Comcast tries calling FCC's bluff

Comcast is like the Wal-Mart of the cable and Internet industry in that it thinks no government agency has the right or the power to impose reasonable regulations. Now the anticompetitive Comcast greed merchants actually have the gall to challenge the FCC outright.

FCC rules are clear: ISP's can't block peer-to-peer traffic. They're not allowed. That's an Allowed Cloud! (But it's a good Allowed Cloud.) Period. End of discussion.

But now Comcast vice-president David Cohen says the FCC lacks the authority to have these rules. What's that again??? Cohen tells the FCC that it has no legal authority to stop Comcast from blocking 'Net traffic. Cohen wrote, "The congressional policy and agency practice of relying on the marketplace instead of regulation to maximize consumer welfare has been proven by experience (including the Comcast customer experience) to be enormously successful."

You're hilarious, David!

The trend towards unregulated market-centered policies has been a failure. Contrast the quality of radio and TV today versus that of 30 years ago. This one's just not even close.

Cohen provided a series of points on which he challenges the FCC, but none of them hold up under any real legal theory. He says the government hasn't authorized the FCC to tell ISP's they can't block peer-to-peer traffic. Actually it has. Cohen also misinterprets a 1946 law that has absolutely nothing to do with the FCC regulating ISP's.

So Comcast is just going to defy the FCC outright and provoke a legal battle challenging the FCC's whole reason for being? It looks like that's what they're about to do. All this just so Comcast can dictate what sort of files customers are allowed to download.

What's the purpose of the FCC if it can't regulate rogue policies of ISP's and other communications firms? Is it to raid 1-watt unlicensed stations for playing "Eat The Poop"?

Just to make sure the FCC isn't on too shaky ground (in case some right-wing activist judge lets Comcast have its way), I'd like to see the states pass their own laws barring ISP's from blocking traffic.

(Source: http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080318-comcast-fcc-lacks-any-authority-to-act-on-p2p-blocking.html)