Mythological trolls — described as old and ugly creatures living under bridges or in caves — are known for one central feature: generally troublesome and injurious to human enterprise. Much of the same can be said for today’s patent troll — the dubious business entity again drawing the ire of Congress that exists solely to acquire patents and make claims of infringement in court.
Well, to be frank, I had never considered my contention that the public interest standard is unconstitutional to mean that the FCC itself is unlawful. To my mind, I simply had suggested that the lawfulness of actions taken pursuant to the public interest standard should be questioned.
Economics · Featured · Politics
Last week, Heritage Foundation President, Jim DeMint and Heritage Action for America Chief Executive Officer, Michael Needham led a discussion at Chicago’s Ritz Carlton. Their topic was “A Bold Agenda for a Better America: Taking on the 114th Congress”, as a way to deliver opportunity to all, but favoritism to none.
Featured · Internet/Telecom · Podcast
Jim Lakely, communications director at The Heartland Institute and co-director of Heartland’s Center on the Digital Economy, talked with one of the best free-market tech experts in Washington: Less Government President Seton Motley, who also happens to be a policy advisor to Heartland.
Actor and director Mel Brooks once famously observed, “It’s good to be the king,” but it’s also very profitable to be the lawman.
According to some activists, charter schools are the villain in the nation’s current education narrative.
Early next year, Gov. Shumlin (D) will unveil a long-awaited financing plan for his proposed single-payer health care system. At least, that’s the expectation. Shumlin has so far defied the law requiring him to explain how Vermont will raise the roughly $2 billion in taxes needed to fund single-payer, blowing through a January 2013 deadline imposed by the legislature.
Political analysts are rapidly reaching a consensus that the recent election was a repudiation of President Obama’s failed policies, and although environmental issues were not the primary focus of the elections, the attention they received indicates a strong rejection of the Obama administration’s environmental policies.
If the FCC believes it needs additional legal authority to ensure no Internet “fast lanes” or “paid prioritization,” it should ask Congress for the authority to do it.
The ongoing struggle between parents and the Missouri government over the state’s school transfer law is another example of politics and bureaucracy winning out over parents, children, and their futures.
Currently the FCC is considering reversing the legal status of American Internet services from lightly-regulated information services to utility-regulated “telecommunications” services in response to a 2014 appeals court decision that limited a portion of the FCC’s net neutrality regulatory authority.
New York City was the first major city to ban vaping, the use of e-cigarettes, wherever cigarette smoking is banned. Cities around the country have followed suit.
In a nation where there is a scarcity of good news, hearing Eric Holder give a farewell speech upon his announcement that he will be leaving as the Attorney General was surely welcome in some circles. I was never a fan of his because he was in my opinion always more of a politician than someone with the responsibility to enforce the laws of the nation.
Featured · Internet/Telecom · Regulation
The FCC’s new professed mantra is “competition competition competition.”
However, the FCC appears to be pursuing a de facto policy of decompetition rather than competition.
The New York Times’ utterly ridiculous Editorial Board recently as one addressed Title II Internet regulatory Reclassification and Network Neutrality – and they did so in utterly ridiculous fashion.
We live at a time when politicians and bureaucrats only know one public policy: more and bigger government. Yet, there was a time when even those who served in government defended limited and smaller government. One of the greatest of these died one hundred years ago on August 27, 1914, the Austrian economist Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk.
Far too many government officials (and civilian Leftists) are Aesop scorpions. It’s in their nature to regulate. And regulate again. And then regulate some more. In Baby Boomer Radical parlance, they are willing – even eager – to destroy the village in order to save it.
Featured · Health Care · Legal Affairs
It’s too soon for champagne, but perhaps a beer is in order. In a 2-1 decision in the case of Halbig v. Burwell, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit has ruled that the Internal Revenue Service cannot interpret the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, as allowing subsidies for those Americans who purchase health insurance from the federal health insurance exchange known as Healthcare.gov. This is because the text of the law specifies that subsidies or tax credits are available for insurance purchased on state-created exchanges.
Featured · Legal Affairs · Politics
The Labour Party, the main opposition political party in New Zealand, made headlines last week when it announced its proposed policy for trying people accused of rape. According to the party’s justice spokesman, Andrew Little, the party is proposing that the burden of proof be reversed in rape trials. In other words, people accused of rape must prove their innocence.
Featured · Government · Internet/Telecom · Legal Affairs
In his novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell described the “memory hole,” a chute leading to a vast incinerator into which all unwanted documents were cast. The memory hole served as the ultimate form of state censorship, destroying any trace of information deemed to pose a threat to the regime. Thanks to a ruling in May by the European Court of Justice, a genuine digital memory hole has come online.
NEWS: The Heartlander
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