posted December 16, 2017 01:01 AM            

quote:

---

Originally posted by Randall:
Buying out the little guy is pure capitalism. If I get bought out, I must be happy with the transaction, no? Less government equals more business freedom. Let the free market decide.

---

WOW.

I'm amazed that someone in the spiritual community would even entertain that thought.

Buying out the little guy and suppressing freedom of speech is FASCISM. The current regime is FASCIST. Attempts to quell dissent, requesting info on people who visited an anti Trump site, a Muslim registry (like Hitler's Jew registry. This goes against the "freedom of religion" that the right shoved down our throat throughout Obama's presidency), proposing a border wall (like Hitler's wall), extreme tax cuts for the wealthy, Trump refusing to condemn white supremacists while condemning protesting NFL players, endorsing a pedophile in Roy Moore, and getting the country close to nuclear war, and this isn't even going into Trump's treason with Russia (led by Putin, a FASCIST). Trump's "presidency" is making Bush look like a saint more and more the longer it goes (I'll even say that Trump has done more damage to this country in a year than Bush has in eight, and he's divided this country way more than Obama could ever dream of), which is saying something as he went to war over oil and is the name you think of along with Reagan when you hear the word "trickle down economics". This presidency is actually making me feel embarrassed to be an American, as this regime is against freedom of speech, racist, Islamophobic, and gets a sick pleasure out of hurting the middle class and below so the wealthiest Americans can have even MORE.

posted December 16, 2017 01:40 AM            

quote:

---

Originally posted by kewf1988:
WOW.

I'm amazed that someone in the spiritual community would even entertain that thought.

Buying out the little guy and suppressing freedom of speech is FASCISM. The current regime is FASCIST. Attempts to quell dissent, requesting info on people who visited an anti Trump site, a Muslim registry (like Hitler's Jew registry. This goes against the "freedom of religion" that the right shoved down our throat throughout Obama's presidency), proposing a border wall (like Hitler's wall), extreme tax cuts for the wealthy, Trump refusing to condemn white supremacists while condemning protesting NFL players, endorsing a pedophile in Roy Moore, and getting the country close to nuclear war, and this isn't even going into Trump's treason with Russia (led by Putin, a FASCIST). Trump's "presidency" is making Bush look like a saint more and more the longer it goes (I'll even say that Trump has done more damage to this country in a year than Bush has in eight, and he's divided this country way more than Obama could ever dream of), which is saying something as he went to war over oil and is the name you think of along with Reagan when you hear the word "trickle down economics". This presidency is actually making me feel embarrassed to be an American, as this regime is against freedom of speech, racist, Islamophobic, and gets a sick pleasure out of hurting the middle class and below so the wealthiest Americans can have even MORE.

I will never sell my blogs out, especially to corporations who want a fascist government, and nobody who really wants things to change for the better should, either. I refuse to let fascism win in the country I was born in, and this repeal (luckily my state is working on its own net neutrality bill) and the current tax bill are fascist, not capitalist.

---

posted December 16, 2017 09:25 PM            

quote:

---

Originally posted by teasel:
It sounds like you're eager to lose a contributor to your forum. A long-term member, too.

---

Thanks, teasel, we all know that 90% of what's said in "humor" is the truth. So he was expressing 90% of his desire to not have me "visit" LL. It's bc i hold his feet to the fire. I'm aware that his clenched teeth and tight grins may not last and he may look for ways to ban me

posted December 16, 2017 09:49 PM            

Here's some hope. The link above talks abt how Trump’s FCC Chair Ajit Pai can try to ignore the overwhelming public support for net neutrality (well over 80% of Americans oppose his net neutrality repeal in the latest poll).

But here’s one group he can’t ignore: federal judges.

And the FCC could be in trouble with the courts. Pai’s order repealing net neutrality and the full 2015 Open Internet Order is on very shaky legal ground.

As the inventor of the term “net neutrality”, Tim Wu wrote last month, “government agencies are not free to abruptly reverse longstanding rules on which many have relied without a good reason, such as a change in factual circumstances. A mere change in F.C.C. ideology isn’t enough.”

Read his full New York Times op-ed for the details, but suffice it to say the FCC’s legal case is weak.

Already, New York State Attorney General along w/ a bunch of other AGs, has filed a lawsuit against the FCC’s repeal of net neutrality. More cases are expected to emerge over the coming days.

Meanwhile here's Tim Wu's brilliantly informative article on this whole issue -

TIM WU: WHY THE COURTS WILL HAVE TO SAVE NET NEUTRALITY

By Tim Wu
November 22, 2017

"Back in 2005, a small phone company based in North Carolina named Madison River began preventing its subscribers from making phone calls using the internet application Vonage. As Vonage was a competitor in the phone call market, Madison River’s action was obviously anticompetitive. Consumers complained, and the Federal Communications Commission, under Michael Powell, its Republican-appointed chairman, promptly fined the company and forced it to stop blocking Vonage.

