
Net Neutrality to Get U.S. Senate Vote as Democrats Force Issue - rayuela
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-08/net-neutrality-to-get-u-s-senate-vote-as-democrats-force-issue
======
JoshuaEN
This vote seems like the best chance of maintaining NN at the national level.
Congress ultimately directly serve at the pleasure of their constituents,
unlike the FCC commissioners.

Point being, the time leading up to this vote is probably be the best time to
let your congress members know your opinion on NN. Do not let the "failure"[1]
of previous efforts to get congress to act in defense of NN dissuade you from
future action, particularly now: It is far easier for a politician to take no
action (as they could when the FCC was ones doing the voting) than to actively
vote against the wishes of their constituents.

\---

[1] Failure in scare quotes since it seems likely part of the reason NN is
still a topic being actively fought for in congress, in the courts, and at a
state level is because there is a large amount of vocal support for it.

~~~
Kequc
Why don't Democrats pass NN through congress and get it enshrined into law?
Instead of trying to block that from happening, since it's Republicans who are
trying to do that.

Why was NN so easy to repeal in the first place? Why didn't Obama do a proper
job if it's such an important issue? I still don't agree with the accepted
wisdom about what NN is in the first place. Seems to me to suggest companies
that are using up a lot of bandwidth are going to start paying more,
competitors are going to start paying less. Which is why every single large
company is opposed to the change.

~~~
awalton
> Why didn't Obama do a proper job if it's such an important issue?

Obama was president while the Republicans held the legislature hostage. It was
a miracle his administration was able to ask for and get any legislation
passed at all; it was easily the most obstructionist congress ever. He
couldn't even appoint a Supreme Court Justice because Mitch McConnell wouldn't
allow congress to hold hearings - that's how impossible a situation he was in.

Obama did exactly as much as he was able to do with the powers he had. He
wasn't about to try the kinds of stunts our current president thinks he can.

And speaking frankly, as a black person, I don't think he even could have
_tried_ to pull these kinds of stunts - he would have been impeached and
booted, as any President pulling these kinds of fascist, dictatorial moves
should be.

~~~
chrchang523
The Democrats controlled both the House and the Senate in 2009-2010. Anything
Obama and other Democrats thought was really important could have been forced
through then.

(Indeed, they did force a major health care reform bill through with zero
Republican support, mirroring how a major tax reform bill was forced through
with zero Democrat support a few weeks ago.)

~~~
ComradeTaco
The Democrats observed the regular order of the Senate, hosted 5 bipartisan
meetings and finished the bill so it could actually be analyzed and read
before being passed [1]. The republicans didn't bother with any bipartisan
meetings and passed it within the same week of finishing writing it. And they
broke the regular order of the senate to do it.

In any case, the two year period between 2009 and 2010 was spent almost
entirely on the economy. Which given how strong the Obama-era recovery was,
seems to be have been time well spent.

[1]
[https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/07/10/us/republican...](https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/07/10/us/republican-
health-care-process.html)

------
temp-dude-87844
This vote is an important device that serves to decouple net neutrality as a
distinct political issue, rather than a footnote in a particular politician's
larger platform which -- to many voters -- isn't as important as some other
hot-button stances to merit single-issue voting. By triggering a senate vote,
this gives an opportunity for each senator to make their stance on this a
matter of official record, theoretically independent from any other
affiliation they might hold. With the FCC's latest ruling opposed by a
majority of liberal and conservatives alike, this is an opportunity to stand
with their constituents.

The other objective of those who brought the vote is to illustrate just how
few, if any, of those on the other side will vote to oppose the FCC's new
rules. This can be weaponized on the ground in later elections, especially
competitive districts -- or in this case, states.

~~~
smsm42
Where the idea that FCC latest ruling is opposed by majority of conservatives
comes from?

Moreover, if you think issue as obscure and technical as NN would be important
enough for a senator to break with their own party, you are deluding yourself.
The only way to make it so is to wage blatantly false campaign like "without
NN you'd be paying 100x for Internet tomorrow and all your favorite sites
would be blocked" \- which is also kinda too late anyway, because we already
know it's not true. Hoping that the average voter can appreciate the fine
points of the tug of war between backbone providers and content generators is,
as I said, delusional.

~~~
temp-dude-87844
My assertion as stated in the parent post is based on the University of
Maryland Program for Public Consultation's December 2017 poll, which asked
respondents to weigh how convincing they found a pro-repeal and a con-repeal
argument, and then asked their final stance. The results show [1] that 75% of
Republican voters, over 88% of Democrat voters, and almost 86% of independents
oppose changes are consistent with the result the FCC's undoing of the Obama-
era NN rules. This survey at the time was widely covered in media, e.g.
[2][3].

