Various rural LECs disputed preliminary FCC findings that they face 100 percent overlap from unsubsidized broadband/voice competitors, which if they do, will lead to their high-cost USF support being phased out under commission rules. Cable companies and other RLEC rivals said they were providing overlapping competition in a number of areas. NTCA, which represents many RLECs, urged the commission to require the competitors to provide specific evidence beyond assertions of previously reported deployment data submitted by broadband providers on Form 477.
Opponents of the U.S. intelligence agencies' surveillance tactics criticized an opinion two years in the making and published Friday by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in Klayman v. Obama (see 1508280027) that said the plaintiffs failed to prove their individual phone records were collected by the NSA, so their Fourth Amendment rights weren't violated and they weren't harmed. The D.C. Circuit didn't rule on the constitutionality of the mass collection program. Instead, Republican-appointed Judges Janice Brown, David Sentelle and Stephen Williams voted 2-1 to send the case back to U.S. District Judge Richard Leon and allow the plaintiffs to prove their records were collected. In his dissenting opinion, Sentelle said the case should be dismissed, not remanded.
Opponents of the U.S. intelligence agencies' surveillance tactics criticized an opinion two years in the making and published Friday by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in Klayman v. Obama (see 1508280027) that said the plaintiffs failed to prove their individual phone records were collected by the NSA, so their Fourth Amendment rights weren't violated and they weren't harmed. The D.C. Circuit didn't rule on the constitutionality of the mass collection program. Instead, Republican-appointed Judges Janice Brown, David Sentelle and Stephen Williams voted 2-1 to send the case back to U.S. District Judge Richard Leon and allow the plaintiffs to prove their records were collected. In his dissenting opinion, Sentelle said the case should be dismissed, not remanded.
The Commerce Department published notices in the Aug. 27 Federal Register on the following AD/CV duty proceedings (any notices that announce changes to AD/CV duty rates, scope, affected firms, or effective dates will be detailed in another ITT article):
The Commerce Department is beginning an antidumping duty new shipper review on solid urea from Russia (A-821-801) at the request of Joint Stock Company PhosAgro-Cherepovets, said the agency (here). Commerce will instruct CBP to allow the posting of a bond instead of a cash deposit for entries of subject merchandise produced and exported by PhosAgro-Cherepovets during the review. The preliminary results of the new shipper review are due in February, with the final results due 90 days after publication of the preliminary results.
The Commerce Department intends to end antidumping duties on purified carboxymethylcellulose from the Netherlands (A-421-811), it said in the preliminary results of a changed circumstances review (here). Ashland Specialty Ingredients, the sole U.S. manufacturer of CMC and the original requestor of the duties, recently requested revocation of the AD duty order. If Commerce decides to revoke the order in the final results of its changed circumstances review, the effective date of revocation would be July 1, 2014, it said. Commerce recently revoked an AD duty order on carboxymethylcellulose from Finland, also at Ashland's request (see 1508250026).
Google rejected European Commission antitrust concerns about its comparison shopping search processes, calling the EC's preliminary conclusions "wrong as a matter of fact, law and economics." In a Thursday posting on its Europe blog, Google said its advertising format for price comparisons "demonstrably improves ad quality and makes it easier for consumers to find what they're looking for." FairSearch Europe Legal Counsel Thomas Vinje, however, said the EC's assessment of Google's dominance in the price comparison shopping market is correct and based on well-established legal principles. The Initiative for a Competitive Online Marketplace (ICOMP) accused Google of being "in denial" about the "devastating impact" its self-preferencing has on the online market.
A listing of recent antidumping and countervailing duty messages from the Commerce Department posted to CBP's website Aug. 27, along with the case number(s) and CBP message number, is provided below. The messages are available by searching for the listed CBP message number at http://adcvd.cbp.dhs.gov/adcvdweb.
Google rejected European Commission antitrust concerns about its comparison shopping search processes, calling the EC's preliminary conclusions "wrong as a matter of fact, law and economics." In a Thursday posting on its Europe blog, Google said its advertising format for price comparisons "demonstrably improves ad quality and makes it easier for consumers to find what they're looking for." FairSearch Europe Legal Counsel Thomas Vinje, however, said the EC's assessment of Google's dominance in the price comparison shopping market is correct and based on well-established legal principles. The Initiative for a Competitive Online Marketplace (ICOMP) accused Google of being "in denial" about the "devastating impact" its self-preferencing has on the online market.
The Commerce Department published notices in the Aug. 27 Federal Register on the following AD/CV duty proceedings (any notices that announce changes to AD/CV duty rates, scope, affected firms, or effective dates will be detailed in another ITT article):