US Senators Are Working to Secure Enough Votes to Reinstate Net Neutrality Rules

Senators are reportedly just one vote short of passing a petition to overrule the FCC in their attempt to reinstate net neutrality. Forty-nine democrats, headed by Massachusetts’ Ed Markey, are trying to rebuff the changes with the Congressional Review Act, which allows Congress to review and potentially overrule new regulations.

But even if it does clear the Senate, the resolution would face an uphill battle. It would need to clear the House of Representatives, where Republicans hold a larger majority and leadership has backed the FCC’s decision. The White House has also sided with the FCC, with press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders lauding the “effort to roll back burdensome regulations.”

Pretty obvious to me that I have to vote democratic in the mid-terms. The republicans of today are bought and paid for by special interests. To whatever amount critics might say the democrats are the same, I say they aren't even in the same ballpark. Republicans don't have a shred of integrity left.

It will never happen. The Dark Side is too powerful.

Edit: What I mean is that net neutrality won't be reinstated because the fix is in, cable companies and their little bitch Pai will make sure of it. Welcome to Trump Universe.

EODetroit said:

Pretty obvious to me that I have to vote democratic in the mid-terms. The republicans of today are bought and paid for by special interests. To whatever amount critics might say the democrats are the same, I say they aren't even in the same ballpark. Republicans don't have a shred of integrity left.

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It's all corrupt. We live in a corporation run country. "1985" just keeps getting more real.

EODetroit said:

Pretty obvious to me that I have to vote democratic in the mid-terms. The republicans of today are bought and paid for by special interests. To whatever amount critics might say the democrats are the same, I say they aren't even in the same ballpark. Republicans don't have a shred of integrity left.

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It really does show how bad things have become when so many people are simply voting for the lesser of two evils. Sure there are good people on both sides but at this point they're so rare that any good they do try to do will never achieve anything.

Wyodiver said:

It will never happen. The Dark Side is too powerful.

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That's what they said when Trump was running for president. Look what happened there.

I am not a member of either party. I lean Republican, bit I strongly support net neautrality

I get that there is an oppertunity for profit without net neutrality, but there are plenty of options for profit with it.

Internet access is a utility in this age, and is good for the countries profitability. It should be open.

The only profit options gained by the absence support monopolies.

EODetroit said:

Pretty obvious to me that I have to vote democratic in the mid-terms. The republicans of today are bought and paid for by special interests. To whatever amount critics might say the democrats are the same, I say they aren't even in the same ballpark. Republicans don't have a shred of integrity left.

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The Democrats are bought and paid for as well, just by different special interests sometimes. It's true they're not the same, but don't think you're not heading to the same place, it's just at different speeds.

I stopped at "US Senators are working..."

What has actually changed since "net neutrality", (and I do use that term loosely), went away?

Net neutrality was about money, not the common man. The companies that would profit off net neutrality, or their definition of it anyway, were for it, those that stood to profit by eliminating it, were against it.

Never was the benefit of the consumers ever anything more than a talking point for the players in this little play.

Well the old net neutrality law was pretty bad too.

What we need is cleaner version of it.

EODetroit said:

Pretty obvious to me that I have to vote democratic in the mid-terms. The republicans of today are bought and paid for by special interests. To whatever amount critics might say the democrats are the same, I say they aren't even in the same ballpark. Republicans don't have a shred of integrity left.

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Wow, you're right. We'd all better vote for the party of open borders, BLM thug worshipping, elimination of 2nd Amendment rights, so we can reverse the "destruction" we're all witnessing of an open and free internet.

I'll bet when Tom Wheeler promised that while reclassification of internet service under Title 2 rules would allow the FCC to BAN CONTENT , they would refrain from using that power, you believed him.

Plenty of "special interests", like Google, ponied up millions in support for this policy. Who knew multinational mega-corps were such big supporters of "freedom", huh?

