Robert L. Jamieson Jr. kicks butt.
Love his column today in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer...hometown paper for our friends at MSFT. Seriously, read the whole piece. But a few highlights:
The man dubbed "The Right Hand of God" has fingerprints all over Microsoft. Still.Jamieson lays out very clearly what Microsoft doesn't seem to comprehend:
Ralph Reed is more than a Friend of Bill -- he is a paid GOP consultant, getting $20,000 a month from Microsoft to help shape the software behemoth's image in the global marketplace.
Judging from Reed's past -- he was the former head of the evangelical Christian Coalition -- that means serving up vitriolic viewpoints about gays and lesbians.
Judging from Microsoft's actions -- the company just yanked its support of a legislative bill in Olympia to protect gays -- the Reed brand of insight is shining through.
From the outside, it appears Microsoft was influenced by Reed -- a man who has President Bush's ear, has a following of millions of conservative Christians who think homosexuality is a sin, and who pushes the evangelical agenda every chance he gets.Jamieson gives Ballmer and Gates credit for soul-searching. Of course, if they had stayed the course, that wouldn't be necessary. But his final line is killer:
Microsoft may not have hired Reed for his social views, but once he gets in the door it's a full-on Holy Roller revival.
This is also true: When Microsoft faced the question of the gay rights bill it let the right hand of God draw the line in the sand in the wrong place.
