Having failed to kill Microsoft in its multiple previous attempts, the European Union went back to the same old well again this week. 

Alleging that the American software giant somehow failed to comply with an already-bizarre 2004 antitrust ruling, the EU has now imposed an €899 million ($1.35 billion) fine, the largest such penalty ever imposed.  This tiresome routine commenced in 2004, at which time the European Commission demanded that Microsoft literally surrender its proprietary technical codes under its decision.  To illustrate, this was akin to demanding that Coca Cola surrender its secret recipe to ersatz European competitors, a concept that even lay observers would recognize as absurd. 

Desperate to discover new ways to target American innovation, the latest alleged basis for the EU's pronouncement pioneers new realms of absurdity.  As ridiculous as this may sound, EU bureaucrats contend that Microsoft has engaged in anti-competitive behavior by charging prices that are too high. 

Consider for a moment how this allegation reveals European regulators' utter inability to understand free market economic principles, principles that allow America and rising Asian nations to outstrip Western Europe in terms of innovation, prosperity and growth.  Namely, if a company such as Microsoft charges prices that are too high, then wouldn't consumers be more inclined to patronize that company's competitors?  For instance, if Volkswagen raises the price of a Jetta to €200,000, wouldn't consumers flock toward BMW or Mercedes? 

Apparently not, in the strange intellectual universe that is the EU. 

Adding to the absurdity of the EU's latest attack is the fact that Microsoft announced just this month a broad expansion of the interoperability of its technology and business practices.  Henceforth, Microsoft will freely publish some 30,000 pages of documentation on its website that were previously available only under a trade secrets license.  Microsoft also unilaterally announced a covenant not to sue open source developers who develop or non-commercially distribute implementation of Microsoft's protocols. 

Microsoft also voluntarily launched an Open Source Interoperability Initiative, agreed to publish protocol documentation for additional products such as Office 2007 and will seek guidance from the international Interoperability Executive Customer Council. 

This constitutes a remarkable revolution in competitive transparency, which will promote technological interoperability worldwide. 

According to the Lilliputian EU, however, Microsoft somehow remains a convenient Gulliver worthy of continuing persecution until it is finally destroyed and replaced by some other American innovator worthy of its wrath. 

This constitutes the third consecutive attack upon Microsoft, and there's no end in sight to the EU's attempt to persecute the enterprise that symbolizes American innovation and prosperity worldwide.  All told, the EU has now imposed a total of €1.7 billion ($2.5 billion) in fines upon it. 

The simple fact is that Microsoft merely serves as the most convenient target for anti-American EU regulators.  American enterprises continue to prevail in the international marketplace, so protectionist European bureaucrats resort to stifling regulation and punitive litigation to promote their own sclerotic corporations. 

Further, the EU's continuing campaign of persecution sends a signal to other American innovators that marketing a product that proves wildly popular to European consumers will only subject it to punitive response from the EU.  At a critical time in which American companies must be allowed to freely export and reduce our trade deficit, this constitutes an extremely dangerous course by Europeans. 

Not only will it penalize American companies and reduce our ability to export, but it will also chill the process of innovation at its inception.  By signaling to American innovators that any degree of extraordinary success will result in bureaucratic fines and forced surrender of intellectual property, there will be less incentive to invest the enormous amounts of money and effort required to create revolutionary products in the first place. 

Moreover, the EU's actions signal to the rest of the world that it is open season on American innovators. 

Unfortunately, this probably isn't the final European assault against Microsoft, and it's certainly not the final assault against other American innovators.  It is therefore critical that American political and business leaders respond to the EU's malfeasance, and make it crystal clear that this sort of protectionism won't be idly tolerated.