If theJustice Department succeeds in breaking up Microsoft (MSFT) , the U.S. economy will collapse and PC users will have fewer tools to guard against hackers and keep their kids away from Internet smut.

So says Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates. None of this is true, of course. Microsoft's media blitz, in full swing since the guilty verdict in its antitrust trial -- is cynical, wrong-headed and mildly extortionist. In their recent essays in Time and Newsweek, Gates and CEO Steve Ballmer attempt in the public-relations realm what they've pulled off in the software arena: using Microsoft's dominance to stir fear -- this time among consumers.

Microsoft's agitprop campaign just might succeed. According to a recent Wall Street Journal poll, 61 percent of American PC users disagree with the Justice Department proposal to split Microsoft. Although the antitrust trial provided ample evidence that Microsoft uses its size and strength to bully allies and crush competitors, a majority of PC users still have a positive opinion of Microsoft.

How could this be? If the Journal's pollsters had spent more time on the phone, they would have discovered that respect for Microsoft is inversely proportional to one's knowledge of how computers and software really work. Since most Windows users don't know -- and don't care -- how their browser interfaces with, say, their word processing software, they are woefully susceptible to Microsoft's pity play.

I tested this theory in an unscientific survey of friends and acquaintances. The most stark divergence of opinions came from two brothers who grew up in the same left-leaning, Irish American household. Both mistrusting of large corporations, the McKenna brothers are equally leery of government heavy-handedness. Each spends days at a time in front of a computer -- one writing sports stories for an alternative weekly newspaper, and the other tapping out database programming code. Guess who's the Microsoft-basher?

"Microsoft is historically very evil," says Geoffrey, the programmer. "I think the breakup will be better for the world at large, because there is enormous incentive for Microsoft's programmers to create software that will work a little better on the Windows operating system than software made by its competitors."

His brother, David, insists otherwise: "I can't help feeling like Microsoft is getting screwed. I kind of fear the unknown as far as what Microsoft might become, but I never trust the government."

Gates surely had people like David in mind when he composed his essay for Time. The piece was big on appeals for public sympathy, but light on common sense. Gates wrote, for instance, that the Justice Department's remedy proposal will retard high-tech innovation and that "technologies that protect against attacks such as the Love Bug virus would ... be much harder for computer users to obtain." Not only your privacy but "the safety of your children online" is endangered.

Like a sideshow swami, Gates says only an untouched Microsoft can decode the mysterious Windows operating system. That's news to the 99.9 percent of software engineers who don't draw a paycheck from Microsoft. Gates pretends that Microsoft leads the way in security, privacy and filtering software, while ignoring that Symantec (SYMC) and Network Associates (NETA) are the leading makers of such products. He also doesn't mention that Americans spent $147 million last year fortifying Windows with additional virus-protection programs.

The software industry's march of innovation has been unrelenting over the years. Microsoft's business model has worked to diminish competition by subsuming potential challengers or putting them out of business. "Microsoft is a competitive company," says computer-security consultant Richard M. Smith. "But they tend to only push the product curve when they face competition."

The Justice Department remedy to split Microsoft is eminently reasonable. If the new software-only half of the company were forced to compete on equal footing with other firms in the industry, we'd be better off. And the public debate over Microsoft's future would benefit if Gates were more honest about how Microsoft contributes to -- and sometimes thwarts -- innovation and competition.