You know, my reason for being concerned about net neutrality is that when you follow the money, it's coming from people I don't trust at all. A lot of corporations were pushing for it to stay in place and I was concerned then because I didn't trust them either. To me that is a red flag that there is something else going on and I don't like it.

Gorankar said:

What has actually changed since "net neutrality", (and I do use that term loosely), went away?

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Um, NN still hasn't gone away. Title II NN is still legally the law of the land, fyi.

tetris42 said:

The Democrats are bought and paid for as well, just by different special interests sometimes. It's true they're not the same, but don't think you're not heading to the same place, it's just at different speeds.

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Yup. The Democrat's platform is that anyone who sets foot in this country for 5 seconds should be granted citizenship regardless of how illiterate or low skilled they are, which is contrary to every other developed country. And why is that? Because the low skilled, uneducated people will vote for whoever gives them citizenship for free even though they did nothing but set foot in this country. The Democrat party will bring anyone into the country at any cost if it means they can secure another vote to stay in / gain power. That is about as corrupt and scummy as you can get. Imagine trying that in Singapore or Australia.

Obviously the Republican party has its issues, but to say the Democrat party is much better is a farce. They'll kick you down the road as soon as the next big voting demographic crops up to keep themselves in power.

They would be far better sponsoring a clean bill that just did NN rather then trying to restore the kluge of Title II? rules that the Obama admin was using.

Flogger23m said:

Yup. The Democrat's platform is that anyone who sets foot in this country for 5 seconds should be granted citizenship regardless of how illiterate or low skilled they are, which is contrary to every other developed country. And why is that? Because the low skilled, uneducated people will vote for whoever gives them citizenship for free even though they did nothing but set foot in this country. The Democrat party will bring anyone into the country at any cost if it means they can secure another vote to stay in / gain power. That is about as corrupt and scummy as you can get. Imagine trying that in Singapore or Australia.

Obviously the Republican party has its issues, but to say the Democrat party is much better is a farce. They'll kick you down the road as soon as the next big voting demographic crops up to keep themselves in power.

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I think you're giving the Democratic party too much credit. They're doing what their donors want. Their donors want cheap labor, that means endless immigration, since that puts constant downward pressure on employee bargaining. It's all about money. I mean Democrats, like Republicans, also voted to expand the military budget, increase the number of wars we're in, and bail out Wall Street. Both sides know how their bread is buttered. None of this gets attention though. All you'll hear are social issues (racism, sexism, immigration, 2nd amendment issues, etc.) because none of that substantially affects the economic status quo, thus it's perfect way to loudly proclaim the differences between the two parties.

tetris42 said:

I think you're giving the Democratic party too much credit. They're doing what their donors want. Their donors want cheap labor, that means endless immigration, since that puts constant downward pressure on employee bargaining. It's all about money. I mean Democrats, like Republicans, also voted to expand the military budget, increase the number of wars we're in, and bail out Wall Street. Both sides know how their bread is buttered. None of this gets attention though. All you'll hear are social issues (racism, sexism, immigration, 2nd amendment issues, etc.) because none of that substantially affects the economic status quo, thus it's perfect way to loudly proclaim the differences between the two parties.

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1: Immigration leads to economic growth, over the long term. More people with more money is the fastest way to grow the economy.

2: "Employee Bargaining" isn't a thing anymore; Unions are basically dead.

3: The military needing a funding increase after years of sequestration. That being said, costs need to get under control. Programs like the JSF eat funds, and that shouldn't happen.

4: The cost of bailing out Wall Street was less then the cost of letting it collapse. That's why the bailouts were combined with tough laws to ensure such bad behavior couldn't happen again. As those laws are now gone, expect to see a repeat in a year or two when the next scheduled recession hits (we're about due for one).

gamerk2 said:

1: Immigration leads to economic growth, over the long term. More people with more money is the fastest way to grow the economy.

2: "Employee Bargaining" isn't a thing anymore; Unions are basically dead.

