"It's not personal, Sonny, it's strictly business."
That quote was first delivered by mob boss Michael Corleone in The Godfather, but last Monday, it became the title of a speech by the Justice Department's acting antitrust chief Omeed Assefi. At a George Washington University event co-hosted with the publication MLex, Assefi described an agency firing on all cylinders, standing strong against bad corporate actors when warranted, but being open to reasonable negotiation to reach the strongest possible result.
Implicitly, Assefi was responding to months of complaints that his agency was bowing to corporate lobbyists and striking weak settle …