[zwerdlds]

Sorry if I get some basic understanding of the law wrong but...

Isn't this the same thing as regulating car emissions? Doesn't 822 only apply to providers in the state itself? Wouldn't it be that the telecoms are welcome to engage in another method of end-customer billing in other states?

What am I missing?

[everdev]

> Like California’s auto emissions laws that forced automakers to adopt the standards for all production, the state’s new net neutrality rules could push broadband providers to apply the same rules to other states.

I think you're right, the motives are very similar.

> Attorney General Jeff Sessions said that California’s net neutrality law was illegal because Congress granted the federal government, through the F.C.C., the sole authority to create rules for broadband internet providers. “States do not regulate interstate commerce — the federal government does,” Mr. Sessions said in a statement.

I thought Republicans were pro-states rights and limited government? How does their position on this jive with their ideology?

[jorblumesea]

Both sides are only "states rights" if it benefits them on any given issue. Dems are against states rights until they get to pass legislation legalizing pot or net neutrality, then suddenly it's not so bad. Similarly, Republicans are all for states rights until some blue state starts passing legislation they disagree with.

Both sides twist the issue to their advantage. Rights for me, not for thee.

[westurner]

Expansion of federal jurisdiction under the Commerce Clause is an egregious violation of Constitutional law.

Does the federal government have the enumerated right under the Commerce Clause to, for example, ban football for anyone that doesn't have a disability? No!

Was the Commerce Clause sufficient authorization for Federal prohibition of alcohol? No! An Amendment to the Constitution was necessary. And, Federal Alcohol and the unequal necessary State Alcohol prohibitions miserably failed to achieve the intended outcomes.

Where is the limit? How can they claim to support a states' rights, limited government position while expanding jurisdiction under the Interstate Commerce Clause? "Substantially affecting" interstate commerce is a very slippery slope.

Furthermore, de-classification from Title II did effectively - as the current administration's FCC very clearly argued (in favor of special interests over those of the majority) - relieve the FCC of authority to regulate ISPs: they claimed that it's FTC's job and now they're claiming it's their job.

Without Title II classification, FCC has no authority to preempt state net neutrality regulation. California and Washington have the right to regulate ISPs within their respective states.

Outrageous!

Limited government: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limited_government

States' rights: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/States%27_rights

[Interstate] Commerce Clause: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause

Net neutrality in the United States > Repeal of net neutrality policy: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_neutrality_in_the_United...

[pas]

The limit is established, and constantly reevaulated by the Supreme Court. For example it was held that gun control cannot be done through the Commerce Clause.

Car emissions and ISPs are different. As ISPs are very much perfect examples of truly local things (they need to reach your devices with EM signals either via cables or air radio), the Federal government might try to argue that the net neutrality regulation of California affects the whole economy substantially, because it allows too much interstate competition due to the lack of bundling/throttling by ISPs.

Similarly, the problem with car emissions might be that requiring thing at the time of sale affects what kind of cars are sold to CA.

Is the Commerce Clause too vague? Yes. Is there a quick and sane way to fix it? I see none. Is it at least applied consistently? Well, sort of. But we shall see.

[Vendan]

ISPs are the very opposite of local, as the only reason I have an ISP is to deliver bits from the rest of the world. Of course, the FCC doesn't seem to understand that...

[westurner]

To summarize the points made in [1]: products can be sold across state lines, internet service sold in one state cannot be sold across state lines.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18111651

In my opinion, the court has significantly erred in redefining interstate commerce to include (1) intrastate-only-commerce; and (2) non-commerce (i.e. locally grown and unsold wheat)

Furthermore - and this is a bit off topic - unalienable natural rights (Equality, Life, Liberty, and pursuit of Happiness) are of higher precedence. I mention this because this is yet another case where the court will be interpreting the boundary between State and Federal rights; and it's very clear that the founders intended for the powers of the federal government to be limited -- certainly not something that the Commerce Clause should be interpreted to supersede.

What penalties and civil fines are appropriate for States or executive branch departments that violate the Constitution; for failure to uphold Oaths to uphold the Constitution?

[pas]

The problem is, someone has to interpret what kind of economy the Founders intended.

Is it okay if a State opts to withdraw from the interstate market for wheat? Because without power to meddle with intra-state production, consumption and transactions, it's entirely possible.

[pas]

I've replied to your other comment, but to reiterate, you subsrcibe to a particular ISP, and especially in case of a cable/wire mediated connection, your choices are by definition all local.

Even if it is provided by corporations from out of state.

The Internet is the very opposite of local, yes. But the last mile connection, the way your packets get to the nearest IXP is local. And that's where the oligopoly and thus the throttling happens.

