>>Sun is doing it best to retard the development of a Java standard
>
>Why would they do that? What are they doing, or not doing?

Evan,
Sun wants Java to be a standard only if they maintain complete control of the future of the languge. They submitted Java to one standards group only to back out when they discovered that the standards committee would make the decisions on new Java features not Sun.

The latest attempt was with the ECMA. Sun has failed to deliver documentation and specifications by the 12/1 deadline the ECMA specified.