Nonsense Protest of the Day: Net Neutrality!

Okay, agitators, time to come out of your parent’s basement, grab a starbucks half-caf soy latte and head on down to the American Enterprise Institute to let FCC Chairman Ajit Pai know that you will not tolerate his attempts to free the internet (that your parents pay for) from restrictive government regulation!

That’s the protest du jour anyway, and it represents just another in the many, many, many attempts by left-leaning activists to let the world know they’re really, really mad, y’all. Like, really mad. And that they don’t have jobs apparently.

In any event, members from the leftist group Free Press, sent out a call to arms to their frustrated friends to join them in downtown Washington, DC to express their distaste for Pai’s

Last month, we made national headlines with our #rickrolling protest for Net
Neutrality at the FCC’s monthly meeting. This week, we’re continuing the
action – and we need your help…

Stand with us on Fri., May 5, at 1 pm in Washington, D.C. when Trump’s FCC
chairman, Ajit Pai, will deliver yet another misleading speech about the
open internet at conservative think tank American Enterprise Institute. If
you’re able to attend, just send an email to let us
know…

Right before Pai’s speech, we’ll gather outside with fellow activists to
display a massive Net Neutrality banner. We’ll march, chant and sing – and
let everyone gathered know that internet freedom is not for sale.

This action is part of the ongoing nationwide fight against Trump and Pai’s
agenda. It’s obvious that this administration wants to silence dissenting
voices by destroying Net Neutrality, and we can’t let that happen.

Pay close attention to that last bit: “silence dissenting voices.” The Hillary contingent is going to use any perceived violation of their constitutional rights — whether accurate or not — as an excuse to rally and protest against any movement at the federal level over the next four years.

Never mind that Pai he was appointed as a commissioner to the FCC by President Obama, and only elevated to Chairman by President Trump.

And what is it that Pai plans that have the agitators so anxious? He literally wants to deregulate the Internet, moving it away from Title II regulations that were most popular under the old phone monopoly Ma Bell. Reason Magazine breaks it down:

The FCC currently regulates Internet service providers (ISPs) under Title II regulations that essentially treat the internet as a public utility similar to the old phone monopoly. Proponents of net neutrality and the invocation of Title II regulations say that such oversight is necessary to ensure that the Internet remains “open” and ISPs don’t block sites or degrade offerings by rivals. Long a critic of Title II regulations, which were invoked after the FCC lost two court battles to regulate the Internet, Pai describes them as “a panoply of heavy-handed economic regulations that were developed in the Great Depression to handle Ma Bell.”

Scrapping these rules, Pai told Reason’s Nick Gillespie, won’t harm consumers or the public interest because there was no reason for them in the first place. The rationales were mere “phantoms that were conjured up by people who wanted the FCC for political reasons to overregulate the internet,” Pai told Gillespie. “We were not living in a digital dystopia in the years leading up to 2015.”

Horrifying, allowing the Internet’s innovation to be governed more by the demands of the free market rather than the federal government.

If any wannabe activists can’t make the rally in DC today, word on the street via Politico Pro (subscription required) is that John Oliver will cover the issue on his HBO show this Sunday.

“Last Week Tonight With John Oliver,” which airs on HBO, is working on a new net neutrality segment, focused on current Chairman Ajit Pai’s effort to undo the rules, that could run as early as Sunday, according to sources familiar with the show’s plans. A rep for HBO could not immediately comment.

So maybe you kids don’t have to leave those basements after all.

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