Court Rejects FCC Request To Delay Net Neutrality Case (thehill.com)

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Court Rejects FCC Request To Delay Net Neutrality Case (thehill.com)

Posted by BeauHD on Thursday January 17, 2019 @01:30PM from the full-steam-ahead dept.

A federal appeals court denied the FCC's request to postpone oral arguments in a court battle over the agency's decision to repeal its net neutrality rules. The FCC had asked for the hearing to be postponed since the commission's workforce has largely been furloughed due to the partial government shutdown. The hearing remains set for February 1. The Hill reports: After the FCC repealed the rules requiring internet service providers to treat all web traffic equally in December of 2017, a coalition of consumer groups and state attorneys general sued to reverse the move, arguing that the agency failed to justify it. The FCC asked the three-judge panel from the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals to delay oral arguments out of "an abundance of caution" due to its lapse of funding. Net neutrality groups opposed the motion, arguing that there is an urgent need to settle the legal questions surrounding the FCC's order.

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How about by Anonymous Coward · 2019-01-17 13:38 · Score: 1

Repeal of legal torture?
Do we need a whole bunch of fucking assholes to talk about that?
Or could we just repeal it?
Summary? by JBMcB · 2019-01-17 14:03 · Score: 3, Insightful

I've poked around and I can't find a good summary of the lawsuit. The claimants are saying it was unlawful for the FCC to repeal the network neutrality rules? Under what basis? There weren't rules, then there were, then there weren't. Did congress pass something instructing them to regulate network neutrality? Otherwise it seems pretty clear it's entirely up to the FCC.

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1. Re:Summary? by Anonymous Coward · 2019-01-17 14:25 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  There are quite a number of lawsuits pending on the subject, I'm not sure which one this story applies to.
  But most of them seem to hinge on arguing that (1) the FCC has a duty to protect consumers (the FTC having already announced that it can't do it, contrary to the FCC's assertion), and (2) it failed to follow proper procedures when it repealed the former regulation. At least one claimant also argues that (3) the FCC's justifications for abandoning NN vary from meaningless gibberish to outright lies, although it's not quite clear to me why that should be considered as a legal point rather than a political one.
  Whether these complaints have legs, I guess we'll find out - eventually.
2. Re:Summary? by SirAstral · 2019-01-17 14:34 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  The first problem is tribalism. It's okay when their side illegally or unconstitutionally does something... just not okay when those not on their side do the same.
  The second problem is...
  Congress cannot constitutionally grant any agency power to write regulations... they may only regulate with the laws congress wrote.
  Agencies at best can only ask/recommend for Congress to make regulations for them to enforce.
  Article 1 section 1
  "All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives."
  Many people have ignorantly and maliciously caused people to think that section 8 sub-section 18 allows congress to let agencies like the FCC to actually create regulation they can then enforce without Congress having to pass them and signed by the President.
  It is pretty much the same as if the Police were allowed to create laws to enforce whenever they like. Just imagine how much value there would be in corporations to buy police departments... like they currently like to "buy" agencies like the FCC?
3. Re:Summary? by Anonymous Coward · 2019-01-17 14:38 · Score: 1, Informative
  
