Room for a View: News and Views

Telecom Giants Win Rigged Spectrum Auction

According to the New York Times, four of the nation’s largest wireless telephone companies took advantage of the Federal Communication Commission’s rules to win over 90 percent of the $18 billion in spectrum licenses auctioned off this winter. The telecom giants won these licenses, which were intended for small businesses to spur competition in the wireless market, by using small companies as fronts in the bidding. For example, AT&T Wireless paid $2.6 billion of the $2.9 billion bid by it’s “partner”, Alaska Native Wireless, for a number of licenses, including one of the three hotly contested licenses to build in New York City. It is doubtful that the Anchorage-based Alaska Native Wireless actually intended to build a wireless communications network in New York—or could have, without the substantial backing (and 80 percent ownership) of AT&T.

Cingular Wireless, AT&T Wireless, VoiceStream Wireless and Sprint PCS not only cleaned up on licenses that were supposed to be set aside for small entrepreneurs, they also benefited from hundreds of millions of dollars in government subsidies that were earmarked for these entrepreneurs. They did it by first lobbying the FCC to change the bidding rules, then taking advantage of the new rules to bid through small companies that were sometimes no more than hastily-manufactured “dummy” businesses created for this purpose. Cingular, bidding through the dummy business Salmon PCS (in which Cingular owns an 85 percent stake), will benefit from more than $550 million in federal subsidies. And AT&T won so many new licenses that it may exceed the legal limit of wireless coverage in a geographic area.

The FCC’s auction rules, according to the federal Small Business Administration, were “illogical and self-contradictory,” since it is ludicrous to imagine that telecommunications giants would bankroll their own competition. While small companies fronting for larger ones walked away with the prize, many small entrepreneurs who were not bankrolled by telecom giants were outflanked and outbid. Some have stated their intention to challenge the auction results in court.

Even prior to the auction, the planned bidding end-run was no secret. “We are going to be doing all our bidding through our designated entity, Salmon PCS,” a Cingular spokesman was quoted in the trade publication, Communications Daily, a week before the bids opened. “That will allow us to bid on all eligible licenses, including a number of those set aside just for small businesses.” A prior appeal by a small bidder to halt the auction, on grounds that AT&T, Cingular, etc. did not meet congressional standards for small entrepreneurs, was rejected by a US court of appeals.

The auction was largely a re-auction of spectrum bandwidth won in a 1996 auction by the now-defunct NextWave Personal Communications, which lost control of its 63 licenses when it went bankrupt and was unable to make payments on its $4.7 billion bid debt. Observers believe the FCC was trying to walk a fine line, preserving Congress’ intent to empower entrepreneurs and spur competition, while avoiding another NextWave disaster. “We did the best we could under the circumstances,” one anonymous FCC official was quoted as saying. “But this certainly does make us look like a bunch of idiots.”

It is worth noting that industry-leader Verizon Wireless was the only major player that didn’t use a small company to front at the auction. Verizon paid significantly more as a result, including more than $2 billion for each of two New York licenses it won. A Verizon executive said his company’s strategy would be cheaper in the long run, predicting that the other major wireless companies will end up having to buy out their small “partners” to gain complete control over their new licenses.
—Todd Paul

Return of the Gag Rule

Don’t be fooled for a minute that the re-imposition of the “global gag rule policy” by President George Bush just three days into his administration was a one-time thank you to his pro-life supporters. Bush’s action, ominously taken on the 28th anniversary of the landmark Supreme Court ruling Roe v Wade, was a clear signal that yet another major assault on a woman’s right to control her reproductive choices has begun.
The policy, previously adopted by the past administrations of Ronald Reagan and Bush, and later rescinded in the early days of the first Clinton administration, bans federal aid to international organizations that use their own money to perform or “actively promote’ abortions, whether through counseling, public information campaigns or lobbying to legalize abortions. Bush chose to revive this policy despite the fact that American tax money hasn’t paid for an international abortion since 1973 when an amendment, put forth by then Senator Jesse Helms (R-NC), to the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, forbid the use of any and all US dollars to fund abortions in foreign countries.

