The
dot com bubble burst because of the Telecommunications Act of 1999.
This piece of legislation benefited the "Baby Bell" industries and
overturned the Telecommunications Act of 1996 that encouraged the robust
dot com boom in the 1990s. The Baby Bells heavily financed Bush's
warchest in 2000 and most people do not realize how big of an issue the
reunification of the Bell Telephone companies was at the end of the 20th
Century. Within a few years, MCI WorldCom was bankrupt and AT&T was
a withered husk with only its good name to offer to the highest bidder
for a few million dollars (Baby Bell SBC bought it and then changed its
name to AT&T) - only Sprint-Eathlink survived of the three major
long distance carriers. Bush delivered his promise to the Baby Bell
companies to give them back their monopoly on telephone service, and by
then, Americans were focused on wars and the Patriot Act. The dot com
boom was an unfortunate casualty in the telecom war - they made an
alliance with the wrong side. That is the story most people don't know
about it. I worked in the telecom lobby in DC in the late 1990s and
early 2000s.
