"Trade and competition issues"

That's the cover Microsoft is taking to defend having Ralphie Reed's Century Strategies on the payroll.

What Ralph Reed knows about trade and competition in the software industry could probably fill a urine sample cup.

So, while I don't think Reed had anything to do with Microsoft's brave decision to reverse themselves on the Washington State anti-discrimination bill -- or any other social issues the company may be considering -- it is fun to hold Gates' and Ballmer's respective clay feet to the fire on this and make them deny, deny, deny.

Because as long as they try to peddle this "trade and competition" stuff, they should suffer the wrath of their employees and their customers (who must be alarmed that a company as powerful as Microsoft could cave to a local Elmer Gantry so easily).

The only reason Ralph Reed is employed by Microsoft is because of his personal relationships with George W. Bush and the rest of the crooks and liars running the Republican Party. That's why Grover Norquist and Haley Barbour have also been used as hired guns by those wonderful folks who give us the "Windows Operating System." In fact, someone might want to look back at Microsoft's claim that they've hired Reed "on occasion" going back "several years." Several years, eh? How much you wanna bet that "several years" coincides with a certain end to an anti-trust trial and the election of Bush II?

The K Street trough runneth over as they take their cut on the money being funneled to those moral absolutists who hold the keys to the Capitol building and the White House.