Eventually, the court must address motion 167. The fact it has taken two months to getting around to addressing it should come as no great surprise considering there were 166 previous motions that preceded it. If you read motion 167 it is apparent that it addresses the issue that the DOJ does not want the testimony they themselves used in the NEA case used against them in this trial but it is even more than that. While JetBlue is not appealing the NEA decision, AAL is.

This puts the DOJ in the position of either having to refute their own NEA testimony (with that appeal still pending) or having to allow that testimony to be used by JB to refute the basis for this trial - which will then be used against them in the appeal. Basically, unless DOJ IS allowed to exclude their NEA testimony they are likely to lose one or even BOTH of their cases.

Thus the judge must either condone the DOJ doublespeak without allowing the NEA transcripts to be entered in evidence (and opening an avenue of appeal to this case if he were to decide against the acquisition) or allow them to be entered in which case it becomes obvious that - in AT LEAST ONE of the cases, DOJ was lying.

It's pretty obvious the judge is trying to signal to DOJ that they'd better cut a deal and settle this because he isn't about to sacrifice his integrity (or be overturned on appeal) to attempt to salvage the appearance of integrity for the DOJ - especially since they picked this fight. Whether politics allows them to do that is another story.