3: The military needing a funding increase after years of sequestration. That being said, costs need to get under control. Programs like the JSF eat funds, and that shouldn't happen.

4: The cost of bailing out Wall Street was less then the cost of letting it collapse. That's why the bailouts were combined with tough laws to ensure such bad behavior couldn't happen again. As those laws are now gone, expect to see a repeat in a year or two when the next scheduled recession hits (we're about due for one).

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Point #2 kind of negates point #1 doesn't it? Since there's no employee bargaining, who are you going to hire between two equally qualified candidates: the regular citizen, or the one who can get deported if he loses his job, thus allowing you to get more work for less? You say more people with more money is the fastest way to grow the economy. Agreed. However, I think we're looking at more people with LESS money. Race to the bottom economics is very much how we seem to be running things.

As for the military, the point is there's no substantive difference between Republicans and Democrats on that issue. Both have expanded the wars we're in, and both vote to increase the military's budget. You say they needed a funding increase, fine. Trump wanted 636 billion, the DOD wanted 639 billion, 89% of Senate Democrats voted to INCREASE that number to 696 billion. Yeah, the military must be barely scraping by with funding like that. BOTH parties are pro-war, pro-military expansion, because that's what their donors want. That's all there is to it.

It's a misnomer framing the bailout the way you do. We had 3 basic options:
1. Not intervene (would have led to a far worse collapse, but would have prevented things from ballooning even worse later).
2. Bail out key institutions out with massive restrictions (nationalize institutions, pass highly restrictive legislation to make sure this never happens again, etc.).
3. Bail out the banks and give them almost everything they wanted.

We went with option #3. And calling Dodd-Frank a "tough law" is a joke. After all, the banks are BIGGER and more consolidated under 8 years of a Democratic administration. Remember, it's a DEMOCRATIC president who killed Glass Steagall in the first place. It was a DEMOCRATIC administration that didn't prosecute anyone for the 2008 crash and voted to continue bailouts started under Bush. At least during the Savings and Loan scandal, people went to JAIL.

But hey, let's pretend Dodd-Frank was enough. Good thing DEMOCRATS working with Republicans voted to weaken it. Again, both parties have donors on Wall Street and tough regulation is not what they want.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying both parties are the same. On economics, the Democrats are much more 1 step forward, 3 steps back, while the Republicans tend to be 4 steps back. We're still going backwards and on some issues, both Democrats and Republicans are completely in lock step if it what's their donors want.

EODetroit said:

Pretty obvious to me that I have to vote democratic in the mid-terms. The republicans of today are bought and paid for by special interests. To whatever amount critics might say the democrats are the same, I say they aren't even in the same ballpark. Republicans don't have a shred of integrity left.

Click to expand...

Let's put the fact the 5 voters to repeal the Rules were all appointed to the board by Obama down the memory hole.

The Democrat effort will not go anywhere. Is it a 2018 campaign song and dance for a power Congress already has. Congress has the power to overrule regulations any time they feel like it.

gamerk2 said:

1: Immigration leads to economic growth, over the long term. More people with more money is the fastest way to grow the economy.

2: "Employee Bargaining" isn't a thing anymore; Unions are basically dead.

3: The military needing a funding increase after years of sequestration. That being said, costs need to get under control. Programs like the JSF eat funds, and that shouldn't happen.

4: The cost of bailing out Wall Street was less then the cost of letting it collapse. That's why the bailouts were combined with tough laws to ensure such bad behavior couldn't happen again. As those laws are now gone, expect to see a repeat in a year or two when the next scheduled recession hits (we're about due for one).

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1) Immigration leads to economic growth, only if you have a shortage of workers. We do not. The only thing they might do is generate more debt and if your income is from those institutions first in line for that miracle cash, I can see where you can say that. Considering the financial sector fear mongered everyone to bail them out the last time, I'm sure they don't fear the bad consequences of over-lending

2) So Let's flood the labor market so we can totally bring those things back but hammer and cycle style this time. Am I right?

