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It's a common negotiation tactic: go to the dealership, look at a car, and leave.  The dealership may drop the price when you come back, and if it doesn't, there are other cars, anyway.  But according to Bill Gates, Microsoft isn't pulling this stunt with Yahoo.

 Bill Gates

Yesterday, the chairman expressed a certain level of comfort with Steve Ballmer's decision not to push the acquisition.  The phrase "independent strategy" came up when he spoke to Fox.

Now the Wall Street Journal is connecting Gates to the phrase "independent paths."  The more he says this sort of thing, the less likely it seems that Microsoft is planning to swoop in and grab Yahoo at a lower price.

These comments also tend to rule out the possibility that Microsoft will purchase some other company (or companies) as a consolation prize.

Of course, Ballmer, more than Gates, is running things at Microsoft, and that was one of Gates's main points during the Fox interview.  It's hard to imagine anyone contradicting Gates in the near future, though, so we might finally see a period of peace and quiet in Redmond.