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You're probably correct on your first assumption that this is campaign related and most likely won't go anywhere. Legislation is the only 'real' way to change t

You're probably correct on your first assumption that this is campaign related and most likely won't go anywhere. Legislation is the only 'real' way to change the section.

pstuart 6y ago
Executive orders are increasingly used to do end-runs around legislation, so don't count them out.
- mindslight 6y ago
  But the existing end runs are generally for things that the Executive already has administrative control over, refuses to abide by restrictions/oversight, and suffers no repercussions - similar to how none of Trump's personal crimes are being prosecuted while he's president. What are the possible results here? Finding sympathetic (ie corrupt) courts that will straight up ignore what the law says and defer to the executive's decrees? Or just directly ordering those federal goon squads to physically take over Twitter et al? I don't want to deny the possibility that such fascist takeovers could happen. They just seem unlikely, compared to gross ineptitude leading to a lack of any results.
  - clusterfish 6y ago
    Why not? "Sympathetic" courts are explicitly Trump's strategy to stay in power by validating vote suppression and even allowing states to not count all the votes. And you think some puny section is exempt from such bullshit? We have a new standard for how much such technicalities as separation of power matter in America, better get used to it. It's not like Democrats will fix all that even if they sweep the election, they'll just sit on their hands as usual.
    - rayiner 6y ago
      Democrats invented obliterating separation of powers, and then bludgeoned the Supreme Court into accepting it through court packing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A.L.A._Schechter_Poultry_Corp._v._United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A.L.A._Schechter_Poultry_Corp.... > This traditional reading of the Commerce Clause was later disavowed by the Court, which after threats from Roosevelt began to read congressional power more expansively in this area, in cases such as NLRB v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp.[8] However, more recent cases such as United States v. Lopez[9] perhaps signal a growing inclination in the Court to once again affirm limits on its scope. In a unanimous 2011 decision, Bond v. United States, the Supreme Court cited Schechter as a precedent.[10]
      - clusterfish 6y ago
        You don't need to go 85 years back to judge current political parties, and that was not the point of my comment. The point is, US governance is fucked, and nobody will save you.
- InitialLastName 6y ago
  I suspect that, after the large-scale Trump-era rollback of Obama-era executive orders (mirroring, of course, a similar transition in 2008), the electorate and political classes are starting to figure out that executive orders don't have a lot of sway once your party loses control of the executive.
notankies 6y ago
You clearly don't understand how [Administrative Law](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Administrative_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Administrative_law) works, which is understandable, because it's a complex morass. We have, largely, FDR to thank for this, with the creation of all of the alphabet soup agencies. Basically, Congress passes laws that grant powers to the Executive to ... execute .. the law and enforce it. These laws instruct the Executive Branch to write administrative policy which is then enforced -- this is the reason, for instance, that the Department of Education could unilaterally rescind the Obama era "Dear Colleague" letter. The laws that are passed, including Section 230 and the rest of the DMCA, grant the Administration broad powers to write policy from the law in places where the law is insufficiently defined. This is why the Section II/Section III reclassification (called "Net Neutrality" by its proponents, though the actual "Neutrality" is of course controversial) could be done unilaterally by Pai and it's the same reason that the FCC is open to re-interpret the law as written in order to write administrative policy. If Congress doesn't like the new policy, they can pass a new law that better defines the Executive's role in enforcing their law.
- tzs 6y ago
  That's only partially correct. Some laws that require executive action to interpret and enforce leave it up to executive agencies to fill in the details. The Telecommunications Act of 1996 is one such law, which is why the FCC plays such a big role in net neutrality. Section 230 is not such a law. It creates a civil liability shield for interactive computer services and states who that applies to and how it is to be used. There is nothing in it for the Executive to execute. It is only executed when someone raises it as a defense in a court case, and it is the judiciary that decide what it means. The FCC can interpret it all they want, but that interpretation will be at best persuasive authority in any court case involving the application of 230.
  - notankies 6y ago
    > it creates a civil liability shield for interactive computer services and states who that applies to and how it is to be used. Right, and the limits of that liability shield are not well enough defined in the law so the policy must define the limits until Congress acts to clarify the law. Hence the rulemaking. Facebook and Twitter's actions yesterday and the controversy over the role of 230 make the lack of clarity apparent. If Congress doesn't like the new administrative policy, allow them to clarify.

