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The denialist can almost always argue that a proposal is unconstitutional. After all, businesses were afforded many civil rights before women achieved suffrage. |
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Allow me to jump ahead in the Denialists' Deck of Cards, in light of Verizon's claim that giving customer records to the National Security Agency is protected by the First Amendment:
"Communicating facts to the government is protected petitioning activity," says the response, even when the…
As anyone who reads this blog knows, I am a passionate advocate for the principles of natural rights as expressed in the Declaration of Independence. But I am also firmly convinced that our nation is far closer to living out those ideals today than at any time in the almost 230 years since that…
Jason Soon is very angry that I dared to criticize John Lott in this post. I wrote about Freedomnomics (where Lott claims that women's suffrage caused a massive increase in the size of the government):
Lott doesn't like women's suffrage
Soon writes:
His basic thesis is that the size of government…
At last, I get it. I understand what "framing" is. It's pandering to the status quo, the petty conventions, and the bigotry of the majority. It means don't rock the boat, don't be different, don't stand up for your beliefs. It means CONFORM. You will get other people to support you if you just…
Huh? How is this denialism? Of course businesses have rights. What are you trying to argue here? Some specific argument about rights might be ridiculous, but others aren't.
I looked in your PDF and it doesn't seem to have any other explanation. I guess if you have to pad out your "deck" to 52 cards, you're going to have some clunkers in there.
Your paper also starts off with a really weak example--network neutrality. I'm sympathetic with the goals, but the opponents have a good point when they say "no problem". So far the arguments are based just on theoretical problems, not actual problems. There are good reasons that we defer to the status quo, since regulations can cause problems, too.
To me, network neutrality regulations smack of the Interstate Commerce Commission. I bet that if passed, they will live on many decades passed their usefulness and be used by businesses to their own ends.
@Ken, the best example in the privacy space is the appeals to the First Amendment whenever a privacy law passes, as in giving people the choice to restrict sale of personal information violates the right to free speech of businesses. More commonly, businesses will argue that a regulation is some form of a taking.
As to network neutrality, the most common example is downgrading of competitors' VOIP. I'm convinced that the industry is wining so much about network neutrality because they do plan to discriminate on content big time. If they didn't really care, they'd ignore the issue.
@Ken, you caught me pre-caffeinated this morning. Let me expand more. I can't count the number of times I've heard an industry lobbyist claim that a regulation violates the rights of their company in direct contradiction to the case law. The most recent example was the do-not-call list. Despite the landscape of the caselaw on commercial speech and opt-out privacy laws, they raised this objection over and over, and then lost in the courts.
On network neutrality--I've deliberately chosen that issue and genetic discrimination for the deck of cards, because I wanted to use examples where readers could experience the full effect of seeing an issue early on, and then through its evolution. In both cases, the industry is spending millions on PR to say "no problem," but I'm willing to be that as soon as they have an opportunity to, they'll move towards discrimination both in the network and on genetics. Perhaps it will be consolidation and competition that justifies the change. Perhaps it will be cost cutting. Etc. Delay benefits them now, because they can't get what they want now. But things will change. These companies aren't spending millions on PR on these issues unless they have big plans.
Businesses do not have any natural rights, anyway. Revoke a few of these priviledges and they'll stop whining. ;-)