4) That's what the fear mongering propaganda said. It was only true for those greedy investment entities drinking from government encouraged high risk debt. The only part of the stock market that would have been affected if people were honest were financial sector stocks. If you were diversified you had litttle to worry about. But the fear mongering caused an economic slowdown and investment panic that did cause most to suffer to some degree.

EODetroit said:

Pretty obvious to me that I have to vote democratic in the mid-terms. The republicans of today are bought and paid for by special interests. To whatever amount critics might say the democrats are the same, I say they aren't even in the same ballpark. Republicans don't have a shred of integrity left.

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Says the person that wants to subsidize corps like Netflix and making everyone elses internet worse to do it. If a minority of all internet users are using the majority of all available bandwidth then those users should pay more. I will vote against anyone that supports this digital form of Marxism.

ISP's against NN. Who I pay money to. Said company would benefit from the repeal. I'm not so sure I would.

Corporation's like Google/Microsoft/Amazon/Netflix/etc. are for NN. I do pay money to Netflix. I would benefit from these companies not being throttled by my ISP at the very least.

The only thing I'm aware of that could potentially be an issue with the Title II NN rules is the content blocking part. Otherwise I agree with the rules.

Taldren said:

Says the person that wants to subsidize corps like Netflix and making everyone elses internet worse to do it. If a minority of all internet users are using the majority of all available bandwidth then those users should pay more. I will vote against anyone that supports this digital form of Marxism.

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You as a consumer are sold bandwidth from your ISP. What you're saying is that you're ok with your ISP charging more for using the advertised speed you are sold?

JackNSally said:

You as a consumer are sold bandwidth from your ISP. What you're saying is that you're ok with your ISP charging more for using the advertised speed you are sold?

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No, he is saying that Netflix needs to pay for what it uses. It is Netflix not giving you the content you paid for at the speed you want it.

jpm100 said:

Let's put the fact the 5 voters to repeal the Rules were all appointed to the board by Obama down the memory hole.

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WTF are you smoking. Not a single person Obama actually nominated for FCC voted for repeal of NN.

Obama didn't nominate Pai, McConnell nominated him to the FCC board. Likewise for any other republicans on the FCC board during obama's tenure.

Gorankar said:

No, he is saying that Netflix needs to pay for what it uses. It is Netflix not giving you the content you paid for at the speed you want it.

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Netflix already pays for what it uses. The ISPs want to charge Netflix an additional fee for services we, as the ISPs customer, are already paying them for.

Gorankar said:

No, he is saying that Netflix needs to pay for what it uses. It is Netflix not giving you the content you paid for at the speed you want it.

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I don't really follow this line of thinking...they give you access to what you want..so its whoever watches it thats using it....


and I'm not saying your wrong, but explain why they should pay for content that someone asked for and is already paying their ISP to receive?

Here are the ONLY THINGS THAT MATTER.

-There are already laws in place that protected from these exact things, hence why these things went to court when they happened (Federal Trace Commission Act, Sherman Act, Clayton Act, FCC Open Internet Order 2010).

-Net Neutrality is primarily about giving the US Government unfettered licensing rights over internet providers of all kinds... This WILL be abused eventually, and is exactly the type of thing that allows China the 'legal authority' to censor their internet.

-The main reason for the repeal was the remove 'regulation' performed by unelected branches of government. Its part of a massive deregulation wave, where the whole idea is that un-elected branches/individuals should not be able to turn on or off federally enforced national 'rules'.... This is meant for elected lawmakers (congress) and ELECTED lawmakers ONLY. Its the very first section of our constitution. Laws are meant to be made be elected officials, and that does not give them the right to delegate that very responsibility over to unelected officials...

