Senate votes to reinstate net neutrality • Hacker News Board

Re: Senate votes to reinstate net neutrality

#201

Post by gtycomb » Thu, May 17, 2018, 2:37 PM UTC

whamlastxmas wrote: post #159

mac01021 wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What was the basic gist of the response?

My response from a Texas senator was that he "supports net neutrality" and then went on define net neutrality as the exact opposite of the commonly accepted meaning.

> then went on define net neutrality as the exact opposite

This guy and my former Arizona senator must have gone to the same school. During the campaign, we listened to a PBS feature of this future senator and family from their kitchen, a happy working middle class setting, discussing their views. He was strongly against bailouts he said, and within 4 months after getting elected he voted just the opposite. The public seldom hears these in our media.

Re: Senate votes to reinstate net neutrality

#202

Post by ensignavenger » Thu, May 17, 2018, 2:40 PM UTC

smsm42 wrote: post #146

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it useful, in politics, to keep a list of issues in respect of which I would, singularly, disregard party affiliation for. (The same with a black list. I won’t vote for a candidate on the wrong side of certain issues.) Putting it on paper is valuable. It clarifies your thoughts. And it makes it clear how draconian these red lines are. (I constantly re-evaluate them, with the goal of talking myself out of them.…

What do you do if none of the candidates qualifies after applying white and black lists? Or, if the candidate both promises something on the while list and on the black list? Not a theoretical question, I don't have the right to vote in US, but if I did, I'd be in this situation for the most elections in the most places where I cared reading about candidates.

I have this problem, I usually write in some fictional characters (or someone one who isn't running or who isn't qualified to run) name in protest. For example, during our last city election, I wrote in Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump for Aldermen. I also wrote in my mother for the school board.

Re: Senate votes to reinstate net neutrality

#203

Post by fjsolwmv » Thu, May 17, 2018, 2:46 PM UTC

frockington wrote: post #191

psychometry wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you're a single-issue voter, basically? How do you feel about all of the other things the GOP has been doing to this country?

Not the poster but I'm normally a single issue voter and am registered just to vote no for 90% of the things the city wants to do. From a macro-perspective, in the last two years I've seen my taxes go down and unemployment drop. That's all that has personally affected me and I can say that the economic optimism in my city has sky rocket. Overall I'm pretty happy with how things are going.

Working more is important than living well?

Re: Senate votes to reinstate net neutrality

#204

Post by ensignavenger » Thu, May 17, 2018, 2:48 PM UTC

Faark wrote: post #194

tzs wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Here we don't have elections that matter because thanks to redistricting and gerrymandering, the outcome (along party lines) is well established. All that means is that the general election doesn't matter, and so you need to move your vote to whatever comes before the general election in your district to make it matter. 1. Register for the party that the redistricting and gerrymandering favors. 2. Vote in that part…

Couldn't the opposite work as well... choose a candidate so extreme even voters of his own party don't want to support him? Isn't that what happened with Roy Moore and Alabama? The US voting system just seems incredible bad.

In Missouri, Claire McCaskill (Democrate Senator) ran campaign ads during a Republican Primary supporting (in effect) the worst possible republican candidate. This massive spend on campaign advertising by McCaskill during the primary led to this weak Republican winning the nomination, and thus an easy victory for McCaskill during the General Election. A pretty good strategy from McCaskill, but also very underhanded.

Re: Senate votes to reinstate net neutrality

#205

Post by fjsolwmv » Thu, May 17, 2018, 2:58 PM UTC

scarface74 wrote: post #93

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've heard the rhetoric. It's not relevant to my point: Group A of companies wants B to pay a bill. Group B doesn't want to pay it. Corporate lobbying ensues, as each tries to make the other's position illegal. Who is "right" or whether or not Group B should pay Group A's bill is not relevant to the accuracy of my statement. EDIT: Please keep this thread on the topic at hand: Why net neutrality is perceived as a libe…

That's not "rhetoric" that's how the internet has worked for decades. Group A and Group B are already paying their own bills for internet traffic via peering agreements and cash when there is unequal traffic on one side. It's not like there is competition for last mile internet service in most of the United States. If Comcast decided they wanted to charge netflix specifically more and not just charge the owner of the…

That's not how peering works, economically. When Netflix's ISP sends a movie to my ISP, is my ISP doing Netflix a favor? No, it's doing me a favor, or both of us a favor. So who should pay? Backbones who aren't either of our ISPs complicate it further.

