Sen. Al Franken gets serious on free speech, net neutrality

Sen. Al Franken started his career as a comedian, but he's dead serious about the issue of net neutrality. Appearing Monday at the Future of Music policy summit at Georgetown University in Washington, the Minnesota Democrat delivered an impassioned defense of net neutrality: the idea that broadband providers should generally treat legal web content equally, and should not discriminate against web-based services that might compete with their own offerings.

"Net neutrality is not a matter of needless government intervention," Franken said. "It is a necessary government response to ISPs voicing their support for a separate and unequal internet. Net neutrality doesn't interfere with the free market -- it protects the free market."