That was the moment when “net neutrality” rules went from a mere academic proposal to a part of the United States legal order. On that foundation — an open internet, with no blocking — much of our current internet ecosystem was built.

On Tuesday, the F.C.C. chairman, Ajit Pai, announced plans to eliminate even the most basic net neutrality protections — including the ban on blocking — replacing them with a “transparency” regime enforced by the Federal Trade Commission.

“Transparency,” of course, is a euphemism for “doing nothing.” Companies like Madison River, it seems, will soon be able to block internet calls so long as they disclose the blocking (presumably in fine print). Indeed, a broadband carrier like AT&T, if it wanted, might even practice internet censorship akin to that of the Chinese state, blocking its critics and promoting its own agenda.

Allowing such censorship is anathema to the internet’s (and America’s) founding spirit. And by going this far, the F.C.C. may also have overplayed its legal hand. So drastic is the reversal of policy (if, as expected, the commission approves Mr. Pai’s proposal next month), and so weak is the evidence to support the change, that it seems destined to be struck down in court.

The problem for Mr. Pai is that government agencies are not free to abruptly reverse longstanding rules on which many have relied without a good reason, such as a change in factual circumstances. A mere change in F.C.C. ideology isn’t enough. As the Supreme Court has said, a federal agency must “examine the relevant data and articulate a satisfactory explanation for its action.” Given that net neutrality rules have been a huge success by most measures, the justification for killing them would have to be very strong.

It isn’t. In fact, it’s very weak. From what we know so far, Mr. Pai’s rationale for eliminating the rules is that cable and phone companies, despite years of healthy profit, need to earn even more money than they already do — that is, that the current rates of return do not yield adequate investment incentives. More specifically, Mr. Pai claims that industry investments have gone down since 2015, the year the Obama administration last strengthened the net neutrality rules.

Setting aside whether industry investments should be the dominant measure of success in internet policy (what about improved access for students? or the emergence of innovations like streaming TV?),

Mr. Pai is not examining the facts: Securities and Exchange Commission filings reveal an increase in internet investments since 2015, as the internet advocacy group Free Press has demonstrated.

But Mr. Pai faces a more serious legal problem. Because he is killing net neutrality outright, not merely weakening it, he will have to explain to a court not just the shift from 2015 but also his reasoning for destroying the basic bans on blocking and throttling, which have been in effect since 2005 and have been relied on extensively by the entire internet ecosystem.

This will be a difficult task. What has changed since 2004 that now makes the blocking or throttling of competitors not a problem? The evidence points strongly in the opposite direction: There is a long history of anticompetitive throttling and blocking — often concealed — that the F.C.C. has had to stop to preserve the health of the internet economy. Examples include AT&T’s efforts to keep Skype off iPhones and the blocking of Google Wallet by Verizon. Services like Skype and Netflix would have met an early death without basic net neutrality protections. Mr. Pai needs to explain why we no longer have to worry about this sort of threat — and “You can trust your cable company” will not suffice.

Moreover, the F.C.C. is acting contrary to public sentiment, which may embolden the judiciary to oppose Mr. Pai. Telecommunications policy does not always attract public attention, but net neutrality does, and polls indicate that 76 percent of Americans support it. The F.C.C., in short, is on the wrong side of the democratic majority.

In our times, the judiciary has increasingly become a majoritarian force. It alone, it seems, can prevent narrow, self-interested factions from getting the government to serve unseemly and even shameful ends. And so it falls to the judiciary to stop this latest travesty."

Tim Wu is a law professor at Columbia, the author of “The Attention Merchants: The Epic Struggle to Get Inside Our Heads” and a contributing opinion writer.

posted December 16, 2017 10:03 PM            

quote:

---

Originally posted by Randall:
I assure you that you don't cause any teeth clenching or warm feet. You're the one who gets heated and leaves--like you stormed out of here when you couldn't drum up support for those OWS idiots. As I told you, it was no revolution, and it faded into obscurity, just like I said it would. LL is a Linda Goodman site first and foremost and an Astrology site second to that. Politics is just a tiny corner here. That being said, you have it quite backwards. A political Forum of all leftists would be boring. You're welcome.

---

"You're the one who gets heated and leaves--like you stormed out of here when you couldn't drum up support for those OWS idiots. As I told you, it was no revolution, and it faded into obscurity, just like I said it would."

Earth to randall! I've absolutely zero idea what you're talking abt. I do not ever remember getting heated and leaving. Nor do i recall ever discussing OWS w/ you or anyone else on LL. You're completely confused is all i can think of. I got heated twice on the roy moore thread once ea at you and jwhip...justifiably so...and i'm still here aren't i?

posted December 17, 2017 11:02 PM            

As it happens I also agree with this piece for the most part, tho i think oversight to prevent monopolization is probly needed once you get as much consolidation in the combined broadcasting/newsmedia/internet as we have now.. to make sure that little people are not priced out of access to the now necessary aspects of the web needed for work etc. And to prevent censorship