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Republicans Back Down, FCC To Enforce Net Neutrality Rules
An anonymous reader writes: Republican resistance has ended for the FCC's plans to regulate the internet as a public utility. FCC commissioners are working out the final details, and they're expected to approve the plan themselves on Thursday. "The F.C.C. plan would let the agency regulate Internet access as if it is a public good.... In addition, it would ban the intentional slowing of the Internet for companies that refuse to pay broadband providers. The plan would also give the F.C.C. the power to step in if unforeseen impediments are thrown up by the handful of giant companies that run many of the country's broadband and wireless networks." Dave Steer of the Mozilla Foundation said, "We've been outspent, outlobbied. We were going up against the second-biggest corporate lobby in D.C., and it looks like we've won."
I know its rather offtopic, but for non-US readers its relevant:
For anyone confused as to the situation of american politics in the past 8 years, the republican party has worked tirelessly to obstruct practically every piece of legislation after the ACA (healthcare legislation.) Theyve played a brinksmanship game with an artificially imposed budget limit, ironically created by them as a kudgel to complain about $cur_president's spending policies but with real power. This "debt ceiling" has been used twice to literally shut down the government. Mail didnt run, troops werent paid, contractors were furloughed, the FCC FTC and even the FDA were all deactivated not once, but twice in a bid to force the presidents hand to concede his high ground and allow their minority legislation to pass. this nihilism cost us 2 credit ratings and an estimated 24 billion dollars. Republicans gained nothing.
fast forward to 2015 when both our houses of legislature, the senate and congress, are now controlled by a gerrymandered republican electorate. The president is on his last term, something we call 'lame duck' and is now openly advocating for everything from free education to immigration reform policies. Republicans, with this control, still havent proposed an alternative to any legislation facing them, and wont even vote on major issues like campaign finance reform or immigration. whats worse, theyre still operating in a 2010 mindset of obstruct and destroy, so we're facing another brinksmanship game in which they threaten to stop funding for the Department of Homeland Security. about 240,000 employees would go unpaid, but be required to work, and every airport in the nation would likely experience a significant impact. Random government shutdowns have major repercussions in world markets that rely on a confident and reliable american government to back things like currencies and bonds.
so for republicans to back down on net neutrality is a serious step forward in a party that generally toes every corporate lobbyists hard line. Remember: theyre the party that apologized for inconveniencing BP during the largest oil spil in recent american history, and yet at this moment have conceeded to the will of the public.
Good people go to bed earlier.
"The internet has been largely unregulated and that has been a really good thing. Most of the growth and innovation we've seen has happened there."
This is not regulation of the Internet, but regulation of the means by which the Internet is accessed.
There are more than a few comparable regulatory actions which helped create the growth of the Internet. Significantly, there was the Carterphone action, which allowed modems to be connected to the Bell network, against their wishes. There was also state regulation of the Bells, which prevented them from charging exorbitant rates for those modem connections. There are the common carrier regulations, by which telco providers receive free or very low cost access to public rights-of-way, avoiding the costs of negotiating and renting land wherever they run their lines. Similarly with cable - they're given access to public rights of way and a monopoly position in exchange for being subject to regulation.
If any of them want to build out services entirely in the free market without making use of public resources, negotiating and paying for all access rights, then I'll support that service being unregulated.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
Oh look, yet another low info voter.
Gigi Sohn, a special counsel for Wheeler, said the text of the actually net neutrality rules are only 8 pages. She said the other pages responds to the millions of public comments, "as required by law."
https://twitter.com/GigiBSohnF...
There is a war going on for your mind.
There are only eight pages of new rules. The rest is explanation, history, legal justification, and commentary. More here: http://e-pluribusunum.com/2015...
Actually I do know what they are about to do. The FCC released a 4 page summary of what the regulations were going to accomplish earlier this month. Just because you have no idea what's going on doesn't mean the rest of us are as uninformed.
http://transition.fcc.gov/Dail...
There is a war going on for your mind.