Why the strongest case for AT&T's merger with Time Warner is also the case against it

[Commentary] There’s growing concern on both the right and the left that major media conglomerates are becoming too concentrated. In particular, there’s a high level of resentment against incumbent telecommunications providers, which are seen as charging high prices and offering poor service. That makes opposing the deal good politics.

Luckily for AT&T, antitrust decisions are supposed to be made based on the law rather than on political considerations. AT&T’s fate will rest in the hands of whoever runs the Justice Department’s antitrust division in the next administration. But in making the case for the deal, the company has a big problem: The most compelling business arguments for the deal — that the new megacompany can boost profits by giving Time Warner content favorable treatment on AT&T’s wired and wireless networks — are also the arguments that are most likely to attract skepticism from regulators. Because of that conundrum, AT&T executives have effectively been forced into telling a somewhat self-contradictory story, talking vaguely about synergies the deal will allow while simultaneously insisting they won’t exploit those synergies so much that it could damage competition.