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Just as social media heavily impacted this year’s London Summer Olympics, it’s also playing a very prominent part in this year’s U.S. presidential election.

In 2008, President Obama showed everyone just how powerful social media could be. Now, both sides are proving just how essential leveraging Facebook, Twitter, and other online platforms are to a successful run at the White House. The constant social media spotlight has meant several significant “campaign stops” for both candidates as unexpected Internet blowbacks forced them to pause and take stock of how the ongoing onslaught of online scrutiny has suddenly turned conventional politics upside down.

Here are three of the most significant ones:

• Campaign Stop #1: Fact-Checking Is Now an Amateur Sport
• Campaign Stop #2: The Speed of Social Media Is a Double-Edged Sword
• Campaign Stop #3: Social Media Knows Where You’re Hiding

Electronic billing has been promoted as a big cost savings for healthcare. But is it? The Center for Public Integrity has challenged the conventional wisdom, and the rest of us would do well to pay attention. For 20 months, CPI combed Medicare records and talked to providers, billing consultants, and others to document one big reason for the growth in Medicare spending over the last decade: Doctors and hospitals are sometimes “upcoding,” or charging Medicare for higher levels of services when they didn’t provide it, while hospital emergency departments too are grabbing billions in extra fees for their services.

A couple of startling findings: 1) “More than 7,500 physicians billed the two top-paying codes for three out of four office visits in 2008, a sharp rise from the numbers of doctors who did so at the start of the decade.” 2) “Use of the top two most expensive codes for emergency room care nationwide nearly doubled from 25 percent to 45 percent of all claims during the time period examined. In many cases these claims were not for treating patients with life-threatening injuries. Often they (patients) were treated for seemingly minor injuries and complaints.”

In response to the CPI investigation and the Times story, Attorney General Eric Holder and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius sent a letter to five major hospital trade groups, warning about fraudulent use of electronic medical records to inflate Medicare bills. The move strikes me as slap-on-the-wrist response to a significant and costly problem, and it certainly bears follow-up from the media.

Deutsche Telekom and MetroPCS have signed a definitive agreement to combine T-Mobile USA and MetroPCS.

This transaction will create the leading value carrier in the U.S. wireless marketplace, which will deliver an enhanced customer experience through a wider selection of affordable products and services, deeper network coverage and a clear-cut technology path to one common LTE network. The combined company, which will retain the T-Mobile name, will have the expanded scale, spectrum and financial resources to aggressively compete with the other national U.S. wireless carriers. Deutsche Telekom’s supervisory board and MetroPCS’ board of directors unanimously approved the transaction. The transaction is structured as a recapitalization, in which MetroPCS will declare a 1 for 2 reverse stock split, make a cash payment of $1.5 billion to its shareholders (approximately $4.09 per share prior to the reverse stock split) and acquire all of T-Mobile’s capital stock by issuing to Deutsche Telekom 74% of MetroPCS’ common stock on a pro forma basis. Deutsche Telekom has also agreed to roll its existing intercompany debt into new $15 billion senior unsecured notes of the combined company, provide the combined company with a $500 million unsecured revolving credit facility and provide a $5.5 billion backstop commitment for certain MetroPCS third-party financing transactions.

The combined company will be a stronger competitor and will be well-positioned to drive future growth. Based on analyst consensus estimates for 2012, the combined company is expected to have approximately 42.5 million subscribers, $24.8 billion of revenue, $6.3 billion of adjusted EBITDA, $4.2 billion of capital expenditures and $2.1 billion of free cash flow (defined as EBITDA less capital expenditures) in 2012. After closing, the company’s headquarters will be in Bellevue, Washington and it will retain a significant presence in Dallas, Texas. The combined company will have an 11-member board of directors, including a number of members appointed by Deutsche Telekom consistent with its equity ownership. The transaction is subject to MetroPCS shareholder approval, regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions. The transaction is expected to close in the first half of 2013.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski announced the winners of America’s first ‘Mobility Fund’ auction.

This market-based policy innovation was part of the Commission’s once-in-a-generation reform of the Universal Service Program last year, which allocated $300 million in savings from cutting waste and inefficiency, to a new Mobility Fund aimed at closing gaps in mobile coverage across the U.S. The effort marks the first time in history the Commission has made universal mobile service an express universal service goal. As a result of the auction, new mobile infrastructure deployment will begin in 31 states with areas that currently lack access to 3G or 4G mobile service. In total, up to 83,000 new U.S. road miles on which millions of Americans live, work, or travel will gain access to advanced mobile networks that significantly enhance opportunities for jobs, education, healthcare and public safety. As part of the auction rules, winning companies must complete projects within three years. They must also make their networks available to other providers for roaming so that as many consumers as possible can benefit from the new networks.

Thirty-eight companies and subsidiaries participated in the auction, submitting nearly 900 bids. Winners ranged from larger national carriers like T-Mobile and U.S. Cellular to smaller carriers like Pine Belt Cellular, Inc. in Alabama, and VTel Wireless, Inc. in Vermont. The Commission expects millions more in private investment to complement the auction funding.