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Even by his own standards, President Obama’s case for net neutrality borders on idiotic.

The president says Internet service should be treated like a basic utility — which is defensible. But then he says bandwidth providers must treat all users exactly alike, all the time, and that will make everyone better off.

It won’t. Which is why utilities don’t act that way.

Power companies, for example, charge different rates to residential customers, small commercial users and large industrial users.

Water utilities often — and rightly — charge higher rates to customers who use huge volumes. This encourages conservation.

The president and other advocates of net neutrality like to compare Internet service to the highways. They claim they don’t want consumers to have to pay tolls or get stuck on gravel roads. Apparently they have missed the past quarter-century of transportation policy innovation.

High Occupancy Toll (HOT) lanes, once derided as “Lexus Lanes,” are now a proven method of reducing congestion — and not just for those who pay extra to use them. When someone uses a HOT lane, he or she leaves the regular lanes, thereby making traffic flow more smoothly in those lanes as well.