Right from all the childhood stories to his interview yesterday on the German TV (i didn't watch the bbc interview), i think there is one single line of thought that runs behind his actions: his absolute beief in capitalism. Read his open letter to the fellow hackers while in college explaining how sharing of code fails to reward the coder and will eventually lead to poor quality of code.
well, that concept might have been proved incorrect, but he believes that every company has the right to take all the necessary steps to crush competetion and this system leads to an efficient market. like the 'adam smith's invisible hand'
...and he works on that principle.