WASHINGTON, April 27 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) today challenged Sen. Byron Dorgan's (D-N.D.) comments on the issue of net neutrality and warned against enacting any type of legislation that would hurt growth and the free market on the Internet.

Sen. Dorgan held a conference call with reporters on April 26, the occasion of pro-net neutrality group SavetheInternet.com's one year anniversary. Sen. Dorgan said, "The Internet became a robust engine of economic development by enabling anyone with a good idea to connect to consumers and compete on a level playing field. The marketplace picked winners and losers, not some central gatekeeper. That freedom -- the very core of what makes the Internet what it is today -- must be preserved."

"If net neutrality is enacted, Congress itself will become the gatekeeper by imposing restrictive and unnecessary controls. Any attempt to regulate the Internet would create an unneeded layer of government bureaucracy on a technology that has thrived precisely because regulations have been absent," said CAGW President Tom Schatz.

In January, Sen. Dorgan reintroduced the misnamed Internet Freedom Preservation Act (S. 215) in the Senate. Net neutrality would mandate that Internet service providers carry every single piece of content and every service available, regardless of cost or need. Content providers have expressed concern that the ISPs would either block content or create different tiers of online services. Such differential pricing occurs in virtually all forms of commerce, such as charging more for faster delivery of packages by UPS or Federal Express. Should net neutrality become law and traffic on the Internet continue to skyrocket, the delivery of important content, such as medical information, will receive the same treatment as spam.

Editorial voices on op-ed pages as diverse as those of the New York Times and Wall Street Journal have criticized net neutrality as a false issue. Last June, the Washington Post editorialized, "The weakest aspect of the neutrality case is that the dangers it alleges are speculative. It seems unlikely that broadband providers will degrade Web services that people want and far more likely that they will use non-neutrality to charge for upgrading services that depend on fast and reliable delivery, such as streaming high-definition video or relaying data from heart monitors."

"Net neutrality is nothing but a solution looking for a problem. This kind of aggressive law-making would violate the principles of both the free market and common sense. Stepping in now could adversely affect taxpayers and consumers by stifling the development of the high-speed Internet services America needs to keep its economy growing and nation competitive," concluded Schatz.

Citizens Against Government Waste is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to eliminating waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement in government.

CONTACT: Alexa Moutevelis of CAGW, +1-202-467-5318

Web site: http://www.cagw.org/