"It's absurd," said the middle-distance runner Nick Symmonds, one of the earliest public critics of Rule 40.
In a crackdown in 2003, dozens of Payá's allies were arrested and imprisoned along with writers and other critics of rule by the Castro family.
Alexander has been an outspoken critic of rules changes, and his selection to head the panel, along with Senate Rules Committee Chairman Roy Blunt (R-Mo).
Critics of the rules cite this change as evidence that sizable donations are corrupting the system.
Critics of the rules point out, though, that it remains far more cumbersome and difficult to transfer full-length movies through the Internet than music files and still pictures.
But critics of the rules, who have long sought to have them repealed, saw today's suspension as a tactical legal maneuver intended, in the long-run, to preserve, and possibly even expand them.
But critics of the rules said that the court provided clear guidance about how to proceed and that Mr. Powell's assertion that the judges had set standards that might be too hard to satisfy was incorrect.
Cruelty of any sort should be dealt with on the playground, critics of the rules tell Ms. O'Grady, but putting certain words into a separate, black-mark-on-your-permanent-record category is likely to cause more problems than it solves.
Critics of the rules said they would discourage international students - who are worth as much as £3bn a year to UK universities - from studying here and give the impression that the UK was not a welcoming destination.
And there are critics of the rule who believe it is not compatible with either the World Anti Doping Agency (Wada) rules, or Swiss law (the UCI is based in the country).
