No court has ever, in 130 years of antitrust practice in the United States, taken the position that dominance in and of itself, absent bad conduct, is illegal. But if you were a reader of The New York Times, you could be forgiven for thinking that as a matter of American law big is bad:
Alphabet was an obvious antitrust target. Through YouTube, Google search, Google Maps and a suite of online advertising products, consumers interact with the company nearly every time they search for information, watch a video, hail a ride, order delivery in an app or see an ad online. Alphabet then improves its products based on the information it gleans from every user interaction, making its technology even more dominant.
Katie Benner & Cecilia Kang, Justice Dept. Plans to File Antitrust Charges Against Google in Coming Week, N.Y. Times, Sept. 3, 2020.
Google is an obvious target for the Times, of course, because Google has eaten its lunch in the competition for advertising dollars. But it’s not an obvious target for anyone who knows something about antitrust, which isn’t in the business of smashing firms that win by being better.
But The New York Journal got its war by whipping Americans into a frenzy against an enemy of its choice. Why shouldn’t The New York Times get its antitrust case against Google?
Unlike in 1898, however, the only Americans who have actually been whipped into a frenzy are the elites: surveys show that Americans still love Google and the other tech giants, at least when they’re not being asked leading questions like: should the government “break up tech companies if they control too much of the economy?” (Actually, the best thing about the surveys is that the tech company Americans like least is the one that elites probably like most: Twitter.)
I suppose that it’s only the elites who matter, however, even those who might pretend not to read the Times. AG Barr is so intent on rushing out a case against Google, presumably because he’s been blinkered into thinking it will clinch a win in November for President Trump, that his line attorneys are in open revolt:
Justice Department officials told lawyers involved in the antitrust inquiry into Alphabet . . . to wrap up their work by the end of September[.] Most of the 40-odd lawyers who had been working on the investigation opposed the deadline. Some said they would not sign the complaint, and several of them left the case this summer.
Katie Benner & Cecilia Kang, Justice Dept. Plans to File Antitrust Charges Against Google in Coming Week, N.Y. Times, Sept. 3, 2020.
As PBS tells it: “Remington, who had been sent to Cuba to cover the insurrection, cabled to Hearst that there was no war to cover.” Hearst replied: “You furnish the pictures. I’ll furnish the war.”