Bob Kerrey: “I believe this conference report is substantially improved from both the House and the Senate bill. I voted against the…”

“I believe this conference report is substantially improved from both the House and the Senate bill. I voted against the bill when it left here, and I intend to support the conference report in its current form. I appreciate in particular the language that provides a more meaningful role for the Department of Justice. I, frankly, would have preferred the language which the Commerce Committee produced last year. I think that would have been better than the 14-part interconnection competitive checklist requirement that is in there. But I think that a meaningful role, including the substantial weight requirement for the Department of Justice, will make it more likely that we will see competition at the local level. I appreciate very much the concern of both the chairman and the ranking member, concern about including some good consumer protection provisions as well as the inclusion of interconnectivity language, incidental interLATA relief for the RBOC's to provide Internet and interactive distance learning services to K through 12 schools, and the so-called Snowe-Rockefeller-Exon-Kerrey, et al, language that will allow the K through 12 schools to be able to go either to the Public Service Commission or the FCC.”