Axios

Former Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler says that there was no 2014 cyberattack meant to overwhelm the agency's comment system during the net neutrality debate, as claimed by a former agency IT official in emails recently published by Gizmodo. The Gizmodo story says that in 2017, after the agency claimed to have experienced a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) taking down its comment system, agency IT chief David Bray told the media that there had been a similar attack in 2014 — and that Wheeler had decided to keep the matter quiet for fear of copycat attacks. 

In our lifetime, no president has matched Donald Trump’s ability to summon the power of the pulpit, friendly media, and the tweet-by-tweet power of repetition and persuasion to move minds en masse. You see this in the silence of Republican critics; the instant shifts in GOP views of the FBI, Putin and deficits; and the quick, widespread adoption of his branding efforts around “deep state,” “Spygate” and “no collusion.” We hear so much, so often that we become numb to what Trump is doing.

The White House announced the nomination of Geoffrey Starks to be a member of the Federal Communications Commission for a five-year term. If confirmed, Starks would fill the seat vacated by Commissioner Mignon Clyburn, who announced her resignation in April. Starks and FCC Chairman Ajit Pai share Kansas roots. Starks currently works in the agency’s enforcement bureau, which investigates possible violations of FCC rules. The nomination does not come as a surprise as Starks was tapped for the role earlier in 2018 by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY).

Very few Americans have enjoyed steadily rising pay beyond inflation over the last couple of decades, a shift from prior years in which the working and middle classes enjoyed broad-based wage gains as the economy expanded. Now, executives of big US companies suggest that the days of most people getting a pay raise are over, and that they also plan to reduce their work forces further. John Stephens, chief financial officer at AT&T, said 20% of the company's employees are call-center workers. He said he doesn't need that many.

A collection of progressive groups will launch a six figure digital ad offensive May 21 telling the Federal Trade Commission to break up Facebook’s social networking empire. The groups are asking for the FTC to do three things: