The Occupy (your city name here) movement has many issues it is trying to bring to light and one of them, as far as I can tell, is how the 99% overcome the rule of the 1% embodied in big government and big corporations. If they movement needs a recent win to be able to hold up and claim as it’s own, it has no further to look this morning than Longmont, Colorado.

In 2005, big corporations, (Comcast and Qwest), and big government, (the Colorado State Senate), conspired to pass a law that withheld from the citizens of every municipality in Colorado, the freedom to decide if they could/should be able to provide much needed broadband services, as a city, to it’s citizens. This law was particularly onerous for Longmont as the city already had an 18 mile fiber optic network in place and was using it to the benefit of it’s citizens. Big business and big government decided, no, you can no longer have free access to what you already own.

This morning, November 2nd 2011, the citizens of Longmont can congratulate themselves in overthrowing big business and big government right here in their hometown. Comcast launched it’s 2nd campaign in as many years to defeat the ballot issue that would keep broadband services in Longmont under their and CenturyLink’s (Qwest), control. Individual citizens did what they could, against an onslaught of spending by Comcast, (the final amount well be well north of $300K), to defeat big corporation’s intentions this time around. Good for you Longmont!

Now, we look to that excellent hometown organization, Longmont Power and COMMUNICATIONS :-) , to come up with a plan and execute it, to bring us much higher broadband speed, and better service, just as they have brought us electricity for a hundred years. They have already proven that they are capable and prudent with the funds they have available and I have no reason to think broadband services from them will be any different. Way to go Longmont! Once again, leading the way in the nation. You’ve given everyone something to celebrate this morning. In our little town, the 99%, (to be specific, 60% of the 99%), won the vote. Way to go!