
Ajit Pai calls California’s net neutrality rules “illegal” - Swifty
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/09/ajit-pai-calls-californias-net-neutrality-rules-illegal
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TYPE_FASTER
From the transcript:

So in early August, we adopted a policy that would allow a single entity to do
the requisite work on the utility pole—a policy commonly known as “one-touch
make-ready.” This policy could substantially lower the cost and shorten the
time to deploy broadband on utility poles.

But according to [https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/08/fcc-gives-
google...](https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/08/fcc-gives-google-fiber-
and-new-isps-faster-access-to-utility-poles):

Despite today's vote, the FCC hurt the cause of faster pole attachment when it
deregulated the broadband industry last year, according to Electronic Frontier
Foundation (EFF) Legislative Counsel Ernesto Falcon. The FCC's anti-net
neutrality vote removed the classification of broadband as a common carrier
service—that now-repealed classification "ensure[d] that every broadband
provider has the legal right to gain access to many of the poles that run
along our roads," the EFF wrote last year.

"I wonder if the anti-net neutrality crowd understands that Title II's
regulation of poles and conduit is now limited to telephone/cable TV thanks to
[the] Restoring Internet Freedom Order," Falcon tweeted today. "The ISPs that
are broadband-only will not get the benefit, thus limiting its positive
impact."

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drfuchs
Ah, the hypocrisy of the "States Rights" crowd: They're all for it, until they
don't like what a state wants to do.

~~~
emodendroket
States' rights were first employed as an argument by New Englanders opposing
the War of 1812. Their more famous Southern exponents were not troubled by the
Fugitive Slave Law. I'd argue that there is nearly nobody who has a principled
commitment to states' rights, rather than using it as an instrument to their
true ends.

~~~
gremlinsinc
I'd like to go a step further and make each state fully autonomous, with a
loosely coupled 'union' for a military force (albeit, MUCH smaller than it is
currently) and intrastate issues like commerce/roads/etc. Each state would pay
taxes to cover those things. State taxes would be > fed, and would cover
Medicare, education, medicaid, and decide their own social programs, and legal
laws.. This would give more freedom, if you can afford/want to live in a
progressive place with universal healthcare move to a state with that, if not
move to the deep south, where they no longer have separation of church and
state, and everything else Republicans want.

~~~
emodendroket
Yes, and then the states can be confederated by some series of articles.
Wonder why nobody thought of this?

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zwerdlds
> "only the federal government can set regulatory policy in this area"

Regulatory policy that apparently he wants to set - but specifically gave that
ability to the FTC.

Seems like he wants to have his cake and eat it too? Am I misunderstanding
this?

~~~
JustSomeNobody
He's trying to tie everything into a ball of legal twine that will take years
to sort out. All the while, the ISPs will have free reign to do whatever they
want.

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frandroid
> After all, broadband is an interstate service; Internet traffic doesn't
> recognize state lines.

Hum, it either recognizes both state and nation-state lines, or neither. Since
the FCC can regulate ISPs, then it clearly recognizes nation-state lines, and
thus state lines.

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Jtsummers
> It follows that only the federal government can set regulatory policy in
> this area. For if individual states like California regulate the Internet,
> this will directly impact citizens in other states.

\-- Pai

Interesting argument. Could his reasoning be used to block attempts by states
(NC, I'm looking at you!) to interfere with municipal broadband?

~~~
emodendroket
I mean it's an argument against a federal system in general, when you think
about it. Any regulation California passes is going to affect what is sold all
over the country, because businesses can't afford to ignore it and making a
special California version is more complicated than just complying in the base
product.

~~~
atomi
The "it's going to be too expensive and complicated" argument has been used by
every group ever opposed to any new regulation.

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shmerl
For Pai, it's only legal when it serves his monopolistic masters. When it
serves the people, it must be illegal. The only thing it poses a risk to, is
monopoly abuse by Comcast, Charter, AT&T, Verizon and the like. Which is
exactly the point.

And Pai lost all power to preempt anything, when he himself removed FCC from
overseeing ISPs and pushed that to FTC.

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jedberg
I believe the entire purpose of passing that law was for California to say
"come at me bro" to the Federal government, and force a showdown on the issue.
I doubt the California lawmakers ever expected it to actually go into effect,
and not get blocked by lawsuits the moment the ink is dry.

~~~
adrr
There's another bill that ties net neutrality to state contracts. It would
forbid the state from signing contracts with ISPs that don't follow net
neutrality. They could also tack on taxes to non-compliance ISPs. The State
will ultimately win the fight. It was very short-sighted for ISPs to make this
federal issue because it would have just ended up with states.

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Fede_V
I've said it in the past, but I'm going to repeat myself: if anyone is willing
to defend Pai's actions, would you like to do a friendly bet (proceeds to to a
GiveWell charity) that as soon as he is legally allowed too he will be given a
sinecure at Verizon/Comcast or an RNC friendly lobby shop?

