Comcast-Time Warner Merger Threat

We live in the age of decreasing choice and virtual corporate monopolies. Washington is as shackled by and beholden to business interests as it has ever been. Now Comcast and Time-Warner are attempting to merge.

As if your cable choices weren’t limited enough. 

[Michael] Copps was a commissioner on the FCC from 2001 to 2011, one of the longest-serving commissioners in the agency’s history. Now he leads the Media and Democracy Reform Initiative at Common Cause. “This is the whole shooting match,” he said. “It’s broadband. It’s broadcast. It’s content. It’s distribution. It’s the medium and the message. It’s telecom, and it’s media, too.” Back in 2011, when Comcast sought regulatory approval of its proposed acquisition of NBC Universal (NBCU), Copps was the sole “no” vote out of the five FCC commissioners.

Copps is not the only former FCC commissioner with an opinion on the merger. Meredith Attwell Baker served briefly there, from 2009 to 2011. President Barack Obama appointed Baker, a Republican, to maintain the traditional party balance on the FCC. Baker was a big supporter of the Comcast-NBCU merger. It surprised many, however, when she abruptly resigned her FCC commission seat to go work for—you guessed it—Comcast. She was named senior vice president for governmental affairs for NBCU, just four months after voting to approve the merger.

[...]

As for the regulators, the news website Republic Report revealed that the head of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division, William Baer, was a lawyer representing NBC during the merger with Comcast, and Maureen Ohlhausen, a commissioner on the Federal Trade Commission, provided legal counsel for Comcast before joining the commission. If you wonder how President Obama feels about the issue, look at who he appointed to be the new chairperson of the FCC: Tom Wheeler, who was for years a top lobbyist for both the cable and wireless industries.

[...]

A leading organization on media policy in the U.S., Free Press, issued a statement following the announcement of the proposed merger. Craig Aaron, the group’s president, said: “No one woke up this morning wishing their cable company was bigger or had more control over what they could watch or download. But that—along with higher bills—is the reality they’ll face tomorrow unless the Department of Justice and the FCC do their jobs and block this merger.”

  Amy Goodman

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.