AT&T purchase of BellSouth gets OK from feds

AT&T's $78.5 billion buyout of BellSouth Corp. won Justice Department approval Wednesday, a decision that sets the stage for further reuniting modernized parts of the old Ma Bell phone monopoly broken up by the government in 1984. The Justice Department approved the deal without conditions, which leaves the Federal Communications Commission as the final hurdle to the merger creating the nation's biggest provider of phone, wireless and broadband Internet services.