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Technology Stocks : AT&T -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: David C. Burns who wrote (1614)	8/10/1998 10:46:00 PM
From: ahhaha	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 4298

ATT is pursuing a one by one policy. They are going to take the local monopolies all around the country and shove the Telcom Act down their throats. The local monopolies are armed with all those municipalities skimming from the government protected monopoly local carrier. The outcome is law suit. The suits will go all the way to the Supreme Court where a small decision will be made which materially leaves the monopolies intact, but lays the ground for unrestrained competition. The Clinton Administration will fight this as will the FCC. They will call it "unfair competition". The problem with any such contrary stance is that the telecommunication industry can't be regulated until a free market has been established. That happens when all are given equal access to long or short distance. Any attempt to extend regulation in the same way that the oil industry was presumably deregulated in 1980 will fail because it follows the way the '96 Act has been so far interpreted: an attempt to prevent monopoly through the unintentional protection of monopoly. Thus there exists an interpretation of the Act that explicitly contradicts another equally valid interpretation. ATT is using this obvious fact in its own interest, but the outcome will be that the Act will become a legal vehicle that has the same consequences as the Sherman Anti-trust Law. That means, in most cases, the Act can't be applied especially in the liberal style in which it has over the last two years. That style is a complete disaster and so is waiting for debate and legal denouement. So far, no large company has decided to attack the law on legal grounds, but inadvertently ATT did today when they opened complaints in Maryland and Illinois. On the surface the complaints are straight forward, but they entail violations of the Robinson-Patman Act. The currently applied interpretation of the '96 Act conflicts with Robinson-Patman. ATT believes they are pursuing law provided in the '96 Act; they actually will end up busting the current liberal interpretation into pieces.