[MSNBC] Is The DOJ's Move To Block AT&T-Time Warner Merger Political?

Cant imagine he DoJ winning this case. Comcast owns NBC. Netflix, Hulu, Youtube, Amazon are all content creators as well as distributors. AT&T is trying to compete with them by entering the content creation marketplace.

 

It almost certainly is political, but I'm not sure why. It seems AT&T's acquisition of DirecTV and then Comcast substantially and dangerously shrinks the # of the cable/tv/internet providers out there and is anti-competitive, no? I would imagine lots of places would only have one option for those services if UVerse/DirecTV/Comcast are are all one entity.

That seems even more problematic in light of the FCC decision to not regulate internet providers as a utility.

 

They are always political in the sense that there are people in the government who feel these mergers have to be challenged regardless

 

i think you mean time warner and not comcast above. AT&T is not buying Time Warners internet service or cable service. Spectrum already bought that. AT&T is just buying the content creation of Time Warner. Such as HBO, Warner Bro.s movies, etc....

In other words its not shrinking the stuff you mentioned above.

AT&T wants to compete with Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, Youtube. All of these groups are content creators and distributes. AT&T wants to be a creator too. thus the purchase.

 

Gotcha - sorry, I got my companies confused there. Yeah, if they aren't expanding their reach in regards to broadband access, that makes more sense why most people thought this would go through without an issue.

 

exactly. no share of the pie is changing in any marketplace. AT&T will just own the piece of the pie previously controlled by Time Warner in the content creation marketplace.

This would be a vertical merger and no vertical merger has ever been blocked i think

probably is politically motivated by Trump. He's being his usual immature self.

 

Yes, of course it is political.

 

It has to do with Turner (which CNN is a part of) - apparently if Time Warner drops Turner from the merger Trump will ok it. This is his vindictive self.

https://www.recode.net/2017/11/20/1...o-lawsuit-antitrust-tv-merger-president-trump

 

Again a situation where Trumps own words will be used against him (now his DOJ) in court.

Also this court hearing could be a road the Trump admin doesn’t want to go down if Trump is vulnerable for an abuse of power charge. If this case leads to evidence the White House stepped in to order the DOJ to weaponize itself for political reasons, that’s a big deal in of itself.

The continued meetings Trump has had with Murdoch these past few months with Murdoch being a key player here in his attempt to buy CNN is going to be an issue in court as well. I don’t know what kind of lawyers ATT has working on this but if they have half a brain they will be able to open up and pretty big can of worms on this one. More to come im sure...

 

Yes. It's Trump. We have all witness him pushing the DoJ publicly. Anyone question how much he push DoJ privately?

 

So much LOSING by Trump. He has to be tired of it....lol


http://money.cnn.com/2018/06/12/media/att-time-warner-ruling/index.html

 

Given how thoroughly the DOJ was routed in this decision, it had to have been politically motivated in the first place. For the DOJ to have pursued it they had to have (a) genuinely thought they had a good case (which doesn't seem too likely now) or (b) been ordered by their boss to pursue it even though it was a bad case.

 

a 7 -2 decisions is like a Soccer score. . . . .
One team really did not show up

Rocket River

 

Another opportunity to issue a subpoena...

White House Rebuffs Lawmaker Demand on Decision to Oppose AT&T Deal

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...-house-demand-on-decision-to-oppose-at-t-deal