Governments often behave like gangster syndicates. Not in all cases or in every way, but if you take the premise as given, and then explain apparent deviations

Governments often behave like gangster syndicates. Not in all cases or in every way, but if you take the premise as given, and then explain apparent deviations as outcomes of internal power struggle or PR campaigns to garner broad support, most things that happen within large governments make some kind of sense, anti-trust included. Governments will accept and enjoy a monopoly if they get a piece of the pie, but there are usually dissenting interests in the wings saying "your monopoly is stopping us from building OUR monopoly, so knock it off". And then anti-trust can have teeth. Likewise, a monopoly can "rise above" negative public opinion and be forced to legitimacy if it demonstrates that it's serving the interests of power. Or a demographic that was being courted ages out, and suddenly the political mood changes to serve the new set of players and things magically become possible. But this kind of thing also accounts for why some public investments get lots of funding, while others languish or are captured by do-nothing rentiers. Or why you end up with popular culture being funded within a narrow set of genres and themes. It's a whole oroborous of elite interests making deals to allocate capital, and often pursuing ego gratification along the way.