Debating the FCC’s Net Neutrality Action

Agitator: Someone dispute any component of this. And stay on topic.

John Fund: The Net Neutrality Coup

Free Press and allied groups such as moveon.org quickly got funding. Of the eight major foundations that provided the vast bulk of money for campaign-finance reform, six became major funders of the media-reform movement…

Onlooker: What was wrong with the system in the first place, that it needed new rules?

Agitator: Precisely what so many of us have been asking. Solution in search of a problem, or, an ante-problem power grab.

Respondent: Okay. How about the title? “The Net Neutrality Coup” = this is going to be another one-sided, ultra-biased, OMG-the-socialists-are-taking-over piece of selective “journalistic” advocacy.

I know right away that if I read this article I’m going… To have to find and read it’s equally biased antithesis. After doing so, I will surely decide I can’t trust anything any of these people have to say. I’ll just have to do the research myself and come to my own conclusion if and when I find the time. (That is not to say I have not already done so.)

That being said… I did read the article. And I was right. Mr. Fund does make one solid point though:

“… President Obama… [blah]… Is ignoring both Congress and adverse court rulings, especially by a federal appeals court in April that the agency doesn’t have the power to enforce net neutrality.”

If true, that would be unacceptable.

This comment must be considered “on topic” because it addresses the interests of the source of the topic itself, and thus, the credibility of all components therein.

Observer: I’ll take a stab at answering the Onloooker’s question.

If the government more often used foresight to produce solutions to problems yet-to-be, maybe we wouldn’t have to play catch-up every time a catastrophe happens. Problems should beget solutions,… And as rational people, we can see problems before they happen… Usually. For those arguing that these rules represent “one more hand in the private sector’s cookie jar,” I would point them to recent consequences of what can be kindly described as myopic regulatory inaction (ex. MMS, the entire economy, etc).

Granted, failure to keep equitable internet access doesn’t have the same consequences as, say, not regulating predatory lending practices, but it’s still something that I, as a consumer, care about protecting. I don’t want to have to pay more for reasonable water pressure, either. Or to be able to take calls from people on other networks if I’m using one particular phone company over another. Those are close metaphors for what we could see done to the internet if there weren’t some kind of protections in place. We’ve talked about real-world scenarios before, and the FCC cites several in their press briefing.

Here’s a great read, because it actually spells out what rules the Commission put in place, and why they did. See if you can find anything you disagree with:

And I’m kind of with the Respondent. It’s one thing to present the topic, but citing guys who use “regulation” and “liberal” as dirty words and who paint the John & Catherine MacArthur Foundation as some activist conspiracy doesn’t exactly win people over. There’s a reason that opinion article was in the WSJ.

Anyways, this was fun as always! Making me put thoughts into words…that’s why I love you, man.

Respondent: I would also raise the question of how enforceable these regulations are, really. The internet is… Kind of big. Many of the entities existing within it are prodigiously proficient with computers and networks and the like. It is also kind …of an international thing. If the authority to enforce is acted upon, how potent will that authority ultimately prove to be, really? An interesting thought experiment that can lead to legitimate points in favor of all schools of thought.

More importantly, regulating The Internet sounds rather expensive, doesn’t it? Can we really afford the effort right now? I’ll admit I haven’t seen any figures, but initially I would say… Ah, no. Probably not so much.

Agitator: What in the piece are you disputing? That the title foretells the subject of an opinion essay?… The FCC has moved without Congressional authority, which, like any executive agency regardless of its mandate should be just as unacceptable. Or do you stand with so many who have refuted Genakowski’s long advocacy, in which case you dispute the action. The idea that a title shouldn’t indicate the content, then that an author shouldn’t use the usual essay form to flesh out his point, in turn leading to a conclusion (Fund’s):

“The Net Neutrality Coup” ends “So the “media reform” movement paid for research that backed its views, paid activists to promote the research, saw its allies installed in the FCC and other key agencies, and paid for the FCC research that evaluated the research they had already paid for. Now they have their policy. That’s quite a coup.”

…is not a repudiation of his argument—it’s a rejection of good argumentation! Fund’s conclusion is what it should be, a simple restatement and impenetrable logical progression of premises.

Observer, what you initially describe is “agency (or regulatory) capture”, the idea an agency created to advance the public interest instead advances the commercial or special interests in its jurisdiction. That’s MMS. The SEC has been myopic. Fund is saying that in fact this move was soup-to-nuts the fruition of something more sinister than even those bureaucratic examples.

Let’s take Cliff Stearns http://ht.ly/3sjnu, who exemplifies more directly your first point, my own elsewhere and repeated by bureaucracies and regulations, that it’s a solution without a problem, or as here, in advance of the problem. As Stearns says, it’s Congress’s job to build a legislative history (we all know they’ve been on this for years) around an issue and address is legislatively. Rulemaking is like that, but after enactment of laws! Genakowski substituted his process for theirs. Back on topic, Fund tells us how. It’s interesting, though, as follows.

We’ll hit a go-to liberal, “involved” government proponent, The Nation. http://bit.ly/gnltmx This piece seems pretty critical. In a way this was as claimed the result of a bona fide rulemaking process, which produce actions across the government that resemble compromises, hence the criticisms of Fund and this guy Nichols. This liberal ends with a typical confusion of his persuasion: “We can have the real thing, and we can realize the full promise of the Internet.” Well, we do have the real thing, and the promise of the Internet is being realized.