On the same day Bush signed the anti-abortion policy into action, he also sent a message to anti-abortion marchers in Washington, in which he claimed that the Declaration of Independence’s pledges of life and liberty extend to all, “including unborn children.” A few days later the Bush administration announced a “safety” review of the abortion inducing drug Mifepristone (RU-486).

Following close on the heels of President Bush’s anti-abortion actions, Senator Tim Hutchinson (R-AZ) and Representative David Vitter (R-LA) introduced legislation, S.251/H.R. 482, which would severely curtail stateside use of the drug Mifepristone (RU-486). Approved by the FDA in September 2000, Mifepristone promises a safer, earlier, private and less invasive option to surgical abortion, especially for those women who live a long distance from an abortion provider.

Introduced to the Senate on February 6, the Hutchinson-Vitter legislation, entitled “RU-486 Patient Health and Safety Act,” allows only those doctors who are trained to perform surgical abortions to prescribe the drug. Among such a doctor’s qualifications would be training to handle an incomplete abortion, legal authorization and training to perform abortions, certification in ultrasound technology in order to date a pregnancy and identify an ectopic pregnancy, training in the administration of the drug through an FDA approved curriculum, and admitting privileges at a nearby hospital.

While proponents of this bill argue such restrictions will protect the health of women against “improper administration of the drug by an inadequately-trained health professional,” opponents say such restriction would severely curtail access to the drug, as well as place it out of the reach of many American woman. Such restrictions would also allow a heated spotlight to be kept on those physicians who are already performing abortions, thus leaving them open for the type of attacks, some which have been lethal, which have occurred over the years since Roe v Wade. In addition, with other physicians besides those performing abortions able to prescribe Mifepristone, the responsibility of maintaining reproductive freedom is distributed more evenly throughout the medical community.

Currently, according the FDA, “doctors allowed to prescribe Mifepristone must have the ability to date pregnancies accurately and to diagnose tubal pregnancies, be qualified  to provide any necessary surgery, or have made arrangements for any necessary surgery, must ensure that women have access to medical facilities for emergency care, and must agree to other responsibilities, such as dispensing the Medication Guide and reporting any adverse events to the sponsor.”

“There is a broader issue here,” says Planned Parenthood’s Adina Wingate Quijada. She warns that the proposed restrictions on Mifepristone are simply the beginning of a “protracted effort to dismantle the approval of the drug.”

“The intent,” claims Quijada, “is to stigmatize what has already been proven to be a safe medication regime with a long history of safety behind it. The message being conveyed by anti-choice groups since the day the FDA approved Mifepristone, has been to plant the seed that this is a fundamentally medically unsafe and dangerous regime.”

Indeed, Mifepristone spent 12 years under review and over four years under the scrutiny of the FDA before they approved its use (as compared with the fast-tracking of Viagra, which was approved by the FDA in just six months). More than 2000 women in the U.S. successfully used Mifepristone during clinical trials, and over 620,000 European women have had entirely safe abortions using the drug since 1988. Not one death has been attributed to its use, something which cannot be said of childbirth. According to statistics released in 1999 by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention the national maternal mortality rate is 7.7 per every 100,000 women, twice the rate set by the federal government under its Healthy People Initiative 2000. Translated, the stats show that one woman dies for every 12,987 who give birth, with big disparities among certain groups in certain areas. Among African-American women in New York, for example, 28.7 of these woman die for every 100,000 pregnancies.

But it seems this presidentially-instigated rally against a woman’s right to choose has awakened a sleeping giant. A deluge of contributions, sent in the name of President Bush, has begun and continues to rain down on the Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) and its 127 national affiliates in a nationwide demonstration of support of reproductive rights. This grassroots pro-choice fundraising campaign inadvertently sprung up after LA Times columnist Patt Morrison called Laura Bush’s “I don’t think that [Roe] should be overturned,” comment on the “Today Show” a “grand slam” in her January 16 column. Laura Bush joins Betty Ford, Nancy Reagan, and Barbara Bush as the fourth Republican first lady to deviate from their party’s position on the subject, Morrison stated.

