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Congressman Introduces Bill To Limit FCC Powers

Posted by timothy on from the but-regulators-are-perfect-and-righteous dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Representative Bob Latta (R-OH) introduced a bill on Wednesday that would limit the FCC's power to regulate ISPs in a supposed effort to keep the internet free. The bill's text is currently not available on the Library of Congress webpage or on congress.gov, but a purported copy has been spotted on scribd. Representative Latta's press release nevertheless indicates that the bill is intended to prevent the FCC from re-classifying ISPs as common carriers under Title II. Latta is one of the 28 representatives who lobbied the FCC earlier this month and were shown to have received double the average monetary donations given to all House of Representative members from the cable industry over a two year period ending this past December."

15 of 176 comments (clear)

  1. Good Sign by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    If one of the largest telecom shills in congress is introducing anti-FCC legislation, this means the telecoms might be fearing a potential turn-around at the FCC.

    Just a month ago it seemed like this was all but impossible to think - maybe some home for REAL net neutrality rulings from the FCC?

    1. Re:Good Sign by penix1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I don't understand why Congress doesn't run afoul of the conflict of interest laws when they are allowed to write legislation that favors the ones funding their campaigns. It is a clear conflict of interest when you are writing laws that puts money in your own pocket. They should have to recuse themselves just like judges have to when they have a conflict of interest in a case. Can someone explain why this isn't a worse case than judges with a conflict considering how it is the law that judges are supposed to be interpreting?

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    2. Re:Good Sign by penix1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      This has nothing to do with capitalism. It is about legalized bribery. When you have someone profiting off the rules they make that is actually anti-capitalism since it is skewing the playing field for other entities in the market.

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    3. Re:Good Sign by sg_oneill · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I don't understand why Congress doesn't run afoul of the conflict of interest laws when they are allowed to write legislation that favors the ones funding their campaigns. It is a clear conflict of interest when you are writing laws that puts money in your own pocket. They should have to recuse themselves just like judges have to when they have a conflict of interest in a case. Can someone explain why this isn't a worse case than judges with a conflict considering how it is the law that judges are supposed to be interpreting?

      In most european/aust/nz countries, most of asia and good chunks of south america and africa, it would be called "Corruption". Belesconi went down for stuff far *less* brazen than what some congress too.These people belong in prison, not seats of power.

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    4. Re:Good Sign by ganjadude · · Score: 3, Insightful

      capitalism != crony capitalism

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    5. Re:Good Sign by penix1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Oh for fucks sake. TELECOM = Phone companies. He received donations from CABLE companies. Completely different tech, somewhat related industry.

      I agree that the cable companies aren't as regulated as the telcos however you left out one big thing in your rant above...

      Cable companies=telecom=phone company+Internet service provider+Content provider.

      They are indistinguishable these days since most if not all cable companies are providing VoiP as well as all the other internet related services. It is called "bundling". And the telcos are doing the same thing especially in the cellular area.

      So you are correct that to level the playing field you either should lift the regulation on the telcos or bring the cable providers under the same regulation.

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    6. Re:Good Sign by InfiniteBlaze · · Score: 5, Informative

      Exactly which cable company is NOT providing telephone service these days? They're telecoms now, plain and simple. The skirt around regulations by claiming "different technology", but it serves the same purpose, and seems like the same thing to the general public. It would seem you're against strict regulation. What will keep telecommunications providers from inspecting every packet that crosses their wires and holding up smaller businesses for protectio...I mean, transit fees? If I pay for 50Mbps bandwidth, and Netflix pays their provider for 50Tbps of bandwidth, but Comcast decides they should be making more money, what stops them from throttling Netflix traffic in exchange for more money? Streaming a video might take...2-3Mbps, right? The number crunchers at Comcast, though, see that Netflix traffic on their network takes up some 50%+ of the total traffic, and they want to ride the gravy train. So, they'll hold up Netflix for more dough, and Netflix will pass on the upcharge to their customers - making Netflix look like the bad guy to people who don't understand how it all works. Shady stuff, man, and we shouldn't give that kind of power to Comcast or At&t or anyone else.

    7. Re:Good Sign by Travis+Mansbridge · · Score: 3, Informative

      Free market capitalism implies competition. From Comcast's own announcement regarding their merger with TWC (http://corporate.comcast.com/comcast-voices/comcast-and-time-warner-cable-file-applications-and-public-interest-statement-with-fcc):

      "Comcast and TWC do not compete against each other in any area"

      We suffer from a cartel among service providers who keep their prices high and their service lousy by foregoing competition, and regulation is necessary to prevent this.

    8. Re:Good Sign by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Capitalism is about free market where all competitors are on the same playing field. If one player can make or change laws in his own favor, it isn't a free market anymore. How dumb are you?

    9. Re:Good Sign by stenvar · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I don't understand why Congress doesn't run afoul of the conflict of interest laws

      Conflict of interest laws apply to judges and civil servants because they are not elected.

      For elected officials, we have a much simpler and more direct way of getting rid of them: we vote for someone else.

      You want to get rid of some other district's elected representative because you don't like what they are saying or doing? Tough sh*t, democracy doesn't work like that.

    10. Re:Good Sign by fnj · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Almost all countries, socialist or not, are riddled with corruption. It is a human characteristic for humans in a position of power to fall into corruption.

      But I'll tell you one country which is not rotting from the head. You're not going to like it, because it is socialist. I am talking about the Republic of Uruguay; specifically of President José Mujica. He is an almost unique example of an uncorrupt leader of a nation. He declined to take up residence in the presidential palace and lives instead on an austere farm and cultivates flowers there. His transportation? Not the armored rolling palace of an Obama, but a 1987 VW beetle! His net worth on taking office was $1800, and he donates 90% of his presidential salary to the public welfare. He lives on the remaining $800 a month.

      He has also overseen the legalization of marijuana, which Obama is too corrupt to do.

      So I'm not sure I can show you a country, socialist or not, which is not sorrupt, but I sure can show you a socialist leader who is not corrupt.

  2. Does anyone actually believe this? by Kuroji · · Score: 4, Informative

    The congresscritters are owned by lobbyists at this point, without question. Lock, stock, and barrel.

    Even if things don't go the way they want, they'll just keep introducing legislation to try and get what their masters want. CISPA is the most blatant example of this.

  3. Just another show of American Oligarchs by Greg666NYC · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Power and Money have no borders. USA, North Korea or Russia makes no difference for oligarchs. They want it all and don't care where the peasants live. As long they are compliant, work hard for a small change and don't ask too much in return. Welcome to XXI century where oligarchs around the world hold hands together.

  4. Isn't it sad? by Opportunist · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Be honest now. When you read this, and how a congressman was trying to limit the power of the FCC, the entity that tried to eliminate net neutrality just recently, did you think "yay" or was your first thought "now how is this going to be used to fuck us over"?

    Am I the only one who feels like ANY kind of law being introduced today is aiming at screwing the average voter over in favor of the interest of a few corporations?

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  5. Contact Bob Latta by whistlingtony · · Score: 5, Informative

    http://latta.house.gov/contact/ His number is Washington DC is Phone: (202) 225-6405. His Ohio toll free number is 800-541-6446.

    Send him an email, or ring him. Please be polite.