Don Libes has a very long post (it's actually an entire press release and more from Verizon) about the reasons why Verizon is suing Montgomery County, Maryland. It is difficult to know who is the good guy and who is the bad guy in all this. I mean, Montgomery County is notoriously corrupt, so it is difficult to believe anything the county says through its officials. Nevertheless, e-Week.com quotes Mont. Co.'s Marylin Praisner saying:

"Verizon just doesn't want to play by the same rules: They haven't submitted a franchise application," Praisner said, adding that when Verizon representatives appeared before her committee, she was told that the company would submit a franchise application, but so far that hasn't happened.

Praisner said that if Verizon didn't like the standard franchise agreement that other cable operators have signed, they could have red-lined the parts they didn't like, and submitted the changed version for negotiation, but she said the company hasn't done that, either.

"I don't think it's rocket science," Praisher said. "Verizon really doesn't want to play by those same rules. This is about a cable franchise; that's the arena in which they want to play."

But if Ms. Praisner is right and this really is all Verizon's fault, I need to ask: why did Anne Arundel County, Maryland just approve a franchise for Verizon under the same federal regulations and similar (if not identical) county cable franchising regulations? Unanimously!?