Tim Karr of SavetheInternet.com reports that the Right's blogfather, Glenn Reynolds of Instapundit, has come out in support of Net Neutrality:

“A lot of people on the right who don’t favor Net Neutrality, or are skeptical of it, are worried that it’s going to lead to regulating Internet providers as common carriers the way that you regulate the telephone companies and that that’s a bad idea.

“I understand the point but the fact is that most of them are common carriers, the telephone company that provides my DSL certainly are already. And the genius of the Internet has been that it is a level playing field. When you go to visit my site, when you go to visit the New York Times site, when you go to visit MoveOn.org or whatever, they’re sort of all out there in the same place and you can seemlessly go from one to another and that really does elevate the little guy.

“And the concern, which I think is completely legitimate, is that if big sites can engage in what’s basically payola for better treatment people will start visiting them more because they load faster and start paying less attention to troublesome little guys such as myself because our sites don’t load as well, don’t display as well, and don’t play on the same field.”

For the context of these words and more, check out Karr's post.

As always, a disclosure that I'm actively working with the Open Internet Coalition to help promote a free and open Internet. Natch.

UPDATE 6:07 PM: A fellow traveler on the World Wide Web points out that Glenn Reynolds has supported Net Neutrality for quite some time. That's solid.

Last night I blogged about this CNN piece on the divide being dug between The White House and bloggers due to the Senate's amnesty bill.

And now the Right's blogfather, Glenn Reynolds of Instapundit, has this to say:

BACK WHEN WE INTERVIEWED RNC CHAIR KEN MEHLMAN LAST YEAR, Helen's first question to Mehlman was something along the lines of Why is President Bush acting like a Democrat?

The GOP lost, Mehlman has moved on, but the Bush Administration is still acting like Democrats -- even to the point of complaining about the "Right-Wing Blathersphere."

Do they want whining from Michael Chertoff and Trent Lott to form the public image of the Bush Administration and the Republican Party?

Apparently they do. Good luck with that, guys. The political press can run with stories about bloggers being in full revolt over immigration, but it's not really a case of bloggers vs. the Administration. Rather, it's a case -- like Harriet Miers, Dubai Ports, PorkBusters, etc. -- of the Bush Administration ignoring the clear warnings available in the blogosphere. And once again, it's not just bloggers who think the Administration is crazy. So far, every time they've done that they've had their head handed to them. That'll happen this time, too, and if they should happen to "win" and pass their bill, the consequences for the GOP will be even worse. "Bizarre Republican Death Wish?" Indeed.

Frankly, that's okay with me. I've long been unhappy with both Democrats and Republicans. The GOP has been better on national security, though that advantage is fading with time, but overall both parties have been lame and more likely to unite in opposition to citizens' rights and liberties than to compete in protecting them. I've often at least sort-of hoped for a third party that would combine the GOP economic-libertarian strands with the Dems' social-libertarian strands. I don't know if the GOP's self-destruction makes that more likely, but it seems like it might. At any rate, if people really want to commit suicide it's hard to stop them, and that seems to be the GOP's main goal at the moment.

It's been a bad weekend for the GOP in the modern world. Some sort of damage control would be extremely helpful.