  Here's the court documents
  http://apps.washingtonpost.com/g/documents/business/state-government-net-neutrality-brief/3178/
  Lets look at facts first.
  1: You have the FCC Chariman, a previous Verizon lobbyist, dancing in a christmas costume last year taunting the public on a youtube video which I believe was paid for with taxpayer money.
  2: You have a public comment period inwhich the FCC's website was flooded with bogus comments which the FCC has refused to release under FOIA so the public can inspect the data themselves to investigate the guilty.
  3: Internet based businesses making strong arguments about how broadband companies are being bought up by content producers who intend on forcing a closed market and restricting public access to information. Understand the entire reason Google dediced to force encyrption on the internet is to get rid of ISP's as competitors for consumer data but they also did a heck of a lot of good for privacy as well. There's a lot to this debate.
  The correct action is to impeach Ajit just on the Taunt video alone because that is utterly disrespectful of the public, elect a new representative, revert the unpopular rules and put through a new comment period and restart the process. Also, you need to get law enforcement in to investigate bribery, foreign government interference, and the performance of "grants" to ISP's and get appropriate charges filed.
  You do that, I think you're going to find a whole lot of bonafide unlawful behaivour.
  And I'll remind you, the Northeast just had a 911 outage because of a NIC Configuration issue. That has a body count. Know what else has a body count? Allowing foreign governments to use our media monopoly to engage in psychological warfare against the public. We've done it before, there are Vietnam Era operations manuals on how to do it up and online. This is not just for fun stuff here. There are consequences, in some cases dire consequences, to this discussion.
4. Re:Summary? by Anonymous Coward · 2019-01-17 15:36 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Why are you idiots playing sides with this issue when Net Neutrality was found to consistently have bipartisan support in many polls, unlike so many other current issues?
  We've all lost if we can't actually talk about issues anymore without saying "go away, [PERSON/GROUP I DON'T LIKE HERE], you're fucking crazy and you always will be."
5. Re:Summary? by Dragonslicer · 2019-01-17 16:34 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  I've poked around and I can't find a good summary of the lawsuit. The claimants are saying it was unlawful for the FCC to repeal the network neutrality rules? Under what basis? There weren't rules, then there were, then there weren't. Did congress pass something instructing them to regulate network neutrality? Otherwise it seems pretty clear it's entirely up to the FCC.
  The Administrative Procedure Act defines the rules and processes for an executive agency to enact, modify, or repeal regulations. If an agency does not follow the APA, the changes can be struck down by a court. That's why, for example, the EPA's removal of certain regulations was reversed by the courts; the EPA failed to show any fact-based reasoning for the changes. Whether or not the courts will rule same way regarding these changes by the FCC remains to be seen.
6. Re:Summary? by Dragonslicer · 2019-01-17 16:37 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  The second problem is... Congress cannot constitutionally grant any agency power to write regulations... they may only regulate with the laws congress wrote.
  Agencies at best can only ask/recommend for Congress to make regulations for them to enforce.
  Reality disagrees with you. Congress has, through laws legitimately passed by Congress, delegated the authority to make certain rules to executive agencies. You can go ahead and file lawsuits to get courts to agree to dissolve every executive agency, but I wouldn't bet any money on your success.
7. Re:Summary? by Anonymous Coward · 2019-01-17 17:14 · Score: 1
  
  Reality disagrees with you. Congress has, through laws legitimately passed by Congress, delegated the authority to make certain rules to executive agencies. You can go ahead and file lawsuits to get courts to agree to dissolve every executive agency, but I wouldn't bet any money on your success.
  Sometimes ultimate power, or close to it, allows ethical people to get good things done, but the problem is those like Donald Trump are hardly unique, and when you funnel more and more power into fewer and fewer hands, things turn real bad when someone like Donald gets power. We need less power effectively put at the whims of a few people. Probably we also need to stop allowing the speaker of the house or senate to stop votes on legislation.
  Maybe if you represent say 3/7ths of a body of congress then 3/7th of the time your allowed to hold a vote or similar. That would help prevent gridlock, and in the case of things like this idiot Trump shutdown, you would see some movement, which might eventually get you to an override on something.
8. Re:Summary? by Anonymous Coward · 2019-01-17 22:02 · Score: 1
  
  That does not mean that an agency can act arbitrarily. I'm not an expert on US law, but at least in my country every agency is duty bound to administer their respective areas in a transparent way and to be able to argue coherently for any policy they enact or procedure establish. You can't just go around changing things however you feel like without any factual basis - that's implicit in the mandate.
9. Re:Summary? by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · 2019-01-18 00:22 · Score: 1, Funny
  
  So Congress has, with the acquiescence of the courts, delegated its constitutional lawmaking to the executive branch, and for its judgement instead, and the courts, the third branch, issue judgement on whether the assigned executive branch, apolitical branch, exercised judgement is good enough to satisfy it, said value weighting, assigned by The People to the most closely controlled branch, now two freaking branches removed from what they specified, in writing.
  Just wondering if we were in a democracy anymore. Thanks for the answer.
  
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10. Re:Summary? by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · 2019-01-18 00:24 · Score: 1
  
  (And a thousand murderous dictators cheer your sentiment.)
  
