The excess funds Microsft and others are holding offshore needs to be repatriated. There is too much dollar liquidity offshore helping US competition, and too little at home where the liquidity is needed. The Fed is also needlessly maintaining a stimulative posture where repatriation of overseas dollars through tax policy could relieve a significant portion of this burden.
My understanding is that most unrepatriated earnings are actually deposited in US banks, meaning that those dollars are already being lent into the US economy. Repatriation is a tax accounting issue.