<story><title>The House just voted to wipe out the FCC’s landmark Internet privacy protections</title><url>https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/03/28/the-house-just-voted-to-wipe-out-the-fccs-landmark-internet-privacy-protections/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>0xa</author><text>The reality is more nuanced--the time to stop this legislation was by preventing it coming to vote in the senate. Typically the senate needs 60 votes to forcefully end debate[0], then merely majority to pass it.  Once can disguise support for a bill by approving to end debate, then voting &amp;quot;Nay&amp;quot; given it will get the necessary 50 to be approved.&lt;p&gt;For JS 34 [1] Mitch McConnell (R, KY) limited debate to 10 minutes--I&amp;#x27;m unclear from the transcript exactly how this was allowed. Richard Blumenthal (D, CT) offered resistance to limiting debate, and Kamala Harris (D, CA) and Patrick Leahy (D, VT) requested the role be called several times as a delaying tactic, but the limiting of debate went through.&lt;p&gt;Just prior to the vote, Brian Schatz (D, HI) offered some debate, but this is cosmetic given the known votes.&lt;p&gt;My read there is little to be gained by trying to legislate implementation power that has been ceded to the executive branch and the various agencies that are run by appointment, and therefore a costly filibuster and fight was not worth the time, effort and political mud.&lt;p&gt;[0] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.senate.gov&amp;#x2F;CRSpubs&amp;#x2F;577d2a5e-2b47-4045-95fa-a76398e41461.pdf&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.senate.gov&amp;#x2F;CRSpubs&amp;#x2F;577d2a5e-2b47-4045-95fa-a7639...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.congress.gov&amp;#x2F;congressional-record&amp;#x2F;2017&amp;#x2F;03&amp;#x2F;23&amp;#x2F;senate-section&amp;#x2F;article&amp;#x2F;S1942-4&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.congress.gov&amp;#x2F;congressional-record&amp;#x2F;2017&amp;#x2F;03&amp;#x2F;23&amp;#x2F;sen...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>ComradeTaco</author><text>The votes in both the house and the senate were almost entirely along party lines. Every republican in the senate that voted, voted for this act and every democrat in the senate that voted, voted against this act.</text></item><item><author>pnathan</author><text>This, right here, is the consequence of the withdrawal from politics many geeks advocated very strongly in an earlier time. &amp;quot;Everything is corrupt, it doesn&amp;#x27;t matter&amp;quot;... turns out to only be a viable philosophy when things &lt;i&gt;mostly work well enough&lt;/i&gt;.&lt;p&gt;What we have in protections and freedoms were purchased through a ton of hard work by prior generations: the liberty to slack and think that it just works ok is a nice side effect of the prior sweat.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>entee</author><text>You can&amp;#x27;t do that for rule repeals, they are only subject to a majority vote in the senate:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Congressional_Review_Act&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Congressional_Review_Act&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;Relevant section:&lt;p&gt;&lt;i&gt;The law provides a procedure for expedited consideration in the Senate. If the committee to which a joint resolution is referred has not reported it out within 20 calendar days after referral, it may be discharged from further consideration by a written petition of 30 Members of the Senate, at which point the measure is placed on the calendar, and it is in order at any time for a Senator to move to proceed to the joint resolution.[7] If the Senate agrees to the motion to proceed, debate on the floor is limited to 10 hours and no amendments to the resolution or motions to proceed to other business are in order, and so the Senate may pass the joint resolution with a simple majority.[7] A joint resolution of disapproval meeting certain criteria cannot be filibustered.[8]&lt;/i&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>The House just voted to wipe out the FCC’s landmark Internet privacy protections</title><url>https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/03/28/the-house-just-voted-to-wipe-out-the-fccs-landmark-internet-privacy-protections/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>0xa</author><text>The reality is more nuanced--the time to stop this legislation was by preventing it coming to vote in the senate. Typically the senate needs 60 votes to forcefully end debate[0], then merely majority to pass it.  Once can disguise support for a bill by approving to end debate, then voting &amp;quot;Nay&amp;quot; given it will get the necessary 50 to be approved.&lt;p&gt;For JS 34 [1] Mitch McConnell (R, KY) limited debate to 10 minutes--I&amp;#x27;m unclear from the transcript exactly how this was allowed. Richard Blumenthal (D, CT) offered resistance to limiting debate, and Kamala Harris (D, CA) and Patrick Leahy (D, VT) requested the role be called several times as a delaying tactic, but the limiting of debate went through.&lt;p&gt;Just prior to the vote, Brian Schatz (D, HI) offered some debate, but this is cosmetic given the known votes.&lt;p&gt;My read there is little to be gained by trying to legislate implementation power that has been ceded to the executive branch and the various agencies that are run by appointment, and therefore a costly filibuster and fight was not worth the time, effort and political mud.&lt;p&gt;[0] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.senate.gov&amp;#x2F;CRSpubs&amp;#x2F;577d2a5e-2b47-4045-95fa-a76398e41461.pdf&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.senate.gov&amp;#x2F;CRSpubs&amp;#x2F;577d2a5e-2b47-4045-95fa-a7639...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.congress.gov&amp;#x2F;congressional-record&amp;#x2F;2017&amp;#x2F;03&amp;#x2F;23&amp;#x2F;senate-section&amp;#x2F;article&amp;#x2F;S1942-4&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.congress.gov&amp;#x2F;congressional-record&amp;#x2F;2017&amp;#x2F;03&amp;#x2F;23&amp;#x2F;sen...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>ComradeTaco</author><text>The votes in both the house and the senate were almost entirely along party lines. Every republican in the senate that voted, voted for this act and every democrat in the senate that voted, voted against this act.</text></item><item><author>pnathan</author><text>This, right here, is the consequence of the withdrawal from politics many geeks advocated very strongly in an earlier time. &amp;quot;Everything is corrupt, it doesn&amp;#x27;t matter&amp;quot;... turns out to only be a viable philosophy when things &lt;i&gt;mostly work well enough&lt;/i&gt;.&lt;p&gt;What we have in protections and freedoms were purchased through a ton of hard work by prior generations: the liberty to slack and think that it just works ok is a nice side effect of the prior sweat.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>mayneack</author><text>I don&amp;#x27;t quite agree with &amp;quot;typically&amp;quot;. The numbers of filibusters (and cloture votes) has radically increased in recent history, but I&amp;#x27;m not sure if you can really call it the default behavior yet.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Filibuster_in_the_United_States_Senate#21st_century&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Filibuster_in_the_United_State...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.senate.gov&amp;#x2F;pagelayout&amp;#x2F;reference&amp;#x2F;cloture_motions&amp;#x2F;clotureCounts.htm&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.senate.gov&amp;#x2F;pagelayout&amp;#x2F;reference&amp;#x2F;cloture_motions&amp;#x2F;...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;Also, it&amp;#x27;s not even applied to 50% of resolutions:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.govtrack.us&amp;#x2F;congress&amp;#x2F;bills&amp;#x2F;statistics&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.govtrack.us&amp;#x2F;congress&amp;#x2F;bills&amp;#x2F;statistics&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>