Redeemer, the next pendulum swing is in process and after the 2018 midterms there is a real possibility of a veto-proof Democratic controlled Congress. At that point it will likely be codified by statute vs. regulation. Unless between now and then the courts find that this recent repeal was arbitrary. The absolute dirth of evidentiary support for the purported reasons for the rule change, as well as the bad faith conduct of Ajit Pai concerning the manipulating of the public comment period. One can hope.
Regardless, I understand the sentiments and their political inspiration, but that still doesn't make them anymore relevant applicable to the threat posed by the elimination of net neutrality and the change of classification to Title I Information Service from Common Carrier:
"In a decentralized, deregulated market, you can't claim to know the likelihood of anything."<--- Of course you can. The markets do it on a daily basis. We also have a history of conduct, recent statements, market incentives, and admissions in litigtion that the ISPs INTEND to do exactly what we are concerned about, i.e. abuse their role as gatekeepers and prioritize, throttle, and censor content where it is in the interest of the ISPs and their shareholders. There is little prognosticating here. The ISPs will slowly introduce changes. They will make subtle adjustments to their terms of service that will be vague and ambiguous to the 1-3% of customers that reportedly read the terms of service. There is no question they will do it, the question is how far will they go.
"Just because something has overwhelming support does not mean an idea is a good one."<---Can't argue with that logic as a general proposition. But there really isn't a debate as to whether net-neutrailty is good. If the value basis is a free and open Internet where neither government or private industry is able to discriminate different Internet content, net-neutrality is GOOD. We have the history of the Internet (which has ALWAYS operated with a form of net neutrality under governement regulation. It was not always called "net netrality" but the principle of treating all traffice equally was the prime component. It was the legal challenges to those regulations that actually ended up in the classification of ISPs to Title II Common Carrier and what we call net-neutrality).
"...a law that also gives the FCC the ability to censor content as well as regulate the internet?"<---This is just a bizarre statement because it is a complete lie. The FCC has absolutely zero ability to censor content. It is also a lie that the FCC has any ability to regulate the Internet. The FCC cannot regulate the Internet. In fact, I cannot think of a single governement entity in the United States that regulates the Internet. The FCC's authority extends to the interstate delivery of the Internet. So it has no authority to censor content or content creators. Up until yesterday's repeal of the Title II classification the FCC was required to intervene and PREVENT any censorship.
Ask yourself this question: If the FCC had the ability to censor the Internet, why have they not censored terrorist web sites, racist groups, or pornogeraphy? IN FACT the arguments and fears of government censorship are the height of bullsh*t. Tell us any time that the governement tried to or was successful in censoring anything. Remember the First Amendment? That applies to the government. It doesn't apply to private companies. So your paranoid, libretarian, fear of governement censorship has absolutely zero basis in reality. In the ENTIRE HISTORY of this country, there have not been any examples of successful censorship. And more telling is the number of times where it may have tried to censor anything can be counted on one hand. Pornography, the Pentagon Papers, WiKi Leaks, etc. etc. etc. The complete disingenuous and spiteful nature of that single argument says a lot about those that adopt it: either they have no understanding of history or are fear mongering in a gross and debasing manner.
"We want companies to succeed so they spend money on jobs and innovation."<---In return for letting them control what information we have access to and the opportunity to censor on a level that we could never imagine from the government as long as they tell us they are censoring material in their terms of service? You apparently do not value the Internet as it is and has been because of net neutrality principles. You are asking and endorsing and happy that the ISPs will now commodotize the Interent and actively discriminate against content for whatever reasons they want with no governement oversight. And while I have agreed with your concerns about local government regulation of rights of way, it is only a part of the problem (and not as big as I think you believe). So in the meantime, nobody (you included) has provided a reason for the need to get rid of net neutrality while the market conditions, e.g. regional monopolies, exist and which compound the the harm to consumers, e.g. you, me, and every person that subscribes to an ISP. So are the relatively small number (and speculative) of jobs worth that trade off? If so , please just move to Russia where the oligarchy is well established; really you don't have to wait for the collapse of our republican democracy.
I would love to read something more about the issue of local regulation of rights of way...it might be somethign you would research and write a post about. I think it deserves more attention since I am one of the very few who lives in the remainig expansion area for Google Fiber that Google has committed to build out before calling it quits. In the meantime, I assume you are willing to pick up the tab on the Netflix surcharge Comcast is likely to impose, so where should I send my bill when it comes? I'll accept a check and I don't even need to see your ID.
RE: The War against the already Open Internet (Part 1)