from the here-comes-some-more-bullshit dept
Last election season you might recall that the Trump administration lied repeatedly and pretended to be really interested in reining in corporate power and shoring up antitrust reform. And while this line was propped up by a lot of useful idiots (like Matt Stoller) who insisted there was common cause to be made with fascists, the whole thing was bullshit, designed to cover up widespread corruption and generational damage to regulatory independence and U.S. corporate oversight.
Despite having followed up on none of their antitrust reform promises, Trumpland is back again pretending it’s an important policy arena for them. This time by leveraging a fake interest in antitrust reform to start seeding the idea that Netflix shouldn’t be allowed to buy Warner Brothers. Who, coincidentally, is fielding a rival bid from Trump’s billionaire right wing friend, Larry Ellison.
“Somebody” leaked word to Republican ally Charles Gasparino at the New York Post, who dutifully presents the idea that the Trump administration actually cares about corporate consolidation as if it’s a serious thing:
“Senior White House officials recently discussed antitrust concerns surrounding Netflix’s interest in acquiring the Warner Bros. studio and the HBO Max streaming service – raising doubts whether such a deal would give Netflix too much power over Hollywood, The Post has learned.
The high-level meeting that took place about 10 days ago hasn’t been previously reported. Several White House officials also suggested during the sitdown that a broader investigation is necessary focusing on Netflix’s market power, a government official who attended the confab said.”
It’s not clear if the administration, Comcast, or Paramount insiders leaked word to Chuck, but it should be reiterated that the Trump administration obviously does not actually care about unchecked “market power.” With one hand, this administration has taken a hatchet to all meaningful regulatory oversight of corporate power, setting back labor rights, consumer protection, and public safety generationally, while with its other hand, it is dismantling what remains of U.S. media consolidation limits.
Most media coverage of these rival bids won’t have the backbone to make it clear that while Netflix ownership of Warner Brothers would most certainly probably be bad for the market, the Trump administration doesn’t actually care about that. It cares about helping billionaire allies and punishing “woke” companies that platform too many minorities and gay people for their liking.
Netflix ownership of HBO likely wouldn’t be good for the brand, but it’s not like Warner Brothers Discovery or AT&T were good for the brand (or market health) either. David Zaslav has been notorious for mismanaging the home of CNN and HBO. And Netflix, as the New York Times noted last September, is possibly the least overtly compromised of the three companies when it comes to kissing MAGA ass (which isn’t saying much, and certainly isn’t guaranteed to last).
In this case, the options here are all bad. The other bidders for Warner Brothers, HBO, and CNN include Comcast (NBC Universal) and Larry Ellison (CBS). Neither would be good stewards of the HBO brand, clearly don’t give much of a shit about healthy market competition, and have shown they’re more than willing to throw any remaining principles in the trash to curry favor with the administration.
The best and correct play for a government that actually cared about antitrust reform, consumer protection, and healthy markets would be no additional consolidation at all. But good faith media reform is not, and has never been, what the Trump administration is after.
Filed Under: antitrust, antitrust reform, charles gasparino, competition, consolidation, corporate power, donald trump, larry ellison, media, mergers
Companies: hbo, netflix, paramount, warner bros. discovery
