David Folkenflik

What I really think is at play is the willingness of senior government officials to intercede in public discourse and say what they are willing or want to hear on the air and what they don't.

in concert with the president's interests and that that applies to a far vaster array of actions by the government and by media owners in response that's deeply troubling more than the question of any given talk show.

I do think that if this were to be enforced and accepted rather than challenged by these network owners and these local station owners, that you would see a tamponing down on certain kinds of conversations that are critical of the president, which, of course, in many ways is the desired outcome here.

The question of the administration is backfiring on them or having limits requires major media owners to push back and not simply accept the administration's logic or demands.

And we've seen that, you know, as as Domenico has laid out properly, the corporate owners of CBS and ABC and others have really sought to accommodate the president as a private citizen in his lawsuits, but also his administration members.

and federal policy in all kinds of ways to get their larger corporate interests through, through regulators, through the administration's gatekeepers, right?

And you've seen even in figures so great as Jeff Bezos, right?

One of the world's handful of richest people, the founder and largest shareholder in Amazon.

He has contorted the Washington Post in many ways to accommodate the president and the administration as well.

And if you're seeing somebody like Bezos willing to do that to make sure the flow of money keeps coming for government contracts, to make sure that the government doesn't go after some of his business practices, it requires a leap of faith to assume that all media owners of much smaller degree are going to be willing to take a more aggressive stance.

Warner owns HBO Max, HBO, Warner Bros.

Studios, the DC Comics franchises, and cable channels including CNN and Discovery.

Netflix won over Warner with a bid for the TV and movie studios, the streaming platforms and intellectual property, but not the cable channels, in a deal worth $83 billion.

Paramount chief David Ellison started the ball rolling by making a series of unsolicited bids for Warner.

He now promises to pay $31 per share, a dollar more than his last offer.

The previous deal included debt and was valued at about $108 billion.

Ellison has made other concessions, too.

Warner has not yet decided the Paramount deal is preferable, but if it does, Netflix will have four days to make a counteroffer.

A shareholder vote is planned for March.

David Folkenflik, NPR News.