Not even the mythical love child of Mary Lou Retton and Greg Louganis could execute a flip like Jeff Pulver did at the 10th anniversary VON show in Boston last month.

According to Network World, he blasted FCC Commish Deborah Tate’s idea of a federal regulation banning child pornography online. “Don’t let regulation get in the way of your innovation,” he told attendees, calling Tate’s proposal a “warning shot” by federal regulators.

If a rule against online child pornography is indeed a warning shot, then so-called Net neutrality regulations are a howitzer blast. Unfortunately, Pulver continues to embrace this unprecedented federal expansion into the Internet as not really an issue of regulation. Alas, he is not the only corporate chieftain pushing this view.

It’s time to disabuse this misconception once and for all. The main vehicle in Congress to codify online “neutrality” is S. 2917 (the Snowe-Dorgan bill). Section E of the bill is explicit about the need for new regulations, giving the FCC six months to prepare the rules for regulators and judges to enforce:

(e) Implementation - Not later than 180 days after the date of enactment of the Internet Freedom Preservation Act, the Commission shall prescribe rules to implement this section that–

(1) permit any aggrieved person to file a complaint with the Commission concerning any violation of this section; and

(2) establish enforcement and expedited adjudicatory review procedures consistent with the objectives of this section, including the resolution of any complaint described in paragraph (1) not later than 90 days after such complaint was filed, except for good cause shown.

Pulver and others may choose to call this something other than federal Internet regulation. But as the saying goes, even if 10,000 people call a duck a horse, it’s still a duck.