Wednesday, August 29, 2018

FakeNews from LA Times on AT&T's Acquisition of Time Warner?

So the LA Times is reporting AT&T's purchase of Time Warner is being held up by a petty Donald Trump who is holding up the deal because he does not like CNN. See AT&T says it will not sell CNN despite pressure from Trump's Justice Department for more details.

Only problem is their logic fails to meet the sniff test.

Anecdotally, AT&T's purchase of Time Warner started drawing more attention from from the Justice Department's Anti-Trust department right after President Trump's nominee was approved, so that does seem suspicious. Moreover, the basis of the DOJ's challenge appears arbitrary (never has the the DOJ imposed divestiture of an asset as a condition of antitrust approval) and contrary (an antitrust block to a vertical transactions would be unprecedented) and therefore, generally without merit.

Superficially then, one might assume that because President Trump is no fan of CNN and Time Warner is CNN's parent corporation, a petty President Trump could be meddling in the acquisition via his DOJ appointment because he does not like CNN.

Except that AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson is a Trump supporter, who might conceivably put pressure on CNN to be more Trump friendly. So why would President Trump object to AT&T purchasing #FakeNews CNN?

Philosophically, it makes much more sense that #DeepState operatives within the DOJ are trying to undermine President Trump by their groundless interference.

That, to me, makes much more sense.