The argument over the Paramount consent decree this past week was whether it can be enforced. The decree we got does not decide the question the states sued over, which was whether a combined Paramount and Warner Bros. lessens competition. My view is that the decisive answer to that question was given on June 12, when the Department of Justice closed its investigation without conditions, and that everything since, the state lawsuit, the ticking fee, the settlement, and the decree, is what happens when the enforcer with the authority to keep two companies apart decides not to use it. So let me say plainly what the rest of this piece is evidence for. I am disappointed in how this played out. I think the Justice Department chose politics over its own staff’s judgment, and I think the states, knowing their case was a long shot and the clock was against them, still settled for less than they should have.
Three shows sent me back through the record, this year’s and 1948’s. On Inside the Stre…
