Thanks for this interesting read. I wasn't aware one can buy a company and then place the debt created onto that company... It doesn't make much sense. And also, why is Private Equity and their methods of mass-mergers not seen as a problem by the European Competition Commission? A monopoly is a monopoly, no?
Modern conservative and neoliberal thinking do not hold that monopolies are bad. Neoliberal thought, in fact, rewards monopoly. I would argue that the ECC does not have a problem with private equity because Goldman Sachs runs the world.
Fun tidbit of history that isn't well known: one of the modern architects of the shift in monopoly thinking from "how much market share?" to "how are consumer prices affected?" was none other than Robert Bork himself, when he was one of Nixon's personal devils, before he had made his name as a national devil.