Obama DoJ May Revive Anti-Trust Enforcement

I found this blog posting by Jamie Love to be very interesting — Knowledge Ecology Notes » Meeting at DOJ on the Ticketmaster /Live Nation merger — especially if its optimism turns out to be justified.

There were several interesting things that came out during the 90 minute meeting. One was that the DOJ clearly understood that the opposition to the merger would not be satisfied with a few divestitures, and this was really an up or down decision for the merger as a whole.

One early question put to us was, would consumers be better off with two vertically integrated companies, rather than one (a not too hypothetical case of TM and LN vertically integrating both promoting and ticket sales). This was not a difficult question for anyone.

My own take was the DOJ is willing to stop the merger, and is devoting resources to build a case against the merger.

This isn't anywhere near the most important merger in history, but could be a major sign of things to come.

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8 Responses to Obama DoJ May Revive Anti-Trust Enforcement

  1. skeptic says:

    “This isn’t anywhere near the most important merger in history, but could be a major sign of things to come.”

    Curious, you call this an act of the “Obama”-DOJ….are you going to put “Obama” in front of every agency action you agree with? What about those you disagree with?

    Do you consider the following an act of the “Obama”-treasury?
    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/03/18/dodd-treasury-officials-i_n_176609.html

    Oops, I criticized Obama. Your resident cyber-brownshirt LACJ is salivating….can’t wait to hear how he blames Bush and republicans for AIG.

  2. LACJ says:

    Ha ha cyber brownshirt, that is me! All your attempts to actually make logical arguments have been shut down unceremoniously, haven’t they now? Oh, sorry, you never actually make any arguments at all! Nor do you engage in discussion or debate. You just criticize for imagined failings.

    As for this one, sorry, only a few days ago Michael posted on something that Obama’s DOJ did that he does not like:

    https://www.discourse.net/archives/2009/03/ungood_doubleplus_ungood.html

    Now, granted the language is not Michael’s, but where shall you find an example of distancing Obama from his agencies? I would suggest you will not…

    All the agencies are part of the Obama Administration, just as they were all Bush’s previously. When an agency does something wrong, its Obama’s problem.

    Now, if you noticed, at the above link, I attempted to come up with some reasons, just for the sake of argument, why the DOJ might do this. However that was not an attempt to rationalize why the arguments of the DOJ are right, which is what too many Republicans did for perhaps the first 5 years of the Bush Administration. You should go over there and criticize me for thinking Obama can do no wrong.

  3. skeptic says:

    “All the agencies are part of the Obama Administration, just as they were all Bush’s previously. When an agency does something wrong, its Obama’s problem.”

    Ok, so why aren’t you putting on your big girl britches and responding to the fact that Dodd now claims that the OBAMA treasury directed him to get the ball rolling to statutorily protect the AIG bonuses, and now the very same administration is pretending it knew nothing and was opposed to the AIG bonuses all along? Back when Bush was president you guys liked to call that type of thing a Lie, and demanded impeachment investigations.

    I can’t wait for you and michael to progress from the denial stage and hear the floundering excuses you try and make. And oh yeah, was it my imagination or did Dodd recently try to run for president on the democratic ticket as well?! Swell bunch of fellows you guys have there. Sooooo much more honest and ethical than Republicans….sure…

  4. LACJ says:

    Skeptic, its a false equivalence. Is everything black or white with you? Or are you just doing your part to rehabilitate 43’s reputation?

    Was it a mistake? Sure. Are lots of people unhappy about it? You are damn right.

    Does it even approach the level of criminality of the Bush Administration? Come on, get a grip. If this Admin gets even close to what Bush and Cheney did, this little issue will be a sideshow.

    It seems like any failing of the Obama Admin means two things to you: One, that they are just as bad as Bush/Cheney, and two, that, unless I come out yelling and screaming about it, I must be in the tank for Obama, and he can do no wrong in my eyes.

    I just pointed to an example of Michael criticizing the Obama DOJ from a couple days ago. But to you that is not enough; unless every failing is pointed out then you won’t be happy.

    Can you see my point?

  5. LACJ says:

    By the way, you are right that Dodd did run for president, and he had a certain level of support specifically because he came out strongly at one point against the war and attacked the Bush Administration, I believe.

    I must admit I do not remember precisely what he focused on, but it was a welcome signal from him for the millions of us who had been waiting for some of these DC people to get on the ball and start addressing the problems we had at that point. I definitely remember being very happy about what he was saying at that time, it was really overdue and we (i.e. 65%+ of the country) were very much in need of some support.

    As I said I cannot remember precisely what he was talking about, but it was pretty big news at the time. I did find one article that refers to his anti Iraq war stance:

    http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16565744/wid/iraq_300/

    Then, in the beginning of the primary, people started writing about how he receives a lot of campaign contributions from big banks and other financial institutions. And you know what? Interest in him cooled.

    So I guess on this issue, well first of all you are at once taking his words (from the article you cite) as gospel and then turning around and basically calling him as duplicitous as any of them. That may be but you can’t have it both ways.

    And so my point is simply, yeah he ran for president, so what? He was done in by Iowa, and never had more that perhaps 5% of the Dem primary vote…

  6. skeptic says:

    “Does it even approach the level of criminality of the Bush Administration? Come on, get a grip. If this Admin gets even close to what Bush and Cheney did, this little issue will be a sideshow.”

    Well, does not seem like Obama is off to a good start in the honesty department. His administration, and likely he himself, knew these AIG bonuses were coming months ago.

    Oh and by the way, why is it that neither you nor michael seem to care that despite Pakistan’s protests, the Obama-led military is regularly launching missiles at targets in Pakistan…arguably a VIOLATION OF INTERNATIONAL LAW!? If Bush were doing this you and he would be throwing a fit.

  7. LACJ says:

    Yes, you are right again. And it is not arguably a violation of international law at all.

    But you are just proving my point. You want every criticism of Obama to be right here, or you are going to accuse the proprietor of being in the tank for Obama, and wearing rose-colored glasses.

    There are a number of problems here. First, I do not seem to remember you being a critic of Bush, and hence I really wonder to what extent this is just concern trolling.

    Secondly, we are still within the first 100 day of the Obama Admin! You cannot simply expect everything to be perfect overnight, it is going to take years of pressure to get even halfway to where we should be.

    Third, Obama has got so many messes, most of which were left by Bush/Cheney. If he isn’t cleaning them up fast enough, pardon me if I an still very much focused on the mistakes and crimes of Bush/Cheney.

    Fourth, things like sovereignty, well first of all no one even notices any more. And quite possibly these attacks are part of a broader strategy. I am not sure. Pakistan is roiling right now, and it seems no one from Pakistan is focusing on this breach of sovereignty…

    When you come here you are welcome to mention these issues, they are important points. But it seems as if each and every time they are just a precursor to your real goal, which is to complain about what this site posts about and doesn’t post about. Indeed, the issues that you raise seem to change each and every time, but the underlying complaint, an unwarranted complaint in my view, seems to be quite consistent…

  8. LACJ says:

    Oh, and I just saw this, which might be relevant, from TPM:

    The bill to tax back those AIG bonuses passed overwhelmingly in the House, but the GOP leadership split. As it turns out, Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA), the minority whip, ended up voting for the bill, despite all his hedging this morning on MSNBC.

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