- the Republican mayor’s office apparently added one sign-off sentence and his signature to the corporate PR document, then sent it to federal regulators on the official letterhead of Roswell, Georgia.
- The letter was part of what Comcast called an "outpouring of thoughtful and positive comments" in support of the proposed mega-merger
- Many of the letters sent to the FCC by state and local officials bear striking resemblance to those of Brown, Wodraska, and Wood.
It appears the amount of money Comcast has bribed lobbied the politician with determines whether they're obliged to write a personal letter, or can use a stock PR document:
- More prominent officials with histories of receiving campaign money from Comcast — like Oregon's Democratic Secretary of State Kate Brown — also recently sent personal letters
I can't tell you how many "endorsement" letters I've written for CEO's/CFO's to sign. I literally just wrote one that Controller at a large company signed as his own. These guys tend to know what they're signing, but this doesn't mean they have the time or inclination to sit down quietly and pen it themselves.
Prior to me writing these letters, I've spent hours working with these people to get them "on board" with what they're committing to.
I guess what I'm saying is that the fact that they're signing "ghost written" letters isn't that shocking. It would be shocking if the FCC didn't already assume as much.
It's not done so much for the FCC, in my opinion, but rather for the public. It's so Comcast can make statements like this:
The letter was part of what Comcast called an "outpouring of thoughtful and positive comments" in support of the proposed mega-merger, which is now entering the final stages of federal review.
Get enough of these boilerplate letters and you can say "outpouring."
It's all a bunch of crap. Everyone hates Comcast. Everyone. Unless they're paying you, you hate them.