I am neither a conservative or liberal but found this
article at osopinion.com
Why Conservatives Support Microsoft
The phrase I heard many times as an excuse for Microsoft's illegal behavior was
"Bill Gates never put a gun to anybody's head and made them use his products."
That phrase kept ricocheting around inside my head until it finally hit something....
That was it!! The "reasoning gap" between me and the hard-right,
dyed-in-the-wool conservatives supporting Bill Gates' felonious monopoly
explained it all: *** Conservatives don't believe in white-collar crime.***
Suddenly it all made sense. That same excuse was used by hard-right
conservatives who support Big Tobacco, too. "Nobody put a gun to their heads
and forced them to smoke." They seemed to be having some sort of obsession or
fixation with guns. Apparently, a person was only a criminal if they used or
threatened to use physical violence. If a company was very wealthy, it just did not
matter how they got there, "by hook or by crook," as long as nobody used guns to
threaten people.
So Microsoft deserves a free ride, according to those steeped in the purest form of
right-wing politics, because they have never been observed using getting physical
with their competitors. They have lied, they have cheated, they have engaged in
deceptive and perhaps fraudulent business practices. Microsoft has used every
dirty trick in the monopolist's handbook, plus several "new and innovative" tricks
that aren't written down anywhere, to punish excellence and hijack successful
products out of the hands of brilliant but powerless innovators. But the fact that
nobody has ever observed them sending Guido or Vito or Don Corleone to visit
their victims means that they must be innocent, right?
Taking this reasoning to its logical conclusion, white-collar crime does not exist,
because if there are no bruises and no bloodshed, then it wasn't really a crime.
Embezzlement, dirty payoffs, and insurance fraud run rampant; stock-market
swindles and false advertising are abundant. But nobody will give these crooks the
hard time they deserve, as long as they look legitimate. If you act like a harmless,
wispy nerd and keep all your threats off the public record, then you can destroy as
many honest businesses as you please.
The ultimate irony, I suppose, was when Judge Jackson ruled that Microsoft "did
violence in the marketplace." As long as he doesn't have a strong Italian accent or
wear brass knuckles, Mr. Gates will keep making people "offers that they can't
refuse." |
