The killer combination for programming languages or why I like F#

True :) The only thing I would miss in Emacs is a visual debugger. I used to write Scheme in a "code carefully so it works the first time around" mode. It worked out because I worked on small systems and Scheme has extremely clear semantics. But imagine having to dive into a framework-based project, big enough that you can't understand it all at once by reading the code. Then, I find that using a debugger and stepping through the code is a really good way to get a grasp of the system. Perhaps, slime provides a good debugging interface -- I just got hooked into visual debuggers before I could find out.

Was there a case made against F# in the cited text?

Sounded more like a rant.

I read it twice. I'm unable to discern what reasons the author puts forward against F#. Seems like most of his criticism is against that certain book.