Big Government has this GREAT story, makes me happy to be a Verizon customer:
Verizon Communications has become the first of what many expect to be many, to sue the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to undo its voting themselves Internet Overlords on December 21st.
This is an FCC self-inflicted wound; they flung wide open the door to lawsuits aplenty with their dictatorial vote – and the sloppy, self-contradicting and unauthorized order on which they voted.
The FCC decided to again usurp authority over the Internet – so as to then impose Network Neutrality – in a manner similar to the one it attempted in 2007 with the Comcast-BitTorrent situation.
A manner which the D.C. Circuit Court last April unanimously said the FCC is not statutorily authorized to execute.
A manner which FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski himself – just two months before calling for the vote and casting an “Aye” – readily acknowledges he and the FCC don’t have the juice to execute.
For their outrageously outsized part – completely unqualified “Public Interest” Group (PIG) Free Press was cited in the FCC order a ridiculous 53 times – the Media Marxists were livid with the order, somehow asserting that the FCC didn’t go nearly far enough outside its clearly demarcated legal bounds.
Leftists, after all, never allow facts to get in the way of a good beating.
And these PIGish Media Marxists were caught utterly unawares by Verizon’s lawsuit, which (as an admitted non-attorney) I find to be some of the best lawyering we’re likely to see for quite some time.
In layman’s terms, Verizon claims in their suit that the FCC order alters wireless licenses (which it certainly appears to do). A clause in the 1996 Telecommunications Act stipulates that if the FCC alters someone’s wireless license and that someone sues, they are guaranteed an expedited hearing in – the D.C. Circuit.