If I ran Microsoft

BillG, SteveB, and the rest of the gang in Redmond are super-smart, and they’re supported by a bunch of big brains.  So, it’s likely they know stuff I don’t…or they’re imagining stuff I can’t.  But support for Microsoft’s plan is not universal, and there’s one important consideration: much of the opinion is driven by the financial goals of Yahoo! stockholders and not by what’s best for Microsoft.  What’s better for Yahoo! stockholders (a higher price per share) is worse for MSFT shareholders.

If I ran Microsoft, I’d set a course away from Yahoo! at warp 9.92 and “Engage!”  (visualize emphatic finger pointing here).  Yahoo is damaged goods.

If Microsoft wants to invest for the future, I see two paths.

For the short term, Microsoft should step up its stock repurchases.  This pushes up the EPS and, in the long run, will benefit all shareholders.  Remember, the shareholders own Microsoft, and they run it through the Board of Directors.  Most shareholders (and employees) don’t want the MSFT brand diluted by Yahoo!.  And there’s still a body of thought that Microsoft would do better if broken up; adding Yahoo! to a big company like Microsoft will add drag.  Remember, Microsoft is about 80,000 people world-wide, but an enormous amount of labor is outsourced, so the effective size of the Company is substantially larger.

My long-term plan is less conventional: set up a venture capital/incubation fund.  Invest in the up-and-coming technologies and businesses that will, some day, out-Google Google.  The model is simple: give them money, help when asked, don’t meddle, and wait.  Think intellectual red wine: it has to age before it becomes valuable.

Imagine the return on a $10 billion world-wide investment in a several hundred start-ups, spread out over 10 years, leveraged through Microsoft’s research and marketing resources!  A significant investment in Europe would pull the rug out from under Neelie Kroes and the crybabies at the EU.   A significant investment outside North America would solidify Microsoft’s international markets and tap the huge intellectual capital developing in Russia, India, and China.

It’s worth considering.

Look who’s rooting for Hillary (follow-up)

My previous post outraged some and bored others.  So, let me be an equal-opportunity offender.

I should clarify my opinion of Mr. Limbaugh, Mr. O’Reilly, the skank Ann Coulter, Monica Crowley, Laura Ingraham, and their ilk.  They’re vile, lying weasels and I consider them to be the lowest form of life on earth.  Yes, even lower than that TV-advertising, ambulance-chasing-by-proxy personal injury lawyer James Sokolove.

If we’re talking about big fat liars, we have to include Bill and Hillary Clinton.  And we’ll reserve a special place in the Liars’ Club Hall Of Fame for the bloody-handed George Bush, Dick Cheney, and the other war criminals appointed to positions in the Cheney administration.  4,065 soldiers, sailors, and Marines have died so that Halliburton may live.

America is a great country with serious problems.  We need honesty, candor, and courage from our leaders; lies during a campaign are a telling indicator of what will come later.  How about the stories floated by the Bush campaign in the 2000 South Carolina primary about John McCain’s illegitimate black child?  And how about Obama’s out-of-context quote on the offered by Hillary’s campaign?  He said the Republican party “was the party of ideas for a pretty long chunk of time…” and her campaign claimed he said he “…really liked the ideas of the Republicans…”  For crying out loud: did they not think we’d figure this one out?  Apparently not.  And why would anyone think Hillary won’t break the truth again, especially in 2012?

We’ve suffered for the last 16 years, with the White House occupied by a pair of overblown egos with their direct lines to the Almighty and congenitally unable to tell the truth.  No, no, no…I’m not talking about Bill and Hillary.  Bush and Cheney?  Well, maybe, but we’ll split the difference and go with Bubba and W.  The moral leadership shown by these two should make the Southern Baptists cringe.  Where is the outrage?

My bottom line: the citizen of the United States deserve the truth.