[1] [http://www.publicconsultation.org/wp-
content/uploads/2017/12...](http://www.publicconsultation.org/wp-
content/uploads/2017/12/Net_Neutrality_Quaire_121217.pdf) [2]
[http://thehill.com/policy/technology/364528-poll-83-percent-...](http://thehill.com/policy/technology/364528-poll-83-percent-
of-voters-support-keeping-fccs-net-neutrality-rules) [3]
[https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-
switch/wp/2017/12/12...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-
switch/wp/2017/12/12/this-poll-gave-americans-a-detailed-case-for-and-against-
the-fccs-net-neutrality-plan-the-reaction-among-republicans-was-striking/)

~~~
smsm42
They didn't ask however whether people oppose specific changes to FCC
regulations, but whether people oppose the consequences that those
regulations' supporters claim that will result from removing those
regulations. This is somewhat different. In any case, thanks for the links.

------
lmroz
The U.S. Senate voted on an older version of net neutrality in 2011 with a
resolution introduced by former republican Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (a
resolution of disapproval of the FCC's Open Internet Order of 2010). It was a
party line vote, 48-52, with republicans (the minority caucus in the Senate at
that time) voting against the order and democrats voting in support of the
order.

[https://www.congress.gov/bill/112th-congress/senate-joint-
re...](https://www.congress.gov/bill/112th-congress/senate-joint-
resolution/6/all-actions)

Also in 2011, the U.S. House of Representatives had a disapproval vote which
passed 240-179, since republicans were in the majority at that time. All but 2
republicans voted to disapprove the FCC order, while all but 6 democrats voted
in support of the order.

[https://www.congress.gov/bill/112th-congress/house-joint-
res...](https://www.congress.gov/bill/112th-congress/house-joint-
resolution/37/all-actions)

~~~
danjayh
The problem isn't net neutrality, it's lack of competition among ISPs.
Normally, I would agree with them - regulating the internet is _not_ the way
to spur innovation. But with an ISP monopoly or duopoly in most markets,
either more competition (my preferred solution) or regulation is needed. As
we've seen with phone service (if you're old enough to remember), regulation
will give us reliable but expensive service, and competition will give us
cheap, reliable, and feature-filled service.

~~~
pwtweet
"competition will give us cheap, reliable, and feature-filled service".
Really, I would love to see the evidence that this would be the case.

~~~
TheAdamAndChe
Competition lowers costs in most industries, especially in markets with a low
barrier to entry. In 1956, fridge would have cost the equivalent of $3000[1].
Now, it's down to a few hundred of dollars, completely because competition
spurred the creation of technological and manufacturing advances, driving the
price down.

The issue here is that some industries, particularly industries with a high
barrier to entry and low returns due to existing competition, are incredibly
difficult to enter. The internet service provider industry happens to be one
of those industries that form monopolies.

[1]
[http://www.thepeoplehistory.com/50selectrical.html](http://www.thepeoplehistory.com/50selectrical.html)

------
beedogs
As usual, Democrats are the only party that gives a damn. Really baffling why
anyone younger than me votes for anyone else.

------
1024core
What I don't understand is: why did it take so much effort to get to 30
supporters, when Democrats have 48 in the Senate? What are the other 18
Democratic Senators doing? Why are they not fully behind NN?

~~~
notadoc
Follow the money. I suspect you will find the answers to your questions here:

[https://www.opensecrets.org/influence/](https://www.opensecrets.org/influence/)

[https://www.opensecrets.org/elections/](https://www.opensecrets.org/elections/)

------
elihu
Would a CRA force a House vote as well?

(The House has another procedure called a discharge petition to force votes on
things that are supported by a majority of representatives but opposed by a
majority of the majority party -- it seems unlikely that there are enough
votes in the House to force a net neutrality vote, though.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discharge_petition](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discharge_petition))

~~~
edaemon
It only goes to the House if the CRA resolution passes the Senate. CRA
resolutions function just like other resolutions or bills, being introduced
and voted on in one house and approved via vote in the other.

------
colanderman
If your senator(s) are on this list [1] write them to THANK them for stepping
up to do so. (And if they're not, write them to request that they do so!)

[1]
[https://twitter.com/SenMarkey/status/950498741366247424](https://twitter.com/SenMarkey/status/950498741366247424)

------
AnimalMuppet
IIRC, the FCC commissioner's (stated) argument against net neutrality was that
it was Congress's job to legislate things like that, not the FCC's job to just
write regulations to make it so. Arguably, it's a defensible point.

