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from the about-headlines:-don't-use-no-double-negatives dept.
The Register has a story about a court ruling that possibly puts one nail in the coffin of the attempt by the FCC (Federal Communications Commission) to prevent states from banning municipal ISPs.
The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals said on Wednesday [PDF] that the American regulator lacks the authority to overrule state laws that prevent cities from operating their own ISPs.
Last year, the watchdog declared it was unfair of North Carolina and Tennessee to block community-run broadband. Now an appeals court has said the FCC overstepped the mark by trying to undo that block with a preemptive order. In other words, in this case, the US states can't be pushed around and overruled by the communications regulator as it lacks the clear authority to do so.
"This preemption by the FCC of the allocation of power between a state and its subdivisions requires at least a clear statement in the authorizing federal legislation," the judges noted.
"The FCC relies upon S706 of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 for the authority to preempt in this case, but that statute falls far short of such a clear statement. The preemption order must accordingly be reversed."
We obviously have not seen the last of this, especially since the amateur lawyer in me believes the court decision was in error.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday August 12 2016, @12:00AM
I'm too old and bitter to believe we can fix ourselves the peaceful way. things have been broken for a long time - some things have been broken nearly 100 years.
Yet apparently not too old to be infatuated with the fantasy of revolution. My view here is that I don't trust anyone with revolution who can't see how to fix the current situation (presumably you're in the US). They have demonstrated that they are already thorough incompetent and blinkered.
Further, I think many of the people who currently lust for revolution now are already responsible for a fair portion of the problems of the US, such as a lousy employment market, driving up the cost of various human needs (particularly, housing, education, retirement, and health care), contributed to the current corporatism (when one gives the federal government so much power over our lives and resources to play with, it shouldn't be a surprise when it uses it to benefit the wealthy), and help with their various loyal opponents to lower the standards of public discourse.
Sure, the US could be better, but we need to remember that things are going pretty well right now. We still have a great deal of freedom and we have peaceful, society-preserving means for making the changes we want. How about we try to make our society better first before we go with revolution?
(Score: 2) by fnj on Friday August 12 2016, @12:48AM
Wake up, chump. Revolutions happen all the time. They are hardly fantasies. Would it be presumptous of me to guess that what you really meant to say was more like "the fantasy that a revolution fixes anything more than very briefly, if at all"?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday August 12 2016, @02:39PM
Revolutions happen all the time. They are hardly fantasies.
Fantasy doesn't mean something doesn't happen. I imagine there's a lot of sex fantasies played out every day, for example.