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First take: From Yahoo! to Uh-oh!

The democratic openness of the Internet - where pretty much anyone can open a laptop and reach a wide audience - is a key to its world-changing power.

Here's the irony: The Internet may need the U.S. Congress to pass a law to preserve its freewheeling nature.

On Thursday, sadly, the U.S. House missed a chance to do the right thing. It rejected a proposal to prevent cable and phone companies from levying extra fees on large Internet users.

A sizable, bipartisan majority decided to leave cable firms such as local heavyweight Comcast and Bell successors such as Verizon free to exact a tariff or toll on Internet users who pump out high-volume content.

It's up to the Senate, then, to protect the Internet as a radically democratic gathering place to share ideas and innovations.

As you sit at your home computer, the issue may seem arcane, the concern overstated. Your broadband connection is working just fine, so what's the problem?

One way to think through the issue is to jot a list of the killer applications the Internet has spawned, such as Google's search engine, eBay's online auction, or the various Weblog programs.

Did any of them emerge from the bowels of a phone or cable company? Nope, they were innovations that started small, but found huge publics thanks to the Internet's openness.

Now imagine that the next infant innovation had to buy its way onto the Internet - by paying steep fees to get on a digital fast lane. Talk about a way to turn Yahoo! into Uh-oh!

If the Internet had begun as a toll road with tariffs set by a few powerful gatekeepers, would we still be thumbing through the hardbound World Book for elusive facts, trudging to the mall for Top 40 hits, hawking cast-offs at yard sales? Hyperbole? Perhaps, but you get the point.

Weekend forecast: Opinions galore

Herein, we share the weekend budget listing of editorials slated for the next three days. All you have to do is plunk a few pennies to get your copy of The Inquirer.

(OK, if you insist, you can read it online for free. Anyway, thanks for reading.)

ONESAT10
The case of the missing Veterans Affairs files has to be one of the worst bureaucratic bunglings in recent times, and one that the VA must do everything in its power to correct.
TWOSAT10
New Jersey's new rule is one that other states should mimic in testing and punishing public school student-athletes caught using performance-enhancing drugs.
ONESUN11
Consumers need to pay attention as Congress nears agreement on "net neutrality" legislation that will make it easier for phone companies to get into the video business and compete with cable companies.
TWOSUN11
Conservative commentator Ann Coulter went over the line in spouting her venom questioning the integrity of the widows of 9/11 victims.
ONEMON12
The firing of dean Warren Wallace for manipulating the petty-cash system at the University of Medicine and Dentistry is another sign that UMDNJ needs drastic changes.
TWOMON12
House Speaker John M. Perzel is predicting that the PA legislature will enact a lobbying reform law by June, but will it be the tough measure needed?
THREEMON12
New Jersey legislators have decided to forgo their Shore tans this summer to work on something much more significant: property tax reform.

Zarqawi theory

The man who beheaded Wilmington's Nick Berg killer - at least, according to U.S. officials - has been killed himself. Here's hoping this will help bring closure to Berg's family, who have suffered so much.
Will the death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, though, bring closure to the incredible conspiracy theories thriving on the Internet about the infamous murder? Who knows? But the stuff out there, in true conspiracy theory fashion, boggles the mind. A Google-ized sampling here.

The Becker way

If you're around the Independence Mall area at 11:00 a.m., stop by Sixth and Chestnut Streets for the ceremony honoring the late federal Judge Edward R. Becker. Fittingly, the 500 block of Chestnut Street - which Becker and others fought so hard to preserve as open to traffic after the initial security paranoia following 9/11 - will be named Becker Way.

Brick by brick

Be a part of something bigger than yourself - Philadelphia's Franklin Square, for instance.

The name-a-brick initiative offers a chance to donate - for the price of one 'Benjamin' - toward the cost of a piece of the square. See www.onceuponanation.org for details of donating online. An old-fashioned form can be downloaded here. (The 'Nation' group also sponsors storytelling in the historic area, pictured here.)

The transformation of the long-neglected square - one of Penn's original five squares in his Greene Countrie Towne - is on track to be completed this summer. The made-over square will feature a new carousel, Philadelphia-themed mini-golf, two playgrounds and food concessions.

It's all part of efforts by Once Upon a Nation, part of Historic Philadelphia Inc., to enliven visitors' experience to the Independence Mall area. Our recent editorial described the effort in more detail.

You don't have to be a tourist, though, to participate. The square will be for locals and out-of-towners alike.

First take: Public-access blackout

It's sad and pathetic that the Philadelphia region - and the city, in particular - is pretty much a test pattern when it comes to public-access television stations.

As The Inquirer's Diana Mastrull wrote earlier this year, there are only a few stations up and running.

