EchoStar/DirecTV dominates Justice
By John Eggerton -- Broadcasting & Cable, 9/20/2002 4:00:00 AM
The Department of Justice is working as fast as it can on the DirecTV Inc./EchoStar Communications Corp. merger, but Charles James, assistant attorney general for the DOJ's Antitrust Division, wasn't ready to tell the Senate Judiciary Committee just when it might be completed.
At a hearing Thursday on the state of antitrust enforcement, James assured Sen. Herbert Kohl (D-Wis.) and the other committee members that 'no single matter in the antitrust division is consuming more resources.'
James also emphasized that it was still working on another major merger much in the news.
When asked how the antitrust division could let the 'deadline for dealing with the merger' of AT&T Broadband and Comcast Corp. pass without 'a whisper of concern or the most modest of conditions,' James responded that the investigation was continuing and that the DOJ was 'not in a position to move against them because there is no imminent harm.'
On the issue of predatory pricing practices in cable-overbuild situations, James said the DOJ needs to look at it periodically as the marketplace changes and added that there is at least one current investigation of a cable company for predatory practices.
Kohl expressed concern that media mergers had resulted in 'fewer and fewer companies controlling the sources of news and entertainment,' diminishing the number of smaller, independent voices.
Kohl said he shared former Federal Trade Commission chairman Robert Pitofsky's view that media-merger reviews require more exacting scrutiny because they affect the marketplace of ideas.
James responded that if Pitofksy meant that media industries are important and, thus, mergers there merit close scrutiny, 'I think that is absolutely correct.'
But James said he wasn't sure he would agree that there should be any basis for scrutinizing such a merger other than the economic consequences.
'The concept of diversity of viewpoints is more in the province of the FCC [Federal Communications Commission],' he said.
FTC chairman Tim Muris echoed those general sentiments but suggested that there was some overlap between diversity of voices and antitrust issues.
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