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House Votes To Overturn FCC On Net Neutrality
suraj.sun writes with this quote from CNet:
"House Republicans voted unanimously today to block controversial Net neutrality regulations from taking effect, a move that is likely to invite a confrontation with President Obama. By a vote of 241 to 178, the House of Representatives adopted a one-page resolution that says, simply, the regulations adopted by the Federal Communications Commission on December 21 'shall have no force or effect.' 'Congress did not authorize the FCC to regulate in this area,' Rep. Rob Woodall (R-Ga.), said during this morning's floor debate. 'We must reject any rules that it promulgates in this area... It is Congress' responsibility to delegate that authority.'"
Today, the House voted to adopt the resolution (H. Res. 200) that will allow it to consider the actual resolution to overturn the regulation tomorrow. Note the words "Providing for consideration" in the title of the actual vote.
Granted, the House is still likely going to vote for the measure, but saying it's already passed is inaccurate.
The civil rights act of 1964 was passed primarily due to Republican support, over strenuous objections of Democrats.
That's a misleading half truth - ain't no "primarily" about it. In the house, 152 Democrats and 138 Republicans voted for the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In the Senate 44 Democrats and 27 Republicans voted to end the filibuster against the bill. Furthermore, votes were mostly correlated with region, not party with southern members of both parties voting against the bill and northern members of both parties voting for the bill.
However, the act was a turning point for both parties with many of those who did vote against it migrating to the Republican party and essentially chasing out the liberal faction. Afterwards Nixon adopted the "Southern Strategy" of race-baiting that has lasted in some form or another ever since.
Essentially any significant republican support for civil rights ended with that vote - most of the people who supported the act ended up being chased out of the republican party and bolstering the democratic party instead. That sequence of events does paint a pretty picture for republican party support of civil rights.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
You're talking almost half a century ago.
There certainly were a lot of Southern racists in the Democratic Party back then, but over that time they have abandoned the Democrats. Any that still might be around certainly left in 2008 when a black man became the head of the Democratic Party. Tell me, what self-respecting (sic) racist would be a member of a party that had a black man at the top?
And where do you think all the racists that left the Democratic Party went? Do you think they all moved to Montana to live in the back woods on armed compounds? No sir, the majority of them became Republicans. If you can come up with any other explanation for where the racists who left the Democratic Party went, I'd love to hear it.
Here's a quiz: There were 400+ Republican candidates for national office in 2010. How many of them do you think were black? If they're not the party of white people, then where are all the people of color?
You are welcome on my lawn.
quote from wikipedia:
As specified in section one of the Communications Act and as amended by the Telecommunications Act of 1996 (amendment to 47 U.S.C. 151) it is the FCC's mission to "make available so far as possible, to all the people of the United States, without discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, or sex, rapid, efficient, Nation-wide, and world-wide wire and radio communication services with adequate facilities at reasonable charges."[sic] The Act furthermore provides that the FCC was created "for the purpose of the national defense" and "for the purpose of promoting safety of life and property through the use of wire and radio communications."[2]
So the FCC making a statement that corporations must not create communication ghettos where only the wealthy get high speed access (that will be the top 20%) and the other 80% get second or third or tenth class access is part of their charter. The FCC wasn't established to support business.
Silly me. Of course, I only speak of some hypothetical dystopian future. I'm not saying there's any observed tendency of things like making unelected bureaucrats the arbiters of fairness, or enabling them to collect millions for indecency violations. And of course this is America, not some dictatorship like Canada where they might ban a song from the airwaves for sarcastically quoting a politically incorrect statement as a way of criticizing it. And the American government would never try to extend its broadcast control into paid content mediums like XM radio or cable tv either. I guess I'm just being paranoid. People who seek and attain authority are usually content with it; at least they don't continually try to expand it. I mean, when a government starts out just establishing official weights and measures, it is nice that they stick with just that, and they don't go expanding their purview to include food labeling, cigarette packaging (and even what can and can't be used as a brand name) or fat content. I'm also glad nobody tries to enact outright bans on fast food.
I'm sure someday excessive regulatory authority could lead to officials engaging in crony capitalism and abusing their authority in ways that happen to favor political allies, exempt favored groups from the more onerous requirements of their regulations, and/or handicap their friends' competitors, but you're right, that's not the kind of thing that regulatory authority has been known to open the door to in the past.
Sorry for bringing my tinfoil hattery into this.
Pi Ran Out