Anyway, none of us dispute Fund.

Observer: What I can see as the future without these rules: one company (Verizon, for example) decides to shut off access to Netflix in favor of their own On Demand service. Another company (let’s say Comcast) allies with Netflix, in exchange for so…me cash, and shuts off Blockbuster to get Netflix’s cooperation. A third (Cox, the dick joke of broadband providers) advertises that they won’t discriminate. Customers eventually move to Cox, the other companies realize that the lost user fee revenue outweighs the benefits gained from their crazy deals, and follow Cox’s model. In 5 years we’re back where we are now and i’ve been inconvenienced in having to move services. My selfish side says I want to avoid that.

See my link for where the FCC specifies the congressional authority under which it’s operating, dating back to 2005. Seems a pretty clear delegation of powers. Sorry for the double-post, i’ll look more at refutations tomorrow.

Respondent: I think I catch your drift. You asked someone to dispute any component of ‘this’ and stay on ‘topic.’ This challenge was posed along with a link to a WSJ article. If the ‘topic’ is ‘this.’ and ‘this’ is a link, then the link IS the topic. And the link is an extremely biased, pointed, and shit-slinging WSJ article. My dispute is with the component of the article itself (categorize and call it whatever you want.) It is uncompelling. It is not an accurate portrayal of the entire issue. The title tells me it’s just another guy screaming “socialist conspiracy!” It’s useless to me. Heard it all before – a million times – tired of it. I heard it the first time. And that was over 2 years ago.

I support the quotation I cited. Conditionally: if it’s true. And I mean entirely true. If such regulations are to be imposed they must go through the appropriate channels. No matter how clogged and dysfunctional those channels may be.

I find the transcending topic posed in my thought experiment much more compelling.

Respondent: If you’re wanting a debate about internet regulation, I don’t think Mr. Fund is a fair way to open the floor.

Agitator: I’m down with spilt ink. To the Respondent, you were right on, but I think that in your first reply you’d criticized argument itself and op-edness rather than disputing any of Fund’s claims. He was not attempting to lay out the entire issue, and nothing short of an encyclopedia could. As we all know, this has been hot topic for years. Fund’s piece is however an accurate portrayal of the set-up – the parties, their interests and their role in this latest incident.

In a largely agreeable accompanying statement, Genakowski recognizes that, “Now at the same time, government must not overreach by imposing rules that are overly restrictive or that assume perfect knowledge about this dynamic and rapidly changing marketplace.” To my point and that of many, many others, McDowell says, “More than 300 Members have warned the agency against exceeding its legal authority. The FCC is not Congress. We cannot make laws.” With the court decisions on this matter, the authority cited has already been roundly rejected. And any “crisis” or observable harm would be quite foreseeable, on the horizon as with the brazen moves of Comcast during the review of its NBC-Universal merger.

Since the Fund piece has served to kick off discussion rather than as a test piñata, I’ll join you outside the prompt. Coups are by necessity keen to timing, and this announcement couldn’t have come at a more interesting time. It’s paradoxical though: the Democratic majorities in Congress could’ve done this, and the incoming majority will inevitably pass Stearns’ disapproval resolution. Additionally, it seems that Genakowski’s FCC has perpetrated what Congressional Democrats have done for four years: bad process pursuing a non-problem unless you’re a union or other interested party besides those who run the thing. I’m also struck by McDowell’s notion of “global Internet regulatory pandemic.” But these aren’t the thrust of Fund’s essay.

I would agree with Baker and McDowell that this action alone could make the industry blink. The whole spectacle is classic. As Baker puts it, “the majority solves a problem of its own making.” And later, “At best, there is a burned-out bulb in the Christmas lights. We endeavor to replace the entire electrical system to fix it.” Who wants this problem? Those named by Fund. How must they solve it? See Fund, soup-to-nuts.

I fully anticipate that this action will get struck down and that, within the next two years, the Congress will deal with this. And thank the Genakowski’s of the world for the provocation.

Agitator: To Mike’s first point: http://bit.ly/ehkpnw Houston, we’ll have a problem!

Respondent: Ah, okay then. I understand all of that. I have not criticized, or even stated my position on, the central issue of internet regulation: yes or no and on what grounds. In that sense you are correct that I have not disputed any of Fund’s claims, but rather expressed my absolute disdain of opinion pieces such as his. Left, Right, Liberal, Progressive, Conservative, Capitalist, Socialist, Fascist, Despot, Pacifist, Communist. I could totally agree, personally, 100% with the content of an opinion piece and still hate it. They egregiously violate my standards of truth. I study logic, so again you are correct that I am often irked somewhat by open-endedness. Unless I can use it to bend something to my advantage if I need to!

Truthfully, I would have to do more research to be in a place to openly declare a position and match your details. Therefore, I will respectfully bow out of this debate.

I will say that I like your words “coups are by necessity keen to timing.” Indeed. The concept of manufacturing problems is as old as the evolution of reasoning. I love the single burnt bulb analogy. And governmental under-reach is just as potentially harmful as governmental overreach.

In the end, I will not dispute Fund, but I will agree on the point of ignoring court rulings. Fin!