This week, Columbia law professor Tim Wu announced that he’s running for lieutenant governor of New York. Wu is the guy who invented the term net neutrality, so this is exciting news.
Wu is a lot like you and me. He doesn’t want to allow fast lanes on the internet. He doesn’t like how big telecom companies take advantage of the American people. He does want to block the Comcast-Time Warner Cable merger. And as New York’s lieutenant governor, he actually could, since Time Warner Cable has substantial business operations in the state.
The campaign won’t be easy. Along with his running mate, Fordham law professor Zephyr Teachout, who’s running for governor, Wu is challenging incumbent Andrew Cuomo and his choice for lieutenant governor, Kathy Hochul. Teachout and Wu say they’re going to take a more progressive approach and point out how Cuomo’s been leaning too far to right lately. It certainly helps their cause that one of the hottest issues in the news this season — net neutrality, of course — is one that Wu’s famous for spearheading. He did invent the phrase, after all.
We’ll be watching Wu as he takes his forward-thinking views on the internet to the floor of the political arena. Again, it’s going to be a tough fight. Wu’s doing it for all the right reasons though. “You can expect a progressive-style, trust-busting kind of campaign out of me,” he recently told the Washington Post. “And I fully intend to bridge that gap between the kind of typical issues in electoral politics and questions involving private power.”
Sounds good, Tim! If you’re eager to hear more about Wu’s leanings, he’ll be testifying before Congress about net neutrality on Friday. Watch for our coverage. [Washington Post, BuzzFeed]
Picture: Tim Wu