This is a sonar ping bouncing off a person closely intermeshed with communities HN readers care about. It casts into relief certain cultural values and tendencies of our community, e.g. our discomfort with moral ambiguity (Bill Gates/Uber/prosecutors/Comcast tend to be judged as scumbag or not in the top comment, with the nuance being expanded upon in child comments versus the other way around).

Given his god-like status in the VC community -- and of the company he founded, which until recently has boasted of its "continuing relationship" with Mr. Perkins -- it's more than appropriate:

    http://www.kpcb.com/teams/partners-emeriti

This stupid letter to the editor has (a) made the news elsewhere (b) been explicitly disowned by his firm: "Tom Perkins has not been involved in KPCB in years. We were shocked by his views expressed today in the WSJ and do not agree."