-So at the end of the day. Pass proper laws if you want them, and pass them the proper way... Do not try to masquerade 'unfettered licensing rights' around as a solution to a problem that already has answers, and dont try to pass it through with unelected officials that open the doors to constant power abuses and struggles.

Crosshairs said:

I don't really follow this line of thinking...they give you access to what you want..so its whoever watches it thats using it....


and I'm not saying your wrong, but explain why they should pay for content that someone asked for and is already paying their ISP to receive?

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They, (the likes of Netflix and Youtube), are asking to pay the same as businesses that use a fraction of the bandwidth. The likes of Netflix and Youtube are all for Net neutrality as it benefits their bottom line. The people that own the networks, want to be able to tier it to benefit their own bottom line. The highest users pay more under their plan and that hurts Netflix/youtube. It is 100% about money, about who has to pay for peering. Aside from the pointless squawking, the consumer is not even a part of this equation really. Even discussing the actual end users like ourselves is practically pointless in regards to net neutrality. We are not what this about. Neither outcome really benefits or harms us past the "what if" scenarios. We will always be the ones paying, always be the ones "guided" to where the money makers want us to go. We had no net neutrality then we had someone's version of it. Nothing really changed for us.

We will never have real net neutrality anyway. We will have the whatever makes the most money for the most powerful and they will call it "net neutrality". This last go around Netflix and Youtube won, this time around maybe the ISPs will.

jamesgalb said:

Here are the ONLY THINGS THAT MATTER.

-There are already laws in place that protected from these exact things, hence why these things went to court when they happened (Federal Trace Commission Act, Sherman Act, Clayton Act, FCC Open Internet Order 2010).

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No there aren't. FTC has minimal to no authority outside of false advertisement. Sherman and Clayton act require a finding of monopoly power which regional monopolies don't count as and take literally decades to run their course. FCC OIO was struct down as the FCC didn't have the authority outside of Title II, the 2015 order is what took its place.

-Net Neutrality is primarily about giving the US Government unfettered licensing rights over internet providers of all kinds... This WILL be abused eventually, and is exactly the type of thing that allows China the 'legal authority' to censor their internet.

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NN has nothing to do with the USG providing any type of licensing rights. And has literally nothing to do with China. If you are worried about china like censorship, etc, you are barking up the wrong tree.

-The main reason for the repeal was the remove 'regulation' performed by unelected branches of government. Its part of a massive deregulation wave, where the whole idea is that un-elected branches/individuals should not be able to turn on or off federally enforced national 'rules'.... This is meant for elected lawmakers (congress) and ELECTED lawmakers ONLY. Its the very first section of our constitution. Laws are meant to be made be elected officials, and that does not give them the right to delegate that very responsibility over to unelected officials...

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Literally every regulation is done by designated branches of the USG. Your understanding of the USG is completely flawed. And congress has always had the ability to delegate authority. This is literally settled law that is hundreds of years old and fully supported by the framers.


So the only things that apparently matter is that your are full of BS in their area and have zero understanding of the facts or the law. That's a quite an accomplishment, to be so wrong.

Gorankar said:

They, (the likes of Netflix and Youtube), are asking to pay the same as businesses that use a fraction of the bandwidth. The likes of Netflix and Youtube are all for Net neutrality as it benefits their bottom line. The people that own the networks, want to be able to tier it to benefit their own bottom line. The highest users pay more under their plan and that hurts Netflix/youtube. It is 100% about money, about who has to pay for peering. Aside from the pointless squawking, the consumer is not even a part of this equation really. Even discussing the actual end users like ourselves is practically pointless in regards to net neutrality. We are not what this about. Neither outcome really benefits or harms us past the "what if" scenarios. We will always be the ones paying, always be the ones "guided" to where the money makers want us to go. We had no net neutrality then we had someone's version of it. Nothing really changed for us.

We will never have real net neutrality anyway. We will have the whatever makes the most money for the most powerful and they will call it "net neutrality". This last go around Netflix and Youtube won, this time around maybe the ISPs will.

