The closest there is to a legitimate argument against it, if you don't know any better, is that there is technological limitations to the amount of data that can be passed at any one time.
That isn't an argument by itself anyway. The argument for traffic management (price discrimination, non-neutrality) is that
the congestion that can otherwise result reduces total welfare (for all consumers aggregated, including those who would be willing to pay for high-tier access but are prevented from doing so), and can therefore be economically inefficient (
wasteful). That is point 4.1, page 25 of the PDF I linked to already.
The problem with that argument is (1) it is a temporary limitation as technology improves
It is irrelevant if it is temporary (which is a forecast on your part). Rush hour street traffic is also "temporary" via that hand-wave--just wait until 9.30am or alternatively wait until the relevant government agency/private operator builds more roads. The loss of welfare is still here, now.
and (2) it is really just an excuse for the ISP's to defer the cost of improving their infrastructure until a later date.
You seem to argue that it is necessary to make the service (for everyone) sufficiently unsatisfying in order to provide the incentive to improve it, forswearing market (IE
price) mechanisms to do that. I disagree.
I'm sorry, but continuing to provide crappy service is not a good excuse for jacking up prices due to artificial scarcity.
Calling scarcity artificial doesn't magic it away. Rejected.
So, tell me. What decent arguments are there against regulation for content tiering.
They include:
1. People want it (evidenced by their willingness to pay for it in myriad ways, rather than by their expressed opinions). (4.12 on the PDF)
2. If data carriers do not have market abuse power, it is difficult for them to harm consumers or lower total welfare/efficiency by attempting to act uncompetitively (and accordingly they have strong incentives not to). (4.15 to 4.21) If you are concerned about market power, deal with that directly
3. One sided markets (where data carriers can only charge end customers are prohibited from charging, and thus differentiating content/app providers because of net neutrality) is also wasteful, since it does not allow the content providers to place any value on who or how many end customers their output has (4.23 to 4.29)
This is not a partisan issue. A lack of network neutrality stifles innovation and kills free market.
That's one side of a two-sided debate. Prohibition of price discrimination is an innovation killer in many more ways than its absence (coffee, financial services, TV, restaurants, etc etc). Consider that the iPad and the iPhone4 are highly non-neutral WiFi/mobile data/app platforms, and then argue that they would have arrived sooner, and more cheaply if Apple had been forced to offer open architecture and all content delivery.
Conservatives should be all for insuring network neutrality and those who know what it really means are.
I don't care what "conservatives" are into. That you only (so far) respond to straw right-wing commentary that I have not even advocated indicates--again--that you are not aware of where the
informed debate is.
See also:
Innovation through discrimination!? A Formal Analysis of the Net Neutrality Debate, Jan Kramer, Lukas Wiewiorra (2010)
"Our main finding is that in the long-run network discrimination will lead to more innovation. Furthermore, we compare the overall welfare effects of discriminatory practice with respect to a network neutral regime and that network discrimination is generally welfare enhancing. This is because congestion is better allocated to the congestion insensitive content providers, while providing some congestion relief to the content providers with congestion sensitive business models. However, in the short-run all content providers are worse off under network discrimination because this effciency gain is fully appropriated by the ISP through the welfare neutral priority charge."
PDF (not gated)
The Economics of Product-Line Restrictions with an Application to the Network Neutrality Debate; Hermalin, Benjamin E, Katz, Michael L (2007)
"For the case of a monopoly service provider, we find that a single-product restriction results in: (a) consumers who would otherwise have consumed a low-quality variant being excluded from the market; (b) consumers “in the middle” of the market consuming a higher and more efficient quality; and (c) consumers at the top of the market consuming a lower and less efficient quality. We find that the net welfare effects can be positive or negative, although the analysis suggests to us that harm is the more likely outcome. Moreover, consumers at the bottom of the market—the ones that a single-product restriction is typically intended to aid—are almost always harmed by the restriction.
In our duopoly analysis, imposition of a single-product restriction always reduces welfare. [ . . . ] Lastly, we find that, to the extent that the regulation is intended to eliminate low-quality products, it may fail"
PDF (not gated)
Only those with, as you say, ideological blindness view it as "all regulation is bad" and therefore network neutrality must be bad.
Rejected, as above.
When you claim--as you do--that all the arguments are on one side, it is a red flag that you have a special interest and/or are the one who is ideologially blind.
The paranoid "we're loosing rights and Liberties" constituency on the Right never fails to entertain. 
