Major telecom mergers have been blocked recently ...
"the last time a big BIG transportation merger
was blocked for anti-trust reasons"
You are saying that telecoms are "transportation"?
I'd say, telecom mergers have been blocked since
the horses all left the barn. AT&T was broken up into
the Baby Bells; then Southwestern Bell merged most of
them -- and the rump parent -- into a reconstituted AT&T.
"The STB put a moratorium on Class I mergers in the late 90s."
And Canadian Pacific floated a plan to merge with CSX just
last month. CSX was "cool" to the idea, and there were "concerns
about regulators", despite the former chair of the STB serving
on the CP Board of Directors. So the plan was dropped -- for now.
But really. Our government won't break up "too big to fail" banks,
or punish the bankers at HSBC involved in trading with Iran in
violation of the embargo. So I don't expect the toothless bunch
of government regulators to get in the way of a big deal. No, I don't.
Sweet of you to think they would.