(FORTUNE Magazine) – Does the U.S. government care about our economy? It's a fair question, given that: (a) The Justice Department and 20 states are working to shackle Microsoft, one of the nation's most successful companies; (b) the Postal Service is issuing a stamp commemorating the 1929 stock market crash; and (c) the Federal Trade Commission is reportedly moving to file antitrust charges against Intel, the world's most successful chipmaker. How hard are these regulators thinking before messing with the two linchpins of U.S. technoleadership?

The answer would seem to be "not very." Some Silicon Valley executives interviewed by the FTC about Intel have come away with the impression that investigators have little understanding of how the technology industry works. Come to think of it, this whole FTC thing smacks of interdepartmental envy. It isn't exactly a stretch to imagine FTC bureaucrats getting all itchy as they watch Justice Department anti-Microsoft people prance around on CNN.

The FTC's issue with Intel isn't anywhere near as serious as Justice's assault on Microsoft (at least so far). What seems to bother the FTC is Intel's practice of withholding technical information about upcoming products from customers with which it has licensing or patent disputes. Sharing those secrets well in advance of a product's release, as Intel typically does, enables computer makers to design their own products accordingly. But if Intel has reason to believe a customer is misusing technical information, isn't the company within its rights to withhold it? The FTC seems to think not, that since Intel's chips are the industry standard, concealing the information is anticompetitive.

So is Intel an unrivaled monopolist? It may dominate the microprocessor market, but competition is stiff enough that Intel has announced unusually hasty price cuts on its latest chips. Advanced Micro Devices, notably, is hot on its heels in key markets. So why is the FTC bothering with this? To look busy? Get on Larry King? Or maybe they are thinking hard: Maybe that 1929 stamp is just the first in a series.

--David Kirkpatrick