ad plugged that into the news release and Armstrong's letter to Lillis, Armstrong called Lillis and we put the letter on the fax machine. Within an hour, we issued the news release along with the letter. When he learned of AT&T's offer, Comcast's treasurer and princi- pal spokesman to the financial community reportedly sucked in his breath and said, "It's staggering." Ken McGee at the Gartner Group said, "The FCC and the Congress are not reshaping the industry any- more, it's Armstrong and AT&T." But referring to the possible bidding war he had unleashed, the Wall Street Journal cautioned that "Arm- strong is steering AT&T into uncharted waters." The Washington Post asked whether AT&T were becoming "too big once again." And the Bell companies all issued statements saying that the merger an- nouncement was still more proof that they should be allowed into long distance. The day after the announcement, Armstrong, Somers, and Hin- dery spent the day meeting with investors and analysts, who acknowl- Tough Calls edged the strategic rationale for the deal but were concerned about the price and particularly worried that it could go higher if Comcast countered. AT&T stock ended the day down 3 3/8 to 53 3/8, just a little more than $2 above the trigger for an additional cash payment. MediaOne was up 7 7/8 to 77 3/8, while Comcast was up 3/16 to close at 67 13/16. The Dow was down 37.5 points. It looked as if the early bets were on AT&T winning a bidding war. But this was just the beginning of a twelve-day ride that was like being caught in the spin cycle of a washing machine. Comcast let it be known that it had received phone calls from Mi- crosoft, AOL, and software billionaire turned cable magnate Paul Allen. Armstrong spoke to Gates and Case. AT&T's investment bank- ers spoke to Allen's. Hindery called around to the major program- mers. Their consensus view was that no one was really serious about joining the Comcast bid. Allen had his hands full with Charter Com- munications, his fledgling cable company. AOL had concl