You and I will never be in a position to sell a successful mobile handset[1], so let's just focus on the app development and sales.
In terms of ease of use, we can use whatever tool we're most comfortable with to develop for Android: C, C++, Java, Flash, C#, Python, Scheme, Ruby, etc. and we have guaranteed approval. Neither Google nor other alleged gatekeepers can dick with our right to publish software. Even if we choose to give it away for free, users can download our apps and install on their Android phones without anybody knowing about it, getting a cut or messing with them. "adb install MyApp.apk" is a birth right on Android, bless the beautiful platform!
For a developer, Android is multitasking, garbage collected, and modern, almost to a fault. You can tweak it to your liking, as much as you want. And should you choose to, you can build it from sources and deploy it on your new exotic board that nobody has ever heard of.
At this point, Android is bigger than the efforts of all the carriers and handset creators, combined. What Android can do is only limited by your imagination, skill, and budget. Nothing is stopping you from developing a new mobile handset that puts the iPhone to shame (and many have done this) and loading Android with it.
Instead of finding fault in specific Android deployments or handsets, ask yourself: what do I want to do with Android?
This thing is bigger than a movement, it's a tsunami wave standing a mile tall: I want to ride it, I want you to ride it. Let's put our creativity together and make use of this thundering power. Or stand in its way to be crushed.
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[1] Unless we use Android or Maemo, which are Free Software :-)