After responding to Provo’s request, XMission had a number of meetings with iProvo which were welcoming and positive. The last meeting we had with them was in December when we were told that we were on track to be a participant and some wholesale pricing was reworked. Yesterday, iProvo held a press conference where they announced the sale of the network to a company named Broadweave.

I attended the press conference and asked a simple question of the mayor, “Do you think the sale of a public asset should be done through a public process?” His response was that it was done in a public fashion and that I only needed to read the RFP to understand that the network sale was a possibility. The RFP title states, “Partnership Opportunities with Telecommunication Service Providers on the iProvo Network” with the keyword being “on”. Later in the document the “goals and design for the Network Project” are laid out, with the first being, “To provide the citizens of Provo a full range of competitive choices for telecommunications services and applications.” How exactly does selling the network to a business which will lock out out all other businesses meet this goal of the RFP? As recent as two weeks ago, Mayor Billings was claiming there were offers, but “due diligence” had prevented a sale. If this is the same “due diligence” that selected HomeNet, an out-of-state company which used forged documents to prop up its financials, then it would have been enlightening to see how Broadweave was selected.

Unfortunately, none of the proceedings in selecting Broadweave are public. Provo officials have handled the public trust much like a private entity in signing “non-disclosure agreements” and not being fully clear that iProvo indeed was for sale. Although the claim is made that Broadweave is paying $40 million for the network, they are simply assuming the bond debt, which will fall back to Provo City if they can’t sustain their business model and Sorenson Capitol backs out of the transaction.

I wish Provo the best success in their efforts, others have been more critical. Some have claimed my comments to the press are so much “sour grapes”. Let me be clear, my interest in iProvo since its inception was being a provider on an open-competition network. I believe there is a very good reason private interests worldwide are not building ubiquitous fiber networks — the payback is beyond 20 years. There is no doubt in my mind that if Qwest, Comcast, and all data service providers were restricted to providing service over one municipal fiber network, it would not only succeed, the public would see cheaper rates and superior service. The lack of proper RFP for the sale of iProvo hands the network over to a single private interest that will control rates and service.

I have been told that there were other national and international companies who expressed interest in purchasing iProvo. Would they have kept the network open to service provider competition? Would there have been a better deal instead of just assuming the bond debt? Without a proper RFP process in place for the sale, the public will never know.

Since the beginning of iProvo, XMission has wanted to help the network succeed. Instead, we have been inexplicably stonewalled and blocked at every turn. What is certain now is that there will be no open competition on the iProvo network. Eventually this country will realize that fiber infrastructure is not a luxury that can be sustained by a business model, but a necessary investment in our economy. Sadly, it is going to take another decade of mismanagement and lost promises by the private sector before that is realized.

A number of people have asked whether I would be interested in running for Utah governor or congress this year. It is humbling to be considered. However, currently my commitment to my family, XMission, and the local organizations I sit on boards for does not lend the time required for a candidacy this year. In January I took on the role of chairing the Utah Heritage Foundation for two years and I feel strongly about seeing that role through. I am looking forward to the political possibilities presented in 2010.

Another sweet gem of ignorance has been dispensed from the Utah Legislature. HB407 asks for creation of a “Community Conscious Internet Provider” seal, which can then be used by the Internet Service Provider (ISP) for marketing their virtue. Where it gets fun is how it asks the ISP to voluntarily give up the 4th Amendment protection of its customers. Line 85 reads, “cooperate with any law enforcement agency by providing records sufficient to identify a customer if the law enforcement agency requests the information and supplies reasonable proof that a crime has been committed using the Internet service provider’s service”. It says nothing of reasonable proof being determined by a judge and thusly issuing a court order.

XMission has always taken the stand that if you want customer information you’re going to need a court order. This act asks us to discard that stance in order to use a “seal” in our marketing. If we at some point decide the seal isn’t worth our customers’ privacy or we somehow fail to uphold the requirements of this law, then XMission is subject to a fine of $10,000.

To its credit, the bill makes handing over my customers’ privacy to the state completely voluntary. No thanks.

According to Ethan Millard, HB139 is dead. However, with the Utah Legislature it isn’t over until it’s over. This is a good sign, thanks to everyone who helped fight this legislation. Thanks to Representative Daw for listening to my and others concerns about the technical problems.

I have been reluctant to endorse a presidential candidate up until this time because I think the way our primary system works is utterly messed up. Seeing candidates drop out of the race after 124,000 people caucus in Iowa is not broad democracy in any sense. However, Utah’s primary is next Tuesday and I think now that it is down to two, it is time to make a public choice.
In Barack Obama’s first term, he sponsored a bill that required more transparency on government bids and earmarks. It creates a website that documents government contracts, grants, earmarks, and loans and allows them to be searched and openly inspected by the public. Accountability through technology was a key plank of my 2006 campaign and I was pleased to see Senator Obama write this bill and get it passed. He also took responsibility for transparency in his own office by disclosing his own earmark requests. Regardless of where I end up, the American public is going to continue to demand transparency in order take back the reins of government from wealthy interests. The fact that a first term senator made a major difference was also affirming.

As president, I believe Barack Obama will return accountability to the Whitehouse and international respect to the United States. I will be voting for him on Tuesday the 5th.