d none of the sexy cities, such as Los Angeles or New York, in its service area, Whitacre had followed his predecessor's model and stuck to his knitting, refusing to be tempted into flashy ventures. On the contrary, he poured money into bolstering his local monopoly, expanding his wireless business, and taking a IO percent stake in the Mexican phone Expect the Dumbing Down of Reality company, Telefonos de Mexico, whose customers shared a community of interest with many of his own customers. He expanded that com- munity of interest by announcing the acquisition of Pacific Telesis in April of 1996. But Whitacre knew that he still had not achieved critical mass, es- pecially if he wanted to serve businesses outside his operating territory in the west and southwest. And by consistently raising revenue, earn- ings, and dividends every year for twelve years, he had made his own stock a currency that could be used to broaden his base even further. After thinking about it for a few days, Whitacre put in a call to his hunting buddy, John Walter. Walter initially thought that Whitacre was following up on his con- gratulatory note and was mildly surprised when he began asking him about the Wall Street Journal article. "Are you really in charge up there?" Whitacre asked. Walter repeated what he had told the Journal: He valued Allen's experience and consulted with him, but the board had agreed that he would be running things. (In fact, Walter seldom saw Allen outside of regular meetings and was slightly miffed at what he interpreted as Allen's aloofness. For his part, Allen was trying to stay out of Walter's way and was becoming increasingly impatient with Walter's focus on symbolic actions, rather than nuts-and-bolts management.) "Well, in that case," Whitacre said, "what would you think of talking about a merger between AT&T and SBC?" To his credit, Walter said, "Now that is something I'd want to talk to Bob about." But even before talking to Allen, Walter knew that this could be the strategic move that would solve the bigg