Net neutrality is back in the news, after President Barack Obama's Nov. 10 proposal for "the strongest possible rules to protect net neutrality."

Net neutrality is the idea that Internet service providers (like Comcast and Verizon) treat all web content equally. Net neutrality supporters say Internet service should operate like electricity: Consumers pay a fee and get equal access to the whole Internet. Internet service providers want financial arrangements that would give some websites prioritized access to Internet users. Proponents of net neutrality worry that websites that are able and willing to pay service providers for prioritized access would have an unfair advantage over smaller operations. That's where Obama comes in. Obama said the Federal Communications Commission should "reclassify" service providers as common carriers, treated as public utilities. Sen. Ted Cruz said Obama's net neutrality "puts the government in charge of determining Internet pricing, terms of service and what types of products and services can be delivered." But Obama said he doesn't want the FCC to regulate Internet prices, and the FCC typically does not regulate prices for similar things, like phone services.

Republican House work

One of the most frequent arguments offered by Republicans to demonstrate how hard they're working is to point out that there are over 300 bills passed by the House that await action in the Senate. In 11 of the past 19 Congresses, more than 300 bills were waiting for Senate action by the time the Congress completed its work. There was a big spike in the number of bills ignored by the Senate - more than 700 - when the Democrats controlled both chambers. It works the other way too. Lots of bills are passed by the Senate that the House ignores - currently 70. There's a big drop-off in the number of bills that the Senate passed over to the House. It's safe to guess that the drop-off is linked to the increase in use of cloture votes in the 110th Congress. More filibustering means fewer bills pass. This Congress has introduced fewer bills than most past Congresses and put far fewer in front of the president to sign.

Who's spending less on defense?

Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who is considering running for president, says the U.S. is at risk because "Our spending on defense has declined 21 percent over four years." But that includes war funding, which has declined now that combat troops are out of Iraq and are leaving Afghanistan. The base defense budget, which does not include war funding, has declined by a more modest 6 percent (12 percent when adjusted for inflation) from a post-World War II high set in fiscal year 2010. Perry's selective use of data distorts the scope of the cuts by comparing today's total defense spending with fiscal year 2010, when the U.S. was fighting two wars.

Chip Tuthill is a Masncos resident. Websites used: factcheck.org and washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker