It's not a perfect analogy, but as the old saying goes... "If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara desert, in 5 years there would be a shortage of sand".
The internet already exists. All of today's problems are minor in scope to the original problems of connecting the nation together. Why turn it over the government now?
What's your stance ? That's a very valid question regarding relationships between individuals, with the law and authorities in one group.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_trade#Current_Restriction...
Customers would then be able to pick and choose their carrier and carriers would be forced to compete based upon service. Not happy with ISP A? Call up ISP B, sign up, and they'll put in a ticket to a tech at the facility to patch you over from ISP A to ISP B instead.
I realize, of course, that this a fantasy that will never happen.
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2010/03/how-amsterdam-was...
We could have a FRAND like situation, where backbone network entities has to sign a Reasonable and non-discriminatory agreement regarding traffic flows. FRAND like systems has it own set of issues, but it has also clear benefits.
Government is the second obvious one. As with roads, government benefit greatly from improved infrastructure. All roads do not benefit from being toll-roads, especially when the traffic flow can radically change overnight. Who knows where the next youtube will be, or if google will move the servers suddenly after a SOPA directive is voted in.
Lastly, government could loosen their total control of the electromagnetic spectrum. Doing so would enabled a true global mesh network to be built, giving anyone with a receiver/transmitter the ability to participated. So long government claims to own the communication layer in the air, I will hold them responsible for the current communication issues in the cables.