~~~
dopamean
This is not an interesting bet at all. Isn't that exactly what many people
leaving government do?

~~~
wahern
Not only that, it's what people entering government _plan_ to do.

I had a conversation with a lead researcher at a pharmaceutical company (also
a friend) where she discussed her plans to work at the FDA for a few years and
then return to private industry. She was very explicit about her reasoning:
companies pay a premium for researchers with FDA experience because such
people are more adept at navigating funding and approval processes.

When I asked whether she considered that she would be participating in a
corrupting (if not corrupt) process, she simply waved the notion away--this is
how it works and what you need to do to advance your career. This person leans
very liberal from a social and political perspective.

This is where we're at as a society. The machinery of the administrative state
is consuming everything in its path. I'm not anti-government or anti-
regulation. But the centralization of power is extremely problematic; not just
conceptually, but literally.

Once upon a time the Federal government had an _explicit_ (if informal) policy
of placing administrative offices across the country. This was, I believe,
largely a matter of sharing the employment opportunities across the states.
But it also had the effect of disincentivizing government work for highly
ambitious people. (Moving to D.C. is far easier to justify than moving to
Oklahoma City.) These administrative offices are increasingly centralized
geographically around D.C. This has attracted industry. The phenomenon is one
example of many that has promoted corrupting processes such as the revolving
door between regulators and industry.

On the bright side, it means there are very concrete countermeasures that we
could begin instituting. For example, instate an _explicit_ , _formal_ policy
of locating administrative agencies--especially executive offices--far outside
the Beltway. Yes, this will be costly in terms of administrative efficiency.
But safeguarding democratic institutions is costly; if we're not prepared to
pay the price then we deserve what we get.

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GW150914
This guy will just say anything, won’t he? I already knew he wasn’t a
constitutional scholar, but this is rich even coming from a shill with as
little self respect as Pai.

 _The broader problem is that California 's micromanagement poses a risk to
the rest of the country. After all, broadband is an interstate service;
Internet traffic doesn't recognize state lines. It follows that only the
federal government can set regulatory policy in this area. For if individual
states like California regulate the Internet, this will directly impact
citizens in other states._

What?! I can’t even begin to express how infuriating this is, the sheer
hypocrisy and wanton dishonesty, from someone who is nominally in the position
of protecting Americans’ interests. Forget the interstate commerce clause,
forget Republican’s supposed respect for state’s rights, forget giving people
a necessary service, let’s use a warped interpretation of the law as a hammer
to empower crooked bureaucracy.

~~~
dsfyu404ed
This fight is pot vs kettle.

CA doesn't think twice about making laws that contradict federal laws or are
in direct violation of the constitution.

Pai is, charitably speaking, in the pocket of industry.

I think CA is within its rights this time around and wins this one fair and
square though despite not having an awesome coffee mug.

~~~
happytoexplain
>CA doesn't think twice about making laws that contradict federal laws

It's been my naive observation that state laws are, in some practical context,
"allowed" to contradict federal laws, in the sense that perhaps they are
simply given some de facto leeway. Am I totally off base? Does this reduce the
hypocrisy?

~~~
dx87
They are only allowed to contradict state laws to the extent that the federal
government may decide it's not worth it to try and enforce the rules in the
state, especially states like CA where they state that they won't cooperate
with enforcement of laws they don't agree with. Even if the state someone
lives in has contradictory laws, you still have to follow the federal laws at
any job that cares about that. For example, if you live in a state that has
legalized recreational or medical marijuana, you still can't use it if you
want to work a federal job or anything that requires a security clearance.

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ddingus
Of course he does.

There would not be such a fight if Ajit were to actually regulate in the
public interest.

I see someone already made the comment, "didn't he give all that to the FTC?"

Indeed.

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greymeister
How long before they use the commerce clause as an excuse to kill California's
law?

~~~
superseeplus
If they do that, can California rewrite the law to distinguish between last
mile service and transit service and regulate only the last mile part?

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mangix
Funny how nobody seems to understand the interstate commerce clause. I guess
this is how they justify being able to do anything...

------
syntaxing
It's quite interesting how much the Trump administration is copying from the
Reagan administration (admittedly, I was not alive during the Regan times so
my info is coming from textbooks). The Trump administration is doing is
essentially its own form of Trump Reaganomics mixed with his own Starve the
beast playbook [1]. Though I feel like this new strategy is more to protect
the self interests of the few around President Trump rather than to cut down
the big government.

[1][https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starve_the_beast](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starve_the_beast)

------
trumped
where does Ajit Pai hangout?

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djohnston
but muh state's rights

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preparedzebra
I hate this guy so much

~~~
dang
Ok, but please don't post unsubstantive comments to HN.

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valarauca1
TBH it is hilarious we believe "net neutrality" exists in the first place.
Peering agreements between ISP's at IPX's are rarely "fair or neuatral" as
different ISP's have different carrying capacity, and will treat traffic from
their own networks preferentially for technical reasons.

But since <5k people understand BGP routing configuration we pretend it is
neutral.

~~~
happytoexplain
It's been my experience that all definitions of net neutrality explicitly
allow prioritization for technical reasons (e.g. streaming). Is this fuzzier
than I thought?

~~~
valarauca1
"technical reasons" is an awesome weasel word in the hands of the right
c-level or legal representative.

~~~
convolvatron
"technical reasons" should be limited to things like the speed of light, or in
this case the necessity to drop packets if the presented load exceeds the
output rate of a link for more than the finite buffer can store.

everything else is policy - which means there is a choice. that choice might
be heavily driven by economics, or by some kind of business strategy. but its
pretty indefensible to say 'the crew in white coats down in the basement told
me we just had to do it that way (shrug)'

so in the absence of speed-of-light issues, 'technical reasons' in this case
is just a planet-sized loophole.