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They aren't doing jack. Comcast et al's customers are requesting data from youtube et al. Data that comcast et al customers have already paid for.

Comcast wants to put up toll roads, charge the drivers, then in addition charge an additional pure profit fee to the vehicle manufacturers. Or as another analogy, imagine a monopoly of Gas stations that not only overcharges its customers, but charges the refineries a fee to pump their gas.

aaronspink said:

WTF are you smoking. Not a single person Obama actually nominated for FCC voted for repeal of NN.

Obama didn't nominate Pai, McConnell nominated him to the FCC board. Likewise for any other republicans on the FCC board during obama's tenure.

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"Ajit Pai is the Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. He was designated Chairman by President Donald J. Trump in January 2017. He had previously served as Commissioner at the FCC, appointed by then-President Barack Obama and confirmed unanimously by the United States Senate in May 2012.." McConnell may have given the recommendation but I'm sure the propaganda talking point tell you to inflate the importance of the recommendation, but ultimately Obama PICKED him and was his boss. Like the others on the board.
https://www.fcc.gov/about/leadership/ajit-pai

Krenum said:

I stopped at "US Senators are working..."

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I know right? At first I was wondering if this article was a gag or not. Since when does a US Congress person work? lol

jpm100 said:

"Ajit Pai is the Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. He was designated Chairman by President Donald J. Trump in January 2017. He had previously served as Commissioner at the FCC, appointed by then-President Barack Obama and confirmed unanimously by the United States Senate in May 2012.." McConnell may have given the recommendation but I'm sure the propaganda talking point tell you to inflate the importance of the recommendation, but ultimately Obama PICKED him and was his boss. Like the others on the board.
https://www.fcc.gov/about/leadership/ajit-pai

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He was appointed by McConnell, Obama isn't going to appoint some arch corporate "conservative" to the FCC. You might want to actually read up on how the FCC actually works before continuing. Obama did shit but uphold long standing tradition. The FCC board isn't fully picked by the president, never has been and hopefully never will be. 3 members are appointed by the president and 2 are appointed by the opposition leader in the senate (AKA McConnel). Nor is any president the boss of any of the FCC board members. They serve independently of the WH just like the rest of the FCC. The President has zero authority over the FCC beyond the basically ceremonial role in formally nominating the board members.

AKA the FCC doesn't work like you think it does, so maybe you should do a little actual self education and get a clue before continuing to spout BS telecom and right wing talking points.

This is nothing but a political stunt. They know nothing is going to come of this. Besides, if they actually gave a shit they'd be writing legislation to do what they supposedly want. You know, the exact way it should be handled. Through Congress making laws.

The fact that they are ignoring their purpose of writing laws tells you everything you need to know.

Crosshairs said:

I don't really follow this line of thinking...they give you access to what you want..so its whoever watches it thats using it....


and I'm not saying your wrong, but explain why they should pay for content that someone asked for and is already paying their ISP to receive?

Click to expand...

The same way as trucks pay more to use toll roads as cars, ISPs charge the heavy users of their roadways more as normal users. They increase the costs to netflix so they can pass that fee onto their users. Thus the heavy users pay the higher rate as it should be.

JackNSally said:

You as a consumer are sold bandwidth from your ISP. What you're saying is that you're ok with your ISP charging more for using the advertised speed you are sold?

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As a tax payer, I already pay for the roadways. I still pay the toll to use them. I would pay more if I was a heavy users (ie trucks). You speak as if this is a new concept.

SmokeRngs said:

This is nothing but a political stunt. They know nothing is going to come of this. Besides, if they actually gave a shit they'd be writing legislation to do what they supposedly want. You know, the exact way it should be handled. Through Congress making laws.

The fact that they are ignoring their purpose of writing laws tells you everything you need to know.

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Congressional parties are full of tigers fighting for the needs of the people when they're in the minority and know they can't pass anything.