Why Do You Defend Microsoft? Don't They Have Enough Money To Defend Themselves?
by Robert Tracinski
Question: How can you refer to a big, powerful corporation as being "persecuted"? Why do businessmen need someone to defend them?as if they didn't have enough money to do it themselves?
Answer: To answer this question, we need only look at the Microsoft antitrust case. Who is arrayed against Microsoft? A coalition of anti-business leftists and self-appointed "consumer advocates"; a cabal of jealous competitors who have hired high-powered lawyers and lobbyists to promote a government attack on Microsoft; and then there is the Attorney General and the Justice Department, with virtually unlimited resources at their command; there is the Congress, where both Democrats and Republicans support the attacks on Microsoft; there is a federal judge who is ignorant of the technical issue in this case and who does not regard the issue of individual rights as relevant to the antitrust laws; finally, there is the press, which alternates between portraying Microsoft as a malevolent Big Brother and portraying the case as too complicated or technical for the layman to take sides.
Who is on the side of Microsoft? There is Microsoft itself?and us. Furthermore, Microsoft's efforts are widely dismissed on the grounds that it is merely protecting its own interests. In the code of modern American politics, it is the victim of government intervention who is considered to have the least right to speak in his own case.
If the majority of businessmen spoke up consistently in defense of their own rights, and the rights of other businessmen, then an organization like ours would be unnecessary. But the tragic aspect of the growth of government controls is that the victims do not understand the justice of their own cause. Part of our goal is to help businessmen to grasp this fact.
In the meantime, who will speak up for the rights of businessmen? Today, even the lowest specimen of humanity?especially the lowest specimen of humanity?can count on support from numerous sources. A homeless drug addict has a dozen different organizations, agencies, shelters, rehab programs, and the like devoted to his aid. A Nazi who burns a cross on his front lawn knows he can call the ACLU to protect his rights. But what if a peaceful, responsible, productive businessman?even a hero of American business?finds himself under attack? Who can he call?
That is our purpose. In her essay "America's Persecuted Minority: Big Business," Ayn Rand called for a "civil liberties union for businessmen." That is one of the functions of the Center for the Moral Defense of Capitalism.
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