Verizon, on the other hand...

... just bought about $4 billion worth of spectrum from Comcast.

Why do I like this deal, after showering AT&T's takeover over of T-Mobile with so much bile?

Because Verizon's deal brings new, unused spectrum to the market, actually doing what AT&T falsely claimed their deal with T-Mobile would accomplish. Because the Verizon deal still leaves the competitors on the field, especially the scrappy one (T-Mob) known for good prices and good deals. Because, in the final look, Verizon isn't AT&T.

Did you note last week that Verizon was the one major cell phone provider that did not use the sneaky software from Carrier IQ that knows more (a lot more) about you than your mother?

There is an obvious difference between Verizon and AT&T. One is good, the other is ... well, not so good. The corporate cultures seem vastly different. It's like going into a restaurant where staff is smiling and professional and eager, versus going into one where the first words you hear are "We close in fifteen minutes." Don't you just wonder what they're doing to your burger back there in the kitchen?

AT&T just seems to be in it for themselves, ya know?

We post this to let our conservative friends understand that we are not anti-business. We like business, and we like functioning markets, where they exist. Which does not include the U.S. pharmaceutical industry or anything that travels in the same wheel rut as AT&T.

That is not to say Verizon only wears a white hat. They were astoundingly silent about the AT&T and T-Mobile deal. Verizon's execs knew even if AT&T succeeded in swallowing T-Mobile and moving past Verizon to become the largest cell provider, even being second largest would increase Verizon's bottom line in a less competitive market. That's how oligopolies work.

But being silent is not the same as openly trying to undermine market competition. Verizon bought $4 billion of spectrum and will bring it online, while AT&T was taking a $4 billion charge for likely blowing a deal with T-Mobile that was a blatant attempt to subvert market dynamics so beloved of the right wing if in name only.

AT&T is anti-business, except their own. Rep. Greg Walden is anti-business,too, except for AT&T's business which Walden conducts quite well as a mole for AT&T at the government level. He is not working for small Oregon companies that need a functioning market in which to buy phone service. But then, we don't give Rep. Walden nearly as much money as he gets from AT&T.

Verizon is the nation's leader in customer service, the leader in basic service, the leader in high speed service, and it appears that lead will continue with this recent purchase of spectrum and marketing deals with cable companies.

Greenspan's warning

“If the pernicious drift toward fiscal instability is not arrested and is compounded by a protectionist reversal of globalization, the current account adjustment process could be quite painful for the United States and our trading partners," warned Alan Greenspan on Sunday, October 20 in a speech on the sidelines of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank meetings (read it here).

There is cause for great alarm in that sentence. Partly because of the incompetence of Bush/Cheney. Partly because of the tendency of both Democrats and Republicans to pander.

The “drift toward fiscal instability” is the deficit that Cheney/Bush has run up during its term of office. They are not conservatives. They are statists drawing power from the moral right. They favor a big government profiting special interests, they have run up huge deficits with tax breaks to large corporations and the wealthy while not paying for their war in progress.

The left is not much better. Their hatred of other people’s money makes them economically illiterate. If they get control of government on an agenda that includes opposition to liberal trade, Greenspan’s “protectionist reversal of globalization” could launch another worldwide recession.

At the end of which, China will be even more clearly the most significant economy in the world. If we start banning their T-Shirts, they may stop buying our debt. We need them more than they need us, and some of the recent market chaos may be related to China’s displeasure with our politics. We did not need to fete the Dali Lama.

The Law of Comparative Advantage proves that trade makes all nations wealthier. Protectionism extended the depression and made it worse. Democrats need to recognize that by trying to save in California jobs more cheaply done in Mexico, we hurt U.S. consumers, Mexican workers, and U.S. workers who can not make things for sale to a Mexico that can not pay for them.

Greenspan is giving us another warning. We are walking an edge. Only by more wisdom than we seem to possess, and a great amount of luck, shall we avoid a fall.