Note well: I take no position on whether this was his _actual_ reason, or just
a smoke screen.

~~~
boomboomsubban
This is what overturned net neutrality in 2014, and possibly would have
overturned it again without the current administration. The FCC states their
right to regulate the issue comes from one incredibly vague line in a 96 act,
that they are to “encourage the deployment on a reasonable and timely basis of
advanced telecommunications capability to all Americans."

------
mehrdadn
This is risky. If lack of net neutrality regulation _doesn 't_ result in
clearly-out-of-bounds behavior by ISPs in the near term, Democrats will be the
ones looking bad for trying to add useless regulation. I hope they've thought
this scenario through.

~~~
CydeWeys
The ISP bad behavior has already been going on for years and is now hitting a
high-pitched fervor now that the FCC has repealed net neutrality. I don't see
how it's risky; the bad behavior is already there and regulation is sorely
needed.

~~~
ikeboy
This would benefit strongly from examples.

------
anfedorov
What's a good resource for understanding broadband markets as a whole?

At least in SF in the past 5 years, Comcast seems to have upgraded 100Mbps
connections to 1Gbps connections. Not sure whether that translates to a bigger
shared pipe for the city as a whole, but it certainly looks like a good amount
of improvement in $:bits, at least in comparison with $:sqFt.

~~~
tfigment
Its an improvement but Comcast has been delaying real improvements for years
but collect insane profits (afaik). I would love to see the numbers as well.
The X1 DVR as far as I am concerned was horrible compared to the ReplayTV or
Tivo circa 2001 (except for obviously HD improvement). It only took 15 years
and lots of legislation mandating cablecards and whatnot to get them to get
there. I don't have hope that they will act in our best interests given past
actions but I have to use them because there are no other real options.

Honestly I would like to see the effective monopoly on physical layer internet
broken up. Allow municipalities own the cables under the street and and not
allow Comcast and others to block companies like Google from expanding by
blocking access to the last mile. There is a lot of unused dark fiber in lots
of places that could have supported 1Gbps a long time ago but doesn't

~~~
smsm42
Comcast profit margin is 12%:
[https://ycharts.com/companies/CMCSA/profit_margin](https://ycharts.com/companies/CMCSA/profit_margin)
That's on the high side, usually it's around 10%. For comparison, profit
margins for Internet/IT companies are around 25%, Google's 24%. Facebook's a
whopping 45%. Microsoft's a remarkable 26%.

Is 12% "insane"? Which one would be the "sane" one?

~~~
harikb
For a company not having any R&D cost, granted monopoly/duopoly via lobbying,
yes 12% may be insane.

~~~
smsm42
Why do you think they don't have any R&D cost? They just launched a mobile
network, you don't think that involved at least some R&D investment? How much
would be sane in your opinion? 1%? No profit at all?

------
notadoc
Why net neutrality has turned into a partisan issue is beyond me, but in this
era seemingly everything must be politicized as part of a divide and conquer
strategy.

I suspect the best hope for net neutrality is for states to adopt it
themselves at the state level.

~~~
bruno22237
It became a partisan issue immediately, as we have one party that is really
against regulation. why wouldn't a conservative/libertarian party feel this
way?

Dems should run on it, win and sign it into law for good!

------
jnordwick
Title II was never meant to be a good solution to net neutrality. It was used
because it was the only level that the FCC had.

Congress can actually craft internet specific legislation and should. It seems
like Title II has become the end game for many because of pure politics, not
because it is a good solution. Remember, parts of Title II had to be ignored
to get this square peg to fit.

No, don't vote for this. Develop an actual, specific policy if that is what
you want. I fear that after Title II is enacted it would be very difficult to
move to better policy in the future.

~~~
CydeWeys
I don't care if it's optimal, I care that it works, which it does. That makes
it good. Don't let perfect be the enemy of the good.

I'm gonna say this flat out: Do you believe in net neutrality? Because this
argument that you're concern trolling with leads me to believe that you don't
actually believe in it. Trying to give supposed "advice" to advance a
goal—that doesn't actually do so—is deceptive.

~~~
chriscappuccio
Works for what, exactly? You obviously have no idea what you're talking about.

~~~
dang
We've banned this account for repeatedly breaking the site guidelines and
ignoring our request to stop.

------
lurr
Good, force people to put their name behind an issue.

~~~
chriscappuccio
what is your NN position, Mr. Lurr?

~~~
lurr
I am pro net neutrality and unwilling to reveal my real name.

I'm also not an elected representative of the people.

------
jjawssd
Bernie did it right. There is no reason for the government to force net
neutrality if instead the government focused on maintaining a competitive ISP
landscape.

