Steve Jobs is the poster boy for La Rochefoucauld

The 17th–century French sage offers perspective from which to view Steve's latest hissy fit, to wit: ordering the removal from all 104 of his Apple stores all books published by John Wiley & Sons.

La Rochefoucauld wrote, in his superb, not–to–be–without–on–top–of–your–toilet–tank, slender book of "Maxims," the following:

Only the great are permitted great faults.

FunFact: Aldous Huxley always carried a copy of La Rochefoucauld's book and found that dipping into it at random was a superb diversion, a source of wonder and a spur to creativity. But I digress.

The reason for Steve's outburst?

Wiley next month is publishing a new, unauthorized biography of Steve by Jeffrey Young entitled "iCon: Steve Jobs, the Greatest Second Act in the History of Business" (below).

Now, I don't know about you but to me, that title hardly sounds like a book I'd want to rail against: rather, I'd be out hawking it.

But you know me, always willing do to anything for a buck.

Anyway, the New York Times ran the story on the very last page of this morning's business section, without a byline, under the fold, in the corner, using the Associated Press feed (below).

Wonder if this almost invisible placement has anything at all to do with the fact that the paper needs Apple's advertising money very, very badly as it continues to show evidence of a severe case of the dwindles with the ever–shrinking bottom line of its ad income.

Nah, couldn't be — not the Times, they'd never do something so Murdochian — or would they?

Daniel Okrent, check your inbox, your emails are piling up.

This one might be too hot a third rail even for the intrepid Times ombudsman.

All Steve's outburst has done is give the upcoming book a huge dose of prepublication publicity and engendered advance orders by the thousands, of which mine will be one as soon as I finish this.

But let's not focus entirely on Steve who, after all, is a God and can by definition do no wrong.

No, it would be the farthest thing from fair and balanced not to note, with amazement, that Microsoft turns out to have Christian Coalition leader Ralph Reed on its payroll.

For the past several years, it turns out, Reed's been on retainer to Microsoft.

In case you were wondering what that means in terms you and I can understand, Microsoft notes that for the past six months Reed has been paid $20,000 a month for his services, whatever they might be.

Bill Gates is squirming a bit with this one, what with all the brouhaha over the anti–gay law Microsoft decided not to oppose recently in its home state of Washington.

Which just goes to show once again that really, really smart people do really dumb things, just like you and me.

I mean, Bill Gates not only said yes to the current depressing, brain–dead Microsoft Windows ad campaign, featuring guys wearing dinosaur heads saying stupid things; he liked Microsoft Bob a lot too, and the idiot dressed in the butterfly costume and, well, you get the idea.

In closing, let me say that I did enjoy the Darth Vader–ish headline over the Times Apple/Steve Jobs story, what with the new "Star Wars" episode opening:

Apple Chief Strikes Back Over Biography

The back story: as a courtesy to Steve, Wiley sent him the book's manuscript two weeks ago.

Apple responded by demanding that Wiley halt the book's release.

Wiley refused and decided to stand behind the book's author.

Apple retaliated last week by removing every one of the dozens of Wiley titles it normally carries from Apple stores around the world.

Apple spokesman Steve Dowling said in the Times story that "company executives were declining to comment."

Boy, what with all the lawsuits (there are 25 at present) against its employees for leaking information and the three suits against Apple–related websites for publishing the leaked material, you'd think the legal department already would have more than enough to keep its lawyers busy.

But then, you don't know Steve Jobs.

As John Markoff wrote on page xix of the preface to his new book, "What the Dormouse Said: How the Sixties Counterculture Shaped the Personal Computer Industry," about Steve, "... he still believed that taking LSD was one of the two or three most important things he had done in his life, and he said he felt that because people he knew well had not tried psychedelics, there were things about him they couldn't understand."

And there you have it, from the prophet (Jobs) himself.