The Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) program (i.e., A, A*, and A+) for most beneficiary countries, i.e., other than those listed as African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) beneficiary countries, will expire on December 31, 2010, unless a law extending it is enacted.

Congress should spend its lame-duck session passing an R&D tax credit and a simplified cybersecurity bill overhauling the Federal Information Security Management Act and setting a uniform policy for data breaches, TechAmerica lobbyists said Monday on a conference call. The lame-duck session will last three weeks and will be dominated by budget issues as well as discussion of extending the expiring Bush tax cuts, said TechAmerica President Phil Bond. Odds are improving for a temporary extension of some tax cuts, he said, since a slow economy is a bad time to raise rates. Reinstating the R&D credit should be a “no-brainer,” said Bond, noting that the loss of the credit threatens 100,000 jobs. He also predicted that passage of a comprehensive cybersecurity bill will be more difficult next year because Congress will be divided. Current bills in the Senate will not pass during the lame duck but a limited bill revamping FISMA and establishing data breach provisions has bipartisan support and could pass, Bond said. There are provisions to overhaul FISMA in the 2010 Department of Defense authorization bill in the House, he added, and a similar provision in S-3480, the Lieberman-Collins cybersecurity bill. Bond said he’s hopeful that Congress will pass something during the lame duck. He gave mixed reviews to President Barack Obama’s tech agenda in the first two years of his term. The industry appreciates that the president has promoted high tech but disagrees with him about taxes, Bond said. He said Obama has performed much better on matters such as broadband and spectrum issues that he has more control over than Congress than he has on others.

Congress should spend its lame-duck session passing an R&D tax credit and a simplified cybersecurity bill overhauling the Federal Information Security Management Act and setting a uniform policy for data breaches, TechAmerica lobbyists said Monday on a conference call. The lame-duck session will last three weeks and will be dominated by budget issues as well as discussion of extending the expiring Bush tax cuts, said TechAmerica President Phil Bond. Odds are improving for a temporary extension of some tax cuts, he said, since a slow economy is a bad time to raise rates. Reinstating the R&D credit should be a “no-brainer,” said Bond, noting that the loss of the credit threatens 100,000 jobs. He also predicted that passage of a comprehensive cybersecurity bill will be more difficult next year because Congress will be divided. Current bills in the Senate will not pass during the lame duck but a limited bill revamping FISMA and establishing data breach provisions has bipartisan support and could pass, Bond said. There are provisions to overhaul FISMA in the 2010 Department of Defense authorization bill in the House, he added, and a similar provision in S-3480, the Lieberman-Collins cybersecurity bill. Bond said he’s hopeful that Congress will pass something during the lame duck. He gave mixed reviews to President Barack Obama’s tech agenda in the first two years of his term. The industry appreciates that the president has promoted high tech but disagrees with him about taxes, Bond said. He said Obama has performed much better on matters such as broadband and spectrum issues that he has more control over than Congress than he has on others.

The effort to build a national public safety network “will be set back years, if not decades,” if Congress gives public safety the 700 MHz D-block, said former NTIA head John Kneuer. In an op-ed Friday for political journalism website The Daily Caller, he urged the FCC to make good on its National Broadband Plan recommendation to commercially auction the spectrum. Congress is unlikely to act during the lame duck session, he said. “It takes a lot of money to build networks, and … the government doesn’t have a lot of it.” Kneuer said a D-block auction would raise “billions” of dollars for the U.S. Treasury, produce “billions more in job-creating private investment,” and improve homeland security. Kneuer, a senior partner of Fairfax Media, consults for T-Mobile.

The International Trade Commission announces that a section 337 patent-based complaint has been filed regarding certain turbomachinery blades, engines, and components thereof.

The FCC will postpone by a half year the deadline for broadcasters and cable operators to be able to pass along emergency alerts using new standards from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said commission and industry officials. The deadline to implement Common Alerting Protocol at radio and TV stations and cable systems is 180 days after FEMA finalized CAP, which was Sept. 30, putting the deadline at the end of March. A draft FCC order likely to be finalized soon extends the time to Sept. 30, 2011, agency and industry officials said. The delay had been expected (CD Oct 5 p1).

The government failed consumers by not intervening in retransmission consent disputes, including the recent battle between Fox and Cablevision, Mediacom CEO Rocco Commisso told investors Monday. The FCC is tasked by the Cable Act with protecting consumers against unnecessary cable rate hikes, and it hasn’t, he said. “Shame on those who have the responsibility and are not willing to do anything about it,” he said. “It’s amazing to me, that the FCC in particular, who has been entrusted with having the responsibility to protect the consumers, goes out to look for authority to address theoretical issues on net neutrality, but always seems to find no authority to take care of consumers when it comes to retransmission consent,” he said.

Imposing net neutrality rules on wireless would be bad for the economy, CTIA said in replies to an FCC notice of inquiry seeking additional input on wireless and managed services. CTIA’s comments echoed those filed by many other industry players. A group of public interest groups led by Public Knowledge said the commission should accept that consensus will remain elusive on various net neutrality issues and it should act now to approve rules.

Broadband reclassification leads Public Knowledge’s list of regulatory priorities, President Gigi Sohn said at a meeting this week with FCC Wireless Bureau Chief Ruth Milkman. “PK believes that the FCC will be on the firmest legal ground to address broadband issues related to public safety, Universal Service, Lifeline/Linkup and other priorities in the National Broadband Plan if it classifies broadband Internet access as a telecommunications service under Title II of the Communications Act,” the group said in an ex parte filing. Sohn also discussed concerns over incentive auctions for broadcasters and the effect on the commission’s recent TV white spaces decision “and on low power TV stations, which are a major source of news and information for the Latino community,” the filing said. Sohn also raised net neutrality, a need for text messaging rules, wireless competition, and media issues including the Comcast-NBCU merger, the filing said.

Broadband reclassification leads Public Knowledge’s list of regulatory priorities, President Gigi Sohn said at a meeting this week with FCC Wireless Bureau Chief Ruth Milkman. “PK believes that the FCC will be on the firmest legal ground to address broadband issues related to public safety, Universal Service, Lifeline/Linkup and other priorities in the National Broadband Plan if it classifies broadband Internet access as a telecommunications service under Title II of the Communications Act,” the group said in an ex parte filing. Sohn also discussed concerns over incentive auctions for broadcasters and the effect on the commission’s recent TV white spaces decision “and on low power TV stations, which are a major source of news and information for the Latino community,” the filing said. Sohn also raised net neutrality, a need for text messaging rules, wireless competition, and media issues including the Comcast-NBCU merger, the filing said.