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11. Re:Summary? by Dragonslicer · 2019-01-18 00:37 · Score: 1
  
  That does not mean that an agency can act arbitrarily. I'm not an expert on US law, but at least in my country every agency is duty bound to administer their respective areas in a transparent way and to be able to argue coherently for any policy they enact or procedure establish. You can't just go around changing things however you feel like without any factual basis - that's implicit in the mandate.
  You are correct. See my post below regarding the Administrative Procedure Act.
12. Re:Summary? by e3m4n · 2019-01-18 00:46 · Score: 1
  
  They should have NEVER existed in the first place. This was another classic example of Obummer thinking he was elected King, going around making new rules and side stepping the legislative branch every chance he got. It has set a precedence that should have never been allowed and now every president thereafter is constantly bypassing congress. Just like the Dreamers act. If you want something to be so, then legislate it. Period. Stop shirking your responsibilities and expecting the executive branch to be the “bad guy“ so you don’t risk losing an election. That’s what cowardly fucks do. All these goddamn states suing the executive branch, when all they have to do is get their goddamn congressman and Senators to pass a fucking law, is ridiculous. If there was a law and the executive branch chose not to enforce it, then you’d have a right to sue the executive branch. You don’t have a right to sue the executive branch for failing to make a law. The case should be dismissed purely on a lack of standing.
13. Re:Summary? by e3m4n · 2019-01-18 00:57 · Score: 1
  
  Making policies based on theoretical possibilities is beyond the scope of their mandate. You would have to prove that the consumer was being harmed. Even these theoretical worst case scenario‘s only serve to harm companies like Facebook and Netflix not the end-user. I’m not saying that rule shouldn’t be made to prevent a problem, but that’s where Congress steps in and not the FCC. In theory someone could violate every FCC rule on issues of language and nudity during a live broadcast. Why doesn’t the FCC flat out just ban live broadcast then? Same reason. You could also theoretically electrocute yourself pissing in a wall outlet. I don’t see any rules requiring us to have those child protection caps on wall outlets to make sure that people don’t fucking piss in them.
  These federal agencies are supposed to only step in when there is clear evidence of abuse. Their rules and mandate should be limited to the scope of the abuse. We cannot have an elected bureaucrats creating legislation. You surrender your democracy when you do shit like that. What’s next? Banning all vehicles because car emissions are linked to cancer? Banning smart phones because the EM radiation from the displays cause sleeplessness? You can’t have a panel of six people deciding what’s best for the entire goddamn world without the rest the world having input and an accountability system to fire them if the rest the world disagrees with them.
14. Re:Summary? by e3m4n · 2019-01-18 01:03 · Score: 1
  
  And youre OK with this? They are elected officials. If they go around passing laws to delegate the rights to legislate, which is outside the scope of the constitution, you fucking fire their ass and replace them with somebody who will not do that shit. Why are so many people so eager to piss away their democracy? If your senator or congressman does something unconstitutional you fucking call them on it. If they continue to do that you fucking replace them. Why is this so hard to understand? Because too many sheep let them get away with it.
15. Re:Summary? by e3m4n · 2019-01-18 01:15 · Score: 1
  
  I could not agree more with your statement about tribalism. Though I try to not use –ism. The other word they used to describe this is whataboutism. That’s just the way of vilifying your opponent when he exposes you for being a fucking hypocrite. Just use the original word for it, hypocrisy. There used to be this proverb about people living in glass houses and throwing stones. All I ever see now is a bunch of shattered ass windows. It’s that tribal mentality that removes accountability from our elected officials. We are so afraid of the other party that we continuously overlook the wretched stench coming off our own candidates. Why is the concept lesser of two evils even acceptable? You’re telling me out of a population of 700 million we can only find two candidates ? Clearly this design was orchestrated and embraced by all sides. Just like they’re punishing people for handing out copies of the constitution at universities, I soon suspect that the book 1984 will find itself on the ban list.
16. Re:Summary? by e3m4n · 2019-01-18 01:27 · Score: 1
  
  It is my understanding that the EPA rules were based on actual environmental disasters not theoretical what if‘s. Each policy that they created was based on the case study of an actual environmental event. The net neutrality rules were based on a fear that stemmed from a patent filing to charge for faster access. Microsoft filed a patent for the Xbox One that would count how many people are in the room watching a pay-per-view. If the number of people exceeded what was deemed the size of a family, it would suspend playback until you called and paid more money. I have yet to see a legislation banning that nor have I seen that actually get implemented. For all we know, as hard as it is to believe, the patent was filed to prevent somebody else from doing that.
  To put this in perspective, in the late 70s and early 80s most Americans were getting screwed over by AT&T Bell. The FTC is already charged with antitrust oversight. Yet the FTC did the right thing and kicked it back to Congress requesting legislation to break them up. This is what should be happening.
17. Re:Summary? by Dragonslicer · 2019-01-18 01:29 · Score: 1
  
