The Lawmaker's Dilemma

Reading economic papers on network neutrality and discussing the issues in class made me to wonder how lawmakers manage to get anything done. The issues are deep, complex, and spans multiple fields including technology economics, and politics. As a computer scientist I have a fairly deep understanding of the technical issues behind net neutrality and the effects of such regulation on software companies and network providers from that perspective, but I admit ignorance on most of the economic arguments brought to bear by Yoo, Lessig, and others. Interestingly, in one Berkeley paper I read I found significant fault with several of the technical issues mentioned along with their interpretation in the debate.

A lawmaker with potentially limited understanding of the issues, or, more importantly, the ramifications of his or her decisions, seems to have no way of rendering a correct verdict given the conflicting views presented by different schools of thought on net neutrality. If the intellectuals can't come to a solid agreement, should lawmakers be expected to succeed where the experts have failed? To me, this foray into politics further strengthened my position that a government should seek to be as minimal as possible while ensuring the rights of the people. Net neutrality is too complex, the consequences of legislation too difficult to predict. Let a good strong economic engine flesh out the issues before executive action is taken.