In dozens of other major metro areas, public-access television gives citizens a voice in their communities - enabling them to produce programming from the mundane to the insightful.

In Philadelphia, the story is that, for years, cable operators - chiefly, Comcast - paid millions in franchise fees to the city. This money was earmarked for setting up a public-access system, but instead went into the city's general fund - where it was spent on other services.

In response to calls for Comcast to come up with additional funds to supplement the franchise fee, the hometown cable giant pretty much has said heretofore that it gave at the office. Not good enough. The lack of public-access television on its home turf is a continuing source of embarrassment for Comcast - or it should be.

The company needs to step up, like the good corporate citizen it has shown itself to be in other arenas. Inquirer business columnist Jeff Gelles lays out the case in today's paper.

This is business, as Comcast officials periodically point out. So it's time for Philadelphia to drop the small-town awe and quit being such an easy touch.

Comcast knows its 4,500 local franchises around the country are its largest asset. It also knows there's often a price to pay for the right to do business with minimal competition.

Today's City Council hearing on extending Comcast's reach in the city cable market is as good an opportunity as any to demand that Comcast make public-access television a reality.

*

Check out Philly's vocal - and patient - public-access TV coalition at phillyacces.org.

First take: Happy to plod toward tax reform

Who says Philadelphia isn't a glass-half-full kind of town?

Faced with the cold reality that long-term business-tax cuts won't happen under this mayor, business and civic leaders and many on City Council still seek to find a reason to celebrate.

Following Council's approval last week of incremental cuts in the Business Privilege Tax (BPT), Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce chairman Stephen D. Steinour called it a good first step.

The tax reform group, Philadelphia Forward, headlined its press release, "WE WIN MORE TAX REFORM!!!"

"After fighting for months with no movement," Philadelphia Forward stated, "our elected officials have approved additional reductions to the job- killing Business Privilege Tax. City Council has heard the plea for more tax reform." No question, the accelerated reduction in the gross-receipts portion of the BPT over three years sends a good signal to businesses considering whether to stay or invest in Philadelphia.

It's not insignificant that this levy on revenues regardless of income - which, for startup firms, is like posting a "Keep Out" sign - is headed down. The latest cuts translate into a savings to businesses of $5 million per year.

Mayor Street says he can manage that revenue loss for the city, but he's opposed to steeper cuts based upon his pet theory that it would hamper essential city services. To believe his theory, you'd have to believe that City Hall, the national capital of pay-to-play, has sweated every last bit of waste and patronage out of its systems.

In doing so, though, he missed an opportunity to enhance the city's competitiveness in a way that, over time, as jobs were created, would boost City Hall revenues.This week, a Council majority once again bought into that false choice of pitting municipal services vs. tax reform - when Council on Thursday pushed back the start of a special tax rebate for low-wage workers.

This low-wage tax cut championed by the late Councilman David Cohen was a somewhat ad-hoc, ragged approach to tax reform. But it was truly bogus to delay it by using the "Washington Monument strategy" - "Gee, if we lose that money, we'll have to close all the parks."

The choice isn't really between higher taxes and basic services. Across-the-board wage-tax cuts are in place, with more coming. The city's property-tax abatement on new homes has helped pump up real estate transfer tax revenues. So the right mix of business tax cuts to retain and add jobs is the next smart move.

There was a better proposal before Council on the BPT. City Councilman Michael A. Nutter's plan was to lock in deeper cuts in the gross-receipts portion of the BPT through 2010, reducing the tax by about 22 percent over the five-year period.

It never was likely that Nutter would get a veto-proof majority for that proposal, yet the tax-reform coalition seems to have eroded even further. Credit three colleagues, at least - W. Wilson Goode Jr., James F. Kenney and Joan L. Krajewski - for standing with him.

Given this mayor's reluctance to cut taxes in anything other than modest increments, the issue of the city's counterproducive tax system gets plopped down in the middle of next year's mayoral election. Every candidate should be prepared to say what he favors - but, please, no "Washington Monument" copouts.

What friends are for

No cardboard cutout, that Sen. Vince Fumo.

Uh-uh. All flesh and blood.

Just read his e-mail to an associate extolling the virtues of friendship. It was among a number of messages unearthed by the FBI as it probes the powerful Philadelphia senator's comings and goings.

As reported by Tom Ferrick on Poliblog, it began as follows:

FRIENDS are supposed
to help FRIENDS!!!
Not give them that kind of
bullshit!!!

There's a wealth of recommendations about what "friends don't" do or should do, of course. Google offers a sampling here.

One headline from this list stands out: "Friends Don't Let Friends Forward Inane Email"