Edwin Meese, the seventy-fifth U.S. Attorney General under Ronald Reagan, and Senior Research Fellow in Regulatory Policy James Gattuso, weighed in on the DOJ's Sirius-XM decision in a joint statement:
"Yesterday's decision by the Department of Justice not to oppose the merger of Sirius and XM was a victory for consumers. Kudos to the DOJ for recognizing that antitrust laws should not look only at narrow, formalistic, definitions the market, but instead at the realities of the marketplace. As our research has shown, the radio market is highly competitive - with satellite radio only one among many competing options for listeners. And by allowing satellite radio to become more efficient, this merger promises to increase that competition. Now it's up to the FCC to complete this year-long process by granting its own approval. It should do so expeditiously, without conditions."
[Heritage.org]
THANK FUCKING GOD! Someone in government who speaks the truth and cuts thru all the bullshit. This merger should never have taken this long. It is criminal and a travesty. After the paperwork is signed, there should be a major investigation into the FCC and the NAB. Charges should be brought. What they did was to intentionally drag both companies thru the mud and hurt them even more financially. It sucks that it took this long, but the combined company and Mel will have the last laugh when terrestrial radio gets its ass handed to them by Sirius. 19million subscribers and growing. Billions saved in synergies. NAB said they don't compete with Sat Rad? HA! Get ready for a woopin' NAB. You're goin dooooown! :-)
What I've found interesting through this process, is from a political standpoint, it hasn't broken down political lines. You've got some Republicans for the merger; some against it. Some Democrats for it; some against it. You have the Attorney General from the Reagan administration saying it's good; the Attorney General from the Bush 41 administration saying it's bad. It's been all over the board.
You know why? Because the ones AGAINST the merger are the ones who've been paid off. Simple as that. Thats why it's all over the party lines. The ones that accepted the bribes from the NAB are the ones against the merger.
>>> You know why? Because the ones AGAINST the merger are the ones who've been paid off.
I was thinking the ones who SUPPORT the merger are those being paid off.
Finally, someone older than 60 with some common sense. Something this country has been lacking since the days of Thomas Paine. Why do the NAB and Clear Channel protest so much? Because they are the OLD format with lots to lose AND they already realize the competition. Period, over and out. I bet the horse drawn carriage makers and the locomotive makers were all really pizzed when Henry Ford came along....but you have to move forward folks.
Finally, someone older than 60 with some common sense. Something this country has been lacking since the days of Thomas Paine. Why do the NAB and Clear Channel protest so much? Because they are the OLD format with lots to lose AND they already realize the competition. Period, over and out. I bet the horse drawn carriage makers and the locomotive makers were all really pizzed when Henry Ford came along....but you have to move forward folks.
Meese is from a "think tank" while the other two are part of the K Street "hired gun tank" and are able to switch sides depending upon how big the bucks.
With all due respect Stack....are you on crack? The NAB has donated heavily to ALL the congressmen opposing this merger. Even if you don't have a stake in this game, anyone has to admit that there is ABSOLUTELY NO REASON to block this merger. It benefits the consumer. Any moron can see that terrestrial radio DOES compete with Sat Radio...not to mention ipods etc. Sat Radio makes up less than 5% of the market. It's ridiculous that the merger has gone on this long. It's criminal really. Thank God people like Cramer are speaking out and pointing fingers. There should be an investigation. The FCC and the NAB dragged this out to be the longest merger in history. While a truly anti competitive merger like the Exxon deal gets approved in a week. Something is fishy in Denmark.
Regan - Stack has apposed this merger from the get go for whatever reason and you are wasting keyboard time trying to change anybody's view here about this or Opie and Anthony vs Howard. Who cares. Merged or not it is still better than terrestrial and we all just want to see it grow.
The merger is not official, yet. The CLOWNS at the FCC need to approve it, and that won't happen until April 10,2008 at the earliest."If I am wrong about the timing," so be it. The date of the next meeting is posted @ http://www.fcc.gov/fccmeetings.html
Look out Mangim P.I. ! Here comes Ed Meese!
"NNTN News HBO 1986."
>>> It benefits the consumer.
It is incomprehensible that any rational person could believe this.
There can be no greater evidence of this than Lee Abrams' decision to leave XM. Abrams was obviously the driving force behind XM's far superior music content, and he's history. Why? Because the merger totally usurped the passion XM's people had for making it the better business.
The merger has already killed sat radio. We're just waiting for the funeral at this point.
"Stack has apposed this merger from the get go" I'm with Stack on this one. I'm a sat radio subscriber, i've had xm and sirius and know the importance of competition. just in the sat radio industry we've seen what competition and the lack of competition does. xm wasted and squandered a huge lead in the market thru it's inability to buy programming content people wanted to listen to. Sirius started out slow but caught up and blew past xm by giving consumers the content and talent they would pay to listen to (Mel is a media genius in that way) If this merger happens cost to consumer will go up, choice in content and competition will go down. Thats a bad/bad for consumers. HD RADIO better be ready with open arms for all the sat radio consumers who are not going to support a MONOPOLY.
