A "Fundamental Right" to WiFi???

Gavin Newsom is a complete idiot.

Reuters: S.F. mayor sees wireless service as basic right---

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, who became internationally known for his campaign a year ago to legalize gay marriage, on Monday said he considered wireless Internet access a fundamental right of all citizens.

Officials said 24 proposals had been turned into the city to deliver wireless Internet services, ranging from Web search company Google Inc., Cingular, the No. 1 U.S. wireless carrier, to Internet service provider EarthLink Inc..

Newsom told a news conference that he was bracing for a battle with telephone and cable interests along with state and federal regulators who he said are looking to derail a campaign by cities to offer free or low-cost municipal Wi-Fi services.

Wi-Fi is a short-range wireless technology that is now built into most laptop computers and is increasingly offered on handheld computers and certain mobile phones. Local officials are mulling plans to blanket every nook and cranny of this hilly city of 750,000 residents with universal Wi-Fi access.


"This is inevitable -- Wi-Fi. It is long overdue," Newsom told a news conference at San Francisco's City Hall. "It is to me a fundamental right to have access universally to information," he said.
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Making wireless access affordable to the entire population of San Francisco was a vital step to differentiating the city in order to make it more economically competitive on a state, national and global level, Newsom argued.

But the mayor also singled out the power of Wi-Fi as an alternative network to provide emergency information to all citizens in the event a natural disaster such as an earthquake were to strike the city and knock out other communications.

Thus, wireless access can be seen a basic right that should be available not just to business professionals but also lower-income citizens. "This is a civil rights issue as much as anything else," Newsom said.

The mayor said he had no exact figures on how much it would cost to build a wireless umbrella to cover the entire city, but cited various informal estimates that have ranged from $8 million to $16 million for antennas and other gear.

"My intent is to have the taxpayers pay little or nothing," Newsom said of the municipal wireless project. (Emphasis added)

What's next? A fundamental right to digital cable or cellular phones or Mercedes? Wi-Fi internet is not necessary for survival.

But what do you expect from a far-Left Lib . . . and in San Francisco, of all places.

How about a "fundamental right" to stupidity? Gavin Newsom has that one squared away.

(Curtsy to Drudge)