[wolf550e]

The GOP does not have an ideology. Anything you could name as a position of their ideology they will (and did) betray for either "winning" or at the behest of their corporate masters.

[exabrial]

You left out how both... all political parties cater to special interests but otherwise accurate

[pm90]

> all political parties cater to special interests but otherwise accurate

Your statement is so broad as to be effectively meaningless. Sun rises in the east. So what?

The difference is that the GP is beholden completely to its corporate masters and does not hesitate in engaging in lies, false propaganda and bad faith politics to achieve its goals. All of which are corrupt and very anti-democratic.

[WillPostForFood]

Democrats now get as much money from corporations as Republicans, but no strings attached, eh?

https://www.opensecrets.org/overview/sectors.php?cycle=2018

[specialist]

Whataboutism is so tedious.

There are plenty of other contributors, both direct and indirect. PACs, billionaires, unions, earned media, Russians, grandmas, etc.

[DannyBee]

California's rules are explicitly allowed by the clean air act, otherwise they would not be okay.

See, e.g, https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/42/7416

and

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/42/7402

and

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/42/7410

[IncRnd]

Those links are about air pollution not general interstate commerce or Title II.

[avs733]

The parent post was about air pollution rules and whether/why/why not they could be used as a corollary to understand what might happen in this case.

The post you are responding to explains that the specific type of legislation that the parent is asking about was explicitly identified in federal law as allowable.

[IncRnd]

Thank you.

[avs733]

Welcome!

[devindotcom]

The idea is that California's law conflicts with a federal rule, the one the FCC recently put into effect. The FCC says its authority preempts that of states on issues like broadband providers, which in a way provide interstate services, arguably making it a federal issue. That's far from settled however and this lawsuit will be a closely watched one.

[komali2]

But I thought the whole idea was that the FCC is refusing to regulate the internet, because it's not their jurisdiction to do so? Wasn't that Pai's reasoning? I'm having trouble finding a source though so maybe my memory's off.

[Alex3917]

> Isn't this the same thing as regulating car emissions?

My understanding is that federal law gives states the option of either following the EPA rules or the CARB rules.

[DannyBee]

Nah, the clean air act specifically is meant to be cooperative with the states and for the states to retain some authority.

[RcouF1uZ4gsC]

If the commerce clause covers a farmer growing his own wheat that he doesn’t sell, it covers internet regulation. The question is if the FCC is authorized by Congress to set the regulations nationwide for internet companies.

[pas]

Not so fast. The same clause also does not cover a lot of things. And ISPs are very much the perfect example of truly local things. And those are not covered.

But we shall see what the courts find.

[Vendan]

I don't have an ISP to talk to the ISP's server, I have an ISP to talk to the global internet, so it's very much not local...

[pas]

Your choices of ISPs is. You buy a connection to a network. Thus the trade happens between you and locally present businesses.

The interstate effect could be due to different services available on the network. So due to the lack of throttling the bundles that the ISPs like to sell wouldn't work, because you could easily buy Netflix or any other non local content.

[Vendan]

My selection of ISPs is local, but so is my selection of power companies, housing, heck, even grocery stores. I choose my ISP on primarily non-local considerations, so I don't think it's quite as cut and dry as you state. (i.e. I choose my ISP because of it's connections to other states and countries, not because of my connection to it.)

[pas]

But there's no market for ISPs where far away ISPs come and present their connections to you. Similarly with housing, even though it's physically possible, real estate markets don't go to the buyers, you don't see houses physically moving to potential buyers. Similarly, thousand mile cables are not laid down for everyone.

And out of state grocery stores don't go to you, even though you can go to them online nowadays. (And in that sense they advertise to you from out of state.)

So, just as you can pick a barber/hairdresser because it can show you the newest trends from other barbers from out of state, you still do the transaction locally, even if the whole hair-onomy might be global.

That said, this is a complex multifaceted problem. (Otherwise everyone would have understood it well by now, even Pai, and everyone would be on the same side, etc. Just as water is wet, the Earth is round, vaccines have amazing cost-benefit ratio, the climate is changing, and emission reduction is the right response, and so on. Ha-ha.) And ultimately we can reason however we want, it's up to some judges to figure this out.

If there were a federal law regulating ISPs, and the whole telecom market, and they were challenged based on lack of constitutional authorization, it'd probably get dismissed fast. (As there are already such laws.) But this is the other way around, and on top of that this is a set of regulations that don't clash with the federal ones, they are merely stricter. (And I'm completely out of my depth about the question of whether the FCC could write rules that'd give rights to ISPs that states can't abridge - or only Congress could do that. But I suspect it can, but only if the regulation has a substantial difference in interstate commerce --- which is the question, is there even an interstate ISP market, and I guess that there isn't.)