Edwin Meese is of the AM generation, he's cashing in his check for words of support. The whole merger is a joke of payoffs and fanboy fantasy.
"XM's far superior music content"
You say this unprovable statment everyday, more people are catching on to the fact that this is not a fact just some BUZZ words that you guys use. I remember here about a year and half ago someone was proven wrong when he stated he heard the same song twice on the same station when he was listing in his rental car, Then the song line up for that day was then posted and proven wrong. So please prove this deeper playlist statement, and I will be the first to say I'm sorry. Have you ever heard The Vault, That is some deep s*it.
PS- Sirius music content is 100% Clear Chanel free. Thats something right.
It may or may not benefit the consumer, but it at least gives them a chance to make a better product for the consumer. Without the merger, at best, they might have been able to barely scrape by with sacrifices to content and R&D. Now they can at least pool their engineering, marketing, and content resources together to try to do better than "just scrape by".
They might still find a way to screw this up, but that's a matter for subscribers to police, not the feds. I could be wrong, but I think management is smart enough to realize they need subscribers a hell of a lot more than subscribers need satellite radio.
>>> So please prove this deeper playlist statement, and I will be the first to say I'm sorry. Have you ever heard The Vault, That is some deep s*it.
If you want to have a pissing match, I can assure you that the Vault cannot even TOUCH deep tracks for depth of playlists -- it isn't even a close call.
>> PS- Sirius music content is 100% Clear Chanel free. Thats something right.
So is XM's. They do, however, provide a few CCU programmed channels as a free "extra". Something Sirius lacks.
Whatever. The argument is never ending, but it is very clear that XM's music content, to those who are more demanding, is far superior.
sure you seem to think xm and sirius are charity's? "Just give them a chance?" F that. They are a business which uses public radio spectrum to make money. Sat radio is a very expensive way to provide radio we're seeing that the business model doesn't work, so they want to "merge" (with Sirius buying xm) good for them, bad for consumers. I don't give a shit that xm and sirius can't make enough money and "just scape(s) by" they are business's which are trying to form a MONOPOLY. Consumers with brains can see thru the BS curtain xm and sirius have put up and saddly so far like fly paper the BS curtain has caught alot of non-thinking sheep who believe everything they are told. Less choice, no competition, higher prices thats the reality of a xm, sirius merge. They had their chance, now HD RADIO will have it's chance to provide consumers with low cost, high quality radio.
Stack Pointer:
One of my main reasons for leaving xm for Sirius was xm's poor Rock channels. The programming was terrible, the jocks were bad. IMO Sirius has the better programming of the two. Not that this is the topic at hand, nor has anything to do with consumers losing choice, losing competition, and gaining higher prices for a MONOPOLY sat radio company.
"If you want to have a pissing match, I can assure you that the Vault cannot even TOUCH deep tracks for depth of playlists -- it isn't even a close call"
No sir, no pissing match needed. I was just asking for some proof to your daily statement about deeper playlist, but you have assured me so that must settle it. I want to assure you that the Sirius signal is 7 times clearer that XM's.
Stack: There can be no greater evidence of this than Lee Abrams' decision to leave XM. Abrams was obviously the driving force behind XM's far superior music content, and he's history. Why? Because the merger totally usurped the passion XM's people had for making it the better business."
All right, enough of your slander. Yesterday you told the world Sirius couldn't pay it's bills. Are you aware of any slow payment history associated with the firm.
Now you're blaming Abrams departure (not quite the death of the medium) on the merger. Got any EVIDENCE to back up that statement, or is this your usual libelous talk.
I'm calling you out, Stack- defend both of those points, or someone reading this blog will have every right to sue you.
Stack: There can be no greater evidence of this than Lee Abrams' decision to leave XM. Abrams was obviously the driving force behind XM's far superior music content, and he's history. Why? Because the merger totally usurped the passion XM's people had for making it the better business."
All right, enough of your slander. Yesterday you told the world Sirius couldn't pay it's bills. Are you aware of any slow payment history associated with the firm.
Now you're blaming Abrams departure (not quite the death of the medium) on the merger. Got any EVIDENCE to back up that statement, or is this your usual libelous talk.
I'm calling you out, Stack- defend both of those points, or someone reading this blog will have every right to sue you.
Regan - despite calling themselves a think tank, and often producing research or policy papers to promote general conservative causes, it is common knowledge that the heritage foundation would never pick sides in something like merger without compensation. Their going rate for this is at least $20K (although to get a former US AG you may want to double that)plus probably another $10K for this latest statement. As for congreemen who suppurted the merger its not a coincidence that most of them are NY Dems who've received contributions from sirius and mel personally.
"Finally, someone older than 60 with some common sense. Something this country has been lacking since the days of Thomas Paine..." Posted by: Chillie Willie
Lines worth repeating a third time.