ISP should be able to charge a fair price for providing connectivity across their networks, but it's not at all obvious what a fair price is, because it's not clear how expensive each packet delivery is and whose packet it is. That's why capitalists/right-wingers say "free market sort it out" and socialists/left-wingers say "government should decide rules about what's fair".

Re: Senate votes to reinstate net neutrality

#206

Post by fjsolwmv » Thu, May 17, 2018, 3:09 PM UTC

caf wrote: post #100

It's interesting the way that the Congressional Review Act operates, to require both houses and the president to sign off on overruling the decision of an executive agency. In bicameral Westminster-style systems, delegated legislation (ie. executive regulations) can usually be vetoed by either chamber. This being under the principle that if the regulation in question had been enacted as regular legislation it would h…

It's a fiction either way. There's no way to decide whether the vetoed action was in or out of scope of the original delegated authority. Maybe one chamber just changed their mind.

Re: Senate votes to reinstate net neutrality

#207

Post by fjsolwmv » Thu, May 17, 2018, 3:20 PM UTC

ryanpcmcquen wrote: post #34

I am surprised this even passed the Senate. It is almost as if Senators want to get re-elected.

The Senate has 51 Republicans but 3 of them are rather independent/centrist and sometimes vote with Democrats.

Re: Senate votes to reinstate net neutrality

#208

Post by fjsolwmv » Thu, May 17, 2018, 3:21 PM UTC

mattnewton wrote: post #14

A lot of people are dismissing this as political theatre, but it serves a useful function as recording the names of everyone against reinstating net neutrality publically, so that challengers can make it a campaign issue in November. No, it probably isn’t going to pass the house, and smart money is on Trump vetoing it even if that miracle came to pass. However, Democrats are testing the waters for a campaign pledge,…

It's essentially a party line vote, so no recording is needed.

Re: Senate votes to reinstate net neutrality

#209

Post by mattnewton » Thu, May 17, 2018, 3:23 PM UTC

fjsolwmv wrote: post #208

mattnewton wrote: post #14

A lot of people are dismissing this as political theatre, but it serves a useful function as recording the names of everyone against reinstating net neutrality publically, so that challengers can make it a campaign issue in November. No, it probably isn’t going to pass the house, and smart money is on Trump vetoing it even if that miracle came to pass. However, Democrats are testing the waters for a campaign pledge,…

It's essentially a party line vote, so no recording is needed.

The record is important, because unlike party / representative positions, it won’t change in the midterms.

Re: Senate votes to reinstate net neutrality

#210

Post by fourthark » Thu, May 17, 2018, 3:34 PM UTC

smsm42 wrote: post #177

alistproducer2 wrote: post #89

I am on the one hand happy to hear about this, but I couldn't help but laugh at the way it was reported on NPR. They said Democrats see this as an issue that can bring voters to the polls. I immediately thought of how few people even know what the heck net neutrality is (about 1 in 4 [0]). Either NPR is making stuff up or the Democrats are seriously in need of some new advice. [0]: https://americanactionnetwork.org/w…

1 in 4? That is insanely high. I would be surprised in 1 in 10 can explain what NN is properly (not "evil ISPs are gonna to make us pay for pr0n!") and about 1 in a 100 to explain what actually happened in 2015 and what happened in 2018 and what is the state of current legislation around ISP-content provider relationships. These things are complex patchwork of years of legislation and require non-trivial knowledge to…

They don't need to understand in order to vote.