“How can the largest cable company in the country buy the second-largest and gain control over 19 of the country’s top 20 markets, 30% of cable, and 40% of broadband, and there be no serious questions?” asks David Carr of
The New York Times.
That is, indeed, the question, and Carr asks it, along with several others like, “Is the merger good for the American consumer?” Considering a Comcast executive has all but promised that cable and Internet prices will go up (and up and up) after the merger, the answer is “no.” Carr also discusses how the merger will crush competition and technical innovation, will restrict access to information through broadband, and ultimately, will leave American consumers in the power of a oligarchy which has no incentive to do what is best for the people.
Given the extensive lobbying power Comcast has in Congress (as previously detailed
here), it is increasingly apparent that the monopolistic "robber barons" of the Gilded Age have nothing on the "media barons" of the Telecom Age.
Don't expect to hear any serious opposition to this merger, or even hear these questions asked, on television -- not on Fox News OR on MSNBC. Because they are part of the same industry that stands to profit by mergers like this.