What I find most concerning is that this isn't a bill or law. Unelected government officials at the FTC can apparently just decide to do this.

IAmBroom 19 minutes ago | parent [-]

Yes, that is the way federal agencies work. Details of complex systems are decided by (hopefully apolitical, public-good-oriented) specialists in the field of interest.

One alternative is that Trump can do it at will. Or, to add a few more steps, Trump can fire the FCC head at will, replace him with a lackey, and then do it at will.

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Ajedi32 10 minutes ago | parent [-]

> [Laws] are decided by (hopefully apolitical, public-good-oriented) specialists in the field of interest

This doesn't sound to me at all like how a democratic country is supposed to function. It feels like you're describing China rather than the US.

> Trump can do it at will.

Which is also not how our constitution is supposed to work. The executive branch (which includes both the president and his appointees) is not supposed to be able to make laws, only execute on existing law.

Yes, I know this is how the system works these days. I'm just lamenting how it went so wrong...

	▲	mothballed 4 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		The intellectual-academic class are having an existential crisis that they've lost the reigns of the unelected bureaucratic apparatus and it is now being wielded against them. They are still confused at how to respond to this as they're certain they couldn't have been wrong about deferring (uh, 'delegate regulatory authority') the power vested in congress and elective representation to themselves. Surprise pikachu when it turns out the "apolitical, public goal oriented specialists' were useful idiots in the process of handing power from congress to the executive. If you thought the political apparatus was willingly going to leave the reigns to "apolitical specialists" rather than ruthlessly consolidating it toward the hands of the most power hungry self-dealing monsters that can command the executive branch then obviously you have not been living in in reality. Of course by the time the blindfold has been removed, the power is already largely consolidated.