If the editorial writers at the Washington Post had their way, the United States would forever be stuck with slow, expensive broadband that leaves entire parts of the country unconnected.

As the Federal Communications Commission, industry and tech groups, lawyers and lawmakers, advocacy organizations and the public try to restore our long-lost status as a world leader in broadband speed, price and adoption, the Washington Post would rather see us do -- nothing.

In an editorial published this morning, the paper chastised the FCC for proposing to “reclassify” broadband as a “telecommunications service,” rather than an “information service,” which was how broadband was classified before the Bush-era FCC changed it. The Obama FCC is following the accepted wisdom that reclassification will allow the agency to pursue plans to bridge the nation’s digital divide and protect Net Neutrality – the principle that stops Internet service providers from interfering with Internet content and online speech. The agency proposed the move after a federal court ruled last month that the FCC doesn’t have authority to regulate broadband under its existing framework.

Instead, the Post is recommending that the FCC intentionally remove itself from overseeing the nation’s dominant communications media for an indefinite period of time while Congress works it all out and industry groups monitor themselves like the good corporate citizens they’ve never been. In the interest of full disclosure on the Washington Post’s behalf, the paper also owns Cable One, an ISP.

The result of telling the FCC to do nothing is that it can’t make policies to help bring broadband to rural areas, low-income homes and disabled people. It can’t protect online privacy or make basic consumer protection rules against price-gouging. And it can’t ensure that ISPs don’t block or degrade online content. Meanwhile, we are sliding further behind our global competitors in every measure of broadband success.

Give us a break, WaPo. It’s depressing as hell that we already have to fight for the FCC’s right to simply do its job. Now we’ve got to contend with editorials like this one that prescribe a deregulated Internet future where the public suffers while corporations thrive.

Oh, and thanks, but no thanks, WaPo, for suggesting that consumers and industry watchdog groups like Free Press can just step right in to provide “healthy oversight” of ISPs in the interim if the FCC decides to accept the paper’s advice to walk off the job and Congress takes months to act. That’s like saying PTA’s should be put in charge of food safety for children, or Greenpeace should conduct oversight of underwater drilling safety.

The Washington Post needs to think hard about what’s really good for the health of our country, not for industry profits. And it certainly isn’t stagnation in broadband deployment or skyrocketing prices.

The Post does have one thing right: Broadband regulation does need help from Congress – in the form of supporting the FCC’s authority.