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What Happens When States Have Their Own Net Neutrality Rules? (bloomberg.com)
Last month FCC Chairman Ajit Pai dismantled Obama-era rules on net neutrality. A handful of lawmakers in liberal-leaning U.S. states plan to spend this year building them back up. FCC anticipated the move -- the commission's rules include language forbidding states from doing this, warning against an unwieldy patchwork of regulations. But lawmakers in New York and California aren't aiming to be exceptions to the national rules; they're looking to, in effect, create their own. From a report: In New York, Assemblywoman Patricia Fahy introduced a bill that would make it a requirement for internet providers to adhere to the principles of net neutrality as a requirement for landing state contracts. This would mean they couldn't block or slow down certain web traffic, and couldn't offer faster speeds to companies who pay them directly. Fahy said the restrictions on contractors would apply even if the behaviors in question took place outside New York. She acknowledged that the approach could run afoul of limits on states attempting to regulate interstate commerce, but thought the bill could "thread the needle." Even supporters of state legislation on net neutrality think this may go too far. California State Senator Scott Wiener introduced a bill this week that would only apply to behavior within the state, saying any other approach would be too vulnerable to legal challenge.
But this wouldn't be the first time a large state threw around its weight in ways that reverberate beyond its borders. The texbook industry, for instance, has long accommodated the standards of California and Texas. [...] The internet doesn't lend itself cleanly to state lines. It could be difficult for Comcast or Verizon to accept money from services seeking preferential treatment in one state, then make sure that its network didn't reflect those relationships in places where state lawmakers forbade them, said Geoffrey Manne, executive director of the International Center for Law & Economics, a research group.
But this wouldn't be the first time a large state threw around its weight in ways that reverberate beyond its borders. The texbook industry, for instance, has long accommodated the standards of California and Texas. [...] The internet doesn't lend itself cleanly to state lines. It could be difficult for Comcast or Verizon to accept money from services seeking preferential treatment in one state, then make sure that its network didn't reflect those relationships in places where state lawmakers forbade them, said Geoffrey Manne, executive director of the International Center for Law & Economics, a research group.
Good! If the citizens of California and New York feel these rules are necessary and important they should be able to dictate such rules as they see fit.
That was, once upon a time, the magic of America, applying bottom up legislation allows for what works in specific areas to be applied and for other areas to not be applied.
It's time to go back to an anti-federalist interpretation of the federal government.
You forgot that people are only anti-federalist when the feds do something they don't like, but all for the Feds to exert their power to prevent states form doing something they don't like.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Republicans are for states rights, unless the states pass laws they don't like.
Democrats are for states rights, unless the states pass laws they don't like.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
"The internet doesn't lend itself cleanly to state lines. It could be difficult for Comcast or Verizon to accept money from services seeking preferential treatment in one state, then make sure that its network didn't reflect those relationships in places where state lawmakers forbade them, said Geoffrey Manne, executive director of the International Center for Law & Economics, a research group."
No. It's not "difficult" for Comcast, Verizon, etc to know where their property is and under what jurisdiction it is. It's not "difficult" at all.
You can't have your cake (we don't know what going on on our networks) and eat it too (we know exactly who is using our networks, pay up).
Big business has shoved these changes through, despite the wishes of the end users. Now as a result, they aren't going to have to deal with one set of regulations, they will have to deal with 50 sets of differing regulations and the resulting lawsuits when they screw up.
It couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of guys.
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
The ability of the states to implement taxes is not abridged, though.
Notwithstanding anything recorded in the Federal Registry, any person, collection of persons, or legal entity providing internet protocol communication services within the borders of Californian shall be taxed yearly for the market value of any equipment the the Attorney General determines is being used to throttle packet rates based upon the packets origin.
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
States and cities make decisions about which businesses get to run cables on property owned by those states and cities. There are many requirements that businesses must meet to run such cables. Why not make net neutrality such a requirement? The city or state is not regulating that business. That business is free to choose not to run their cable in the right-of-way and shit on net neutrality. But, if they want that contract, they have to meet the standards of the property owners.
Stick that in your FCC.
The preemption doctrine has been around for a long time, and has been consistently upheld by the Supreme Court: once the feds decide to regulate, states may also regulate only to the extent and in ways that Congress specifies. With the default case being, if Congress doesn't specify, the states can't regulate.
For example, the Clean Air Act explicitly gives California authority to set tougher-than-federal emission standards for some things (cars in particular) -- it's right there in the statute. Other states are given authority to choose between the federal standard or the California standard where they are different, but no other state can make up its own standard.
Actually, it is the other states that are imposing their own form of bat-shit craziness on New York and California, which are merely the targets of your ire because you fully embrace the flawed agenda of the faux-conservative right-wing Republicans. It was the same with same-sex marriage. States like Alabama and Kansas went out of their way to attack liberals, declaring they would not recognize the actions, even the Civil Unions of other states. A serious violation of the Constitution. They even sought to use California's public referendum to achieve such discrimination. Which said success should tell you something, as well as their failures in courts.
It's actually the Republicans who refuse to work with those who don't toe the party line. And they have nothing to offer, notice how they spent years declaiming for an ACA repeal, but never got around to offering an alternative. They couldn't even stand to hold meetings and discussions on it, let alone have a debate. Same with their tax cuts.
And let's really recognize the truth, the Republican members of state legislatures across the country have been in big Telecom's pocket, doing everything they can to prevent municipal ISPs, opposing accountability for big corporations, and handing them even more tax dollars for nothing.
Sorry, but it's the truth, and any declarations otherwise are as false as Trump's Voter Integrity Commission.
It's OK though, as long as rampant gerrymandering and voter discrimination is allowed, the GOP can screw America.
Why is it bad that the people always favor things that they would like?
I think the point that "Registered Coward" was trying to make is that you have a bunch of "anti-federalists" who claim to object to actions by the Federal government on principle, but who will then happily endorse Federal action when it's in favor of their own pet politics. Basically, he's accusing people of hypocrisy.
Like you have people who are pro-gun, who don't like the idea of the Federal government doing any gun control because it's "Federal overreach". They want gun regulations, if there are any, to be set by the state. They argue that it makes more sense because the culture around guns and the need for a gun in Wyoming may be very different than in Washington D.C., so the people in Washington shouldn't make rules for Wyoming. Ok. Fair enough. I wouldn't necessarily say that's the end of the discussion, but it's a valid point.
But then those same people will propose a Federal law mandating that a gun permit from any state should be honored in all states. Basically, if Wyoming allows any random idiot without training to carry a concealed weapon, they want the Federal government to intervene and tell every other state to allow those same idiots to carry a concealed weapon. It's still the Federal government trying to override the state's decisions on gun control, but when the Federal government is overriding the states in a way they like, they're fine with it. Ergo, the objection to "Federal overreach" is not based on any principle. It's really just that they don't like what the federal government is doing, so they're making up fake "principles" for rhetorical purposes.
Not that there aren't genuine libertarians and anti-federalists, but a lot of the "libertarians" aren't libertarians, and the "anti-federalists" aren't opposed to federal action. A lot of them are a bunch of crybabies who are making up nonsense because they aren't getting their way.