mivox - 10:40 pm on May 1, 2002 (gmt 0)

Consumers and the public do have recourse through the courts, but it is the government, not the public, pushing this lawsuit.

So if someone is convicted of a crime, unless the public decides they need to be punished, the justice system should just let them go? Should we put sentencing for violent criminals up for a vote before they're locked up? ;)

Antitrust cases aren't all neat and tidy like regular criminal cases. There is no automatic sentencing hearing like you see at the end of a criminal trial. What we're watching now is the equivalent of a hearing on an appealed criminal sentence... The argument you give above sounds more like nitpicking on the semantics of antitrust law function than any actual weak points in the MS/DOJ case.

Besides, the situation is a little more complex than gov't vs. the people... The Federal gov't would be happy to let it drop with the more lenient agreement they worked out with MS, and how do you know that the state Atty. Generals of the 9 dissenting states didn't get a flood of letters urging them not to accept the Feds' proposed settlement?

The message to corporate America is to watch out for big brother, making sure he always gets his share. Bill Gates did not pony up, and now he's paying for it.

Who didn't he pony up to? The Clinton administration? The nine dissenting states? What makes you say this? Do you have records of relevant campaign contributions for MS & their major competitors backing this theory up?

The US justice system is supposed to send out a message that if you break the law you stand a good chance of being put through the wringer for it... that's all I see happening here.