Hundt and Kennard maintained fairly strict unbundling requirements on the ILECs, which go beyond Title II in their potential effect, and also maintained Title II carriage and the Computer II/III rules, but of course only on physical transport, not ISPs.

The key question, then, boils down to this: Who plays post office in the era of electronic publication? The USPS carries all newspapers on a nondiscriminatory basis. It is the parcel common carrier of last resort. IIRC Ben Franklin created it in order to promote the free press.

If there is no compulsion for ISPs per se to carry any and all content (as we agree there shouldn’t be), then what prevents the one or two ISPs that reach a given customer from censoring the electronic press? Apple already does this on its iPhone app store. I suggest that the mere threat of such regulation has held the Bells at bay so far, so if the threat were lifted by, say, regulatory certainty (not something we’re used to…), then their behavior could change rather dramatically. And of course they could try man-in-the-middle attacks on ecommerce, via the IMS concept. AT&T liked that idea too.

The simple answer is to concede common carriage at the bottom of the stack, at just and reasonable prices that return a fair profit.

It’s also worth nothing that back in those days, you actually had Republicans like Sen. Stevens in favor of Title II classification while Senator Kerry opposed Title II. So your over simplification that this is just some W/Rove/Cheney plot doesn’t really fly.

Estoppel is not a problem if changed circumstances, or errors of fact or law in the original position, can be shown. After all, Powell and Martin directly contradicted positions of previous Commissions. What makes them the final canon?

I’ve made it clear that I agree that regulation of ISPs per se is not a good idea, but that only withstands scrutiny when regulation of infrastructure allows open entry into the ISP market. And no, Verizon Wireless is not competition for Verizon-ILEC. Nor is CMRS of any kind a competitor. You’re just repeating Republican talking points.

And puh-leez let’s not go down that “widows and orphans” trail again. I’m sure that many retirement funds own Goldman Sachs too. That doesn’t excuse their behavior.

The ideal solution, structural separation, lets the “widows and orphans” buy a stable, rate-of-return regulated stock (LoopCo), while the more speculatively-inclined could invest in the ServiceCo, which would be subject to little regulation, and thus be free to make high profits, or lose their shirts.