  Yes, because I would rather have decisions regarding whether a certain chemical is a dangerous water pollutant or a certain drug is safe and effective made by people with scientific expertise than by lawyers that I barely trust to write a law correctly in the first place.
18. Re:Summary? by e3m4n · 2019-01-18 01:44 · Score: 1
  
  Look at the breakup of ATT. Once the experts decide its bad they go back to congress and congres passes the laws and or directs the agency. The FTC did not break up ATT by themselves. You somehow think doctors can’t be bribed by corporations? It’s amazing how many pharmaceuticals get approved that later get taken off the market because they faked the drug trials you somehow think doctors can’t be bribed by corporations? It’s amazing how many pharmaceuticals get approved that later get taken off the market because they faked the drug trials and real people suffered. Death should not be a listed side effect of an approved medication.
19. Re:Summary? by JackieBrown · 2019-01-18 02:00 · Score: 1
  
  Reality disagrees with you. Congress has, through laws legitimately passed by Congress, delegated the authority to make certain rules to executive agencies. You can go ahead and file lawsuits to get courts to agree to dissolve every executive agency, but I wouldn't bet any money on your success.
  But you can't have it both ways. Now Trump is able to use that same power to get rid of everything put into place without an actual law.
  That's a good reason why we shouldn't have given so much power to the agencies.
20. Re:Summary? by farble1670 · 2019-01-18 08:25 · Score: 1
  
  Otherwise it seems pretty clear it's entirely up to the FCC.
  Agreed. The correct solution is to elect a president that you trust to appoint an FCC head that isn't in telecom's back pocket.
  As for today, we got what we voted for. Wait out the term and then do something about it.
21. Re:Summary? by farble1670 · 2019-01-18 08:35 · Score: 1
  
  Now Trump is able to use that same power to get rid of everything put into place without an actual law.
  That's weird. I wonder why the FCC is suing CA it prevent it from passing a law re-instating NN.
22. Re:Summary? by farble1670 · 2019-01-18 08:38 · Score: 1
  
  The correct action is to impeach Ajit just on the Taunt video alone
  He is appointed, not elected. You'll have to impeach the guy that appointed him.
23. Re:Summary? by farble1670 · 2019-01-18 08:47 · Score: 1
  
  If you want something to be so, then legislate it.
  California is trying, but the the justice dept. is suing them to prevent it.
  https://www.nytimes.com/2018/0...
24. Re:Summary? by JackieBrown · 2019-01-18 14:29 · Score: 1
  
  Makes you wish there wasn't an agency that could just override states wishes, right?
25. Re:Summary? by farble1670 · 2019-01-19 20:30 · Score: 1
  
  Makes you wish there wasn't an agency that could just override states wishes, right?
  Like all the states that sued to get rid of NN. Oh wait, there weren't any.
26. Re:Summary? by JackieBrown · 2019-01-21 01:35 · Score: 1
  
  Live in the past pal
Re:Coming next... by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · 2019-01-18 00:28 · Score: 2

There are not essential people available to approve food labeling changes so companies are making the case that regulatory agency cannot put them on hold as it impacts freedom of speech.
I predict "the same side" arguing the op topic should proceed also argue the government should be able to stop the latter in its tracks.
Commence sophistry at this point.

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On what basis? by cascadingstylesheet · 2019-01-18 01:27 · Score: 1

What is all this "sue whenever you don't like something" carp?
It's actually not illegal (yet) just to disagree with past democrat presidents.
1. Re:On what basis? by Anonymous Coward · 2019-01-18 02:36 · Score: 1
  
  But an agency cannot change regulations when those changes are in conflict with the laws that allow them to regulate.
  That is the point that is being argued, and when NN was passed, the R AGs sued just as quickly.
  This is the messy soup that is democracy. As Churchill said:
  
  It is the worst for of government imaginable, other than everything else we have tried.
Re:Did you canvass UK Parliament when you revolted by Zontar+The+Mindless · 2019-01-18 07:57 · Score: 1

The intent of the Second Amendment is to guarantee one's right to protect oneself from harm, not to engage in extrajudicial punishment.

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