Ralph Johnson wrote:
>> Greg Palast wrote:
>>
>> I bet Mr. Gates, so quick to shout "piracy!" could name two products that
>> depend heavily on the lifted intellectual discoveries of others: 
>> MS-DOS and
>> Windows. To make sure no one could steal from him what he had so freely
>> boosted, Gates has run an international campaign to legally lock up his
>> monopoly on ideas. Bill's nobody's fool. He must know that if the
>> intellectual property defenses are breached, it will come from the 
>> need to
>> get cheap AIDS drugs to Africa. So we see Gates putting his two cents 
>> (in his
>> case, two billion) into the Africa AIDS holocaust issue. In February 
>> 2002,
>> Bill and wife Melinda made the cover of Newsweek for their bighearted
>> philanthropy. The grinning couple's foundation has spent hundreds of 
>> millions
>> for AIDS treatment in Africa, working paw-in-claw with Merck and other 
>> Big
>> Pharma corporations tied to a PR campaign that drowns out the calls of
>> doctors pleading to end TRIPS restrictions. If there's any doubt where 
>> the
>> Gates's hearts lie, the Wall Street Journal notes that their 
>> foundation has,
>> oddly, invested over $200 million in drug company stocks. If
>> this "charitable" operation eviscerates protest against the TRIPS
>> thought-police and medical patents are upheld, Gates's donations could 
>> have
>> the effect of killing more people than they save.
>>
>>         From "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy" page 190
> 
> This is hate-mongering, pure and simple.  Please do not post it to this 
> list.
> 
> -Ralph Johnson
> 

this looks more like a bunch of interesting facts IMHO.

I do not see any hatred here, but I understand the analysis can be 
disappointing to people believing in mercantilist "charity".

Stef