Blair Levin, the man in charge of the FCC's national broadband plan, wasn't impressed with the first round of requested comments on how best to achieve our national broadband goals. According to Levin, "sloppiness" and the "lack of seriousness and purpose" in most comments weren't useful to the agency in formulating a plan. "There's actually very little in the 8,500-something pages that moves the ball forward," Levin said.

Consumer group Free Press quickly piled on, complaining that the dull and useless comments were mostly the work of incumbent carriers who like things the way they are. While carriers certainly want taxpayer money, notes the group, they don't want regulation -- and aren't particularly eager to admit broadband competitive and deployment shortcomings.

"Incumbents have the largest pool of resources and broadband data at their fingertips, but their comments offer nothing more than the same old tired pro-deregulation arguments," says Derek Turner at Free Press. "It is clear from their recommendations that the phone and cable companies want the national broadband plan to simply be a ‘do-nothing’ plan -- a strategy that has already proven to be an epic failure for consumers.

It's interesting to see Levin complain about broadband comments that contain vague consensus but offer no specific detail, since as we noted yesterday, that can also be said of recent media interviews by new FCC boss Julius Genachowski. Levin has until February to craft a plan, and not too surprisingly, he's finding that empty rhetoric about the miracles of innovation aren't helpful.