You're probably correct on your first assumption that this is campaign related and most likely won't go anywhere. Legislation is the only 'real' way to change the section.

pstuart 6y ago

Executive orders are increasingly used to do end-runs around legislation, so don't count them out.

mindslight 6y ago
But the existing end runs are generally for things that the Executive already has administrative control over, refuses to abide by restrictions/oversight, and suffers no repercussions - similar to how none of Trump's personal crimes are being prosecuted while he's president. What are the possible results here? Finding sympathetic (ie corrupt) courts that will straight up ignore what the law says and defer to the executive's decrees? Or just directly ordering those federal goon squads to physically take over Twitter et al? I don't want to deny the possibility that such fascist takeovers could happen. They just seem unlikely, compared to gross ineptitude leading to a lack of any results.
- clusterfish 6y ago
  Why not? "Sympathetic" courts are explicitly Trump's strategy to stay in power by validating vote suppression and even allowing states to not count all the votes. And you think some puny section is exempt from such bullshit? We have a new standard for how much such technicalities as separation of power matter in America, better get used to it. It's not like Democrats will fix all that even if they sweep the election, they'll just sit on their hands as usual.
  - rayiner 6y ago
    Democrats invented obliterating separation of powers, and then bludgeoned the Supreme Court into accepting it through court packing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A.L.A._Schechter_Poultry_Corp._v._United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A.L.A._Schechter_Poultry_Corp.... > This traditional reading of the Commerce Clause was later disavowed by the Court, which after threats from Roosevelt began to read congressional power more expansively in this area, in cases such as NLRB v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp.[8] However, more recent cases such as United States v. Lopez[9] perhaps signal a growing inclination in the Court to once again affirm limits on its scope. In a unanimous 2011 decision, Bond v. United States, the Supreme Court cited Schechter as a precedent.[10]
    - clusterfish 6y ago
      You don't need to go 85 years back to judge current political parties, and that was not the point of my comment. The point is, US governance is fucked, and nobody will save you.
InitialLastName 6y ago
I suspect that, after the large-scale Trump-era rollback of Obama-era executive orders (mirroring, of course, a similar transition in 2008), the electorate and political classes are starting to figure out that executive orders don't have a lot of sway once your party loses control of the executive.

notankies 6y ago

You clearly don't understand how [Administrative Law](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Administrative_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Administrative_law) works, which is understandable, because it's a complex morass. We have, largely, FDR to thank for this, with the creation of all of the alphabet soup agencies. Basically, Congress passes laws that grant powers to the Executive to ... execute .. the law and enforce it. These laws instruct the Executive Branch to write administrative policy which is then enforced -- this is the reason, for instance, that the Department of Education could unilaterally rescind the Obama era "Dear Colleague" letter. The laws that are passed, including Section 230 and the rest of the DMCA, grant the Administration broad powers to write policy from the law in places where the law is insufficiently defined. This is why the Section II/Section III reclassification (called "Net Neutrality" by its proponents, though the actual "Neutrality" is of course controversial) could be done unilaterally by Pai and it's the same reason that the FCC is open to re-interpret the law as written in order to write administrative policy. If Congress doesn't like the new policy, they can pass a new law that better defines the Executive's role in enforcing their law.

tzs 6y ago
That's only partially correct. Some laws that require executive action to interpret and enforce leave it up to executive agencies to fill in the details. The Telecommunications Act of 1996 is one such law, which is why the FCC plays such a big role in net neutrality. Section 230 is not such a law. It creates a civil liability shield for interactive computer services and states who that applies to and how it is to be used. There is nothing in it for the Executive to execute. It is only executed when someone raises it as a defense in a court case, and it is the judiciary that decide what it means. The FCC can interpret it all they want, but that interpretation will be at best persuasive authority in any court case involving the application of 230.
- notankies 6y ago
  > it creates a civil liability shield for interactive computer services and states who that applies to and how it is to be used. Right, and the limits of that liability shield are not well enough defined in the law so the policy must define the limits until Congress acts to clarify the law. Hence the rulemaking. Facebook and Twitter's actions yesterday and the controversy over the role of 230 make the lack of clarity apparent. If Congress doesn't like the new administrative policy, allow them to clarify.