I think, the price of wireless spectrum has been inflated by Google participation, i.e. telco has overpaid for it. There is saying: "Generals always prepare to fight the last war". Wireless voice market is near saturation and telco won't be able to get the same revenue for data as voice. It is actually the same was with landlines. Voice was true cash cows, not DSL. Otherwise they would not go to video market. I think, in near future they start selling unused spectrum for 30%-50% of original price.
Making Verizon overpay for something is like saying you forced someone with a 70 IQ to say something stupid.
It's negligible and irrelevant. Verizon would have spent twice that if it meant protecting their massive profit margins (caller ID, SMS, MMS) long term -- without batting an eyelash. Verizon is an epic U.S. business operation with one of the most powerful lobbying machine's on K-Street, and Google just started lobbying Uncle Sam last month or so...