Could a DirecTV acquisition bolster Verizon's video base?

Speaking at the Goldman Sachs Communicopia event earlier this month, Verizon Communications' CEO Ivan Seidenberg said that not only was he no longer going to worry about voice line loss, but that video, not voice, would be the "core product" of its wireline business. Although Verizon continues to make subscriber strides with its Fiber to the Premise-based FiOS TV offering, which had more than 2.5 million customers as of June 30, the service provider still trails cable and satellite video providers in terms of size. If Verizon keeps pace with its predictions to gain 600,000 net additions in the first half of 2009, it would become the fifth-largest video provider by 2012.  

But a Wall Street Journal article argues that buying DirecTV would catapult Verizon to the number two video provider status trailing only Comcast. Not only would such a marriage enable Seidenberg to make his wireless voice/video bundle more of a reality, but it would gain another national marketing outlet. Besides the obvious regulatory hurdles such a deal would have to get through, the other question is whether Verizon would face competition from fellow RBOC AT&T from getting to DirecTV first.

For more:
- Wall Street Journal has this article