The columnist went on to suggest that in order to honor Bush on Presid ent’s Day, instead of sending a gift, “in certain circles” people give money to a cause in the honoree’s name. Morrison’s column ended, “So check that mailbag, Mr. President, for a card reading, “President George W Bush, a donation had been made in your name to Planned Parenthood.”

As donations began to stream into Planned Parenthood offices all over the country, many of them with attached pro-choice messages for the president, the organization added a “President’s Day Campaign” donation button to their official Web site. By Friday, February 16, the eve of the President’s Day weekend holiday, an overwhelming response to Morrison’s suggestion had yielded approximately $500,000 in contributions to the Planned Parenthood by 15,000 individuals, many of them first-time supporters of the organization. That same day, mail bags stuffed with the personal messages to the president were hand-delivered to the new Executive Office building in Washington, DC.

And if that weren’t enough of a President’s Day message, a separate action, taken the previous day on February 15, saw a bipartisan group of 50 lawmakers, among them six Republicans, launch a drive in the House and the Senate to over turn Bush’s “global gag rule” policy. Introduced by Representatives Nita Lowey (D-NY) and Nancy Johnson (R-CT), and Senators Arlen Spector (R-PA) and Barbara Boxer (D-CA) the Global Democracy Promotion Act says it is wrong to withhold medical information from women in developing countries that women in the US can access every day, to force groups to stop talking to their officials about reproductive rights and to deny women in other countries access to legal abortions.

“The global gag rule presents NGOs with a dangerous choice,” said Lowey whose district office is in White Plains. “If you want to participate in US programs, you have to withhold vital information from patients, you have to sacrifice your right to free speech, and you have to stop providing legal health services with your own non-US funds. This policy puts women and children in danger around the world. It is an affront to the principals of freedom and democracy on which this country was founded.” Lowey likened Bush’s imposition of the gag rule to preying on women abroad by not allowing them to take part in the same “inalienable, constitutional rights as American women.”

In the meantime, the donations continue to roll in to Planned Parenthood offices around the nation. With GW’s birthday coming up in July, one can only wonder what the size of his birthday present, in numbers of donations to Planned Parenthood, will be by then.

For those who would like to join in the fray or let your opinion be known, we have included the following:

Planned Parenthood—www.plannedparenthood.org

Senator Tim Hutchinson—Senator.Hutchinson@Hutchinson.senator.org

Representative David Vitter—David.Vitter@mail.house.gov

Representative Nita Lowey—nita.lowey@mail.house.gov

White House—president@whitehouse.gov

—Lorna Tychostup

The New Napster

The big February news for Internet-savvy music fans was that Napster lost its court appeal and will probably have to abandon its current service, which enables free music swaps between computer users worldwide, in violation of copyright laws. What has not been so widely reported is that Napster already has a new business model in place, has presented it to the major record labels, and is negotiating with them for an agreement. Under the new model, which was unveiled February 20, Napster would become a subscription service, with subscribers paying between $2.95 and $4.95 per month for a basic membership and between $5.95 and $9.95 per month for a premium membership. Basic membership would allow a limited number of monthly file downloads, premium would allow an unlimited number.

Out of this subscriber service, Napster proposes to pay $1 billion to the recording industry over five years. Major labels would receive $150 million per year, divided among the number of labels that signed up for the plan. In return, Napster would receive non-exclusive licensing for song distribution. $50 million per year would be paid to independent labels and artists based on the volume of transfers.

Napster believes its users will be willing to pay for the new subscription service, and that the recording industry will be willing to make a deal. It plans to launch the new service this summer.

Some observers have suggested that the recording industry will do a deal with Napster if it knows what’s good for it. If Napster shuts down, many users will likely migrate to other, decentralized file-sharing systems, like Gnutella, which will prove much harder to control.
—T.P