“It is quite clear the Commission’s majority does not believe that the merger of Charter, Time Warner Cable, and Bright House is in the public interest. This Order spends over 100 pages detailing the harms that would allegedly result from the transaction. And when the discussion turns to the merger’s purported benefits, the words “modest” and “minimal” are used over and over again. So why is the Commission approving this merger? Because it has turned the transaction into a vehicle for advancing its ambitious agenda to micromanage the Internet economy.”
“Given how badly broken the current merger review process has become at the FCC – how rife it is with fact-free, dilatory, politically motivated, non-transparent decision-making – I believe Congress should implement major reforms of the procedural and/or substantive rules governing the Commission’s assessment of transactions. Either the FCC should employ something akin to the Antitrust Division’s process and standard of review or its authority in this area should be significantly restricted (no serious, knowledgeable observer will maintain that the professional staff at the Justice Department or Federal Trade Commission do not or cannot adequately protect the public interest). Whatever the legislature’s preferred approach, the status quo at the FCC when it comes to transactional review cannot continue. The ideologically inspired extortion has to end.”