"If Nokia had gone with Android, the best that it might have achieved was to become an also-ran—another in an endless stream of me-too commodity smartphone makers." No. Nokia could've been Samsung, which has the lion's share of the Android market. And Android Lumia would be the prettiest Android handset on the market.
The Pando author also seems to have forgotten that Android saved Motorola, took HTC to new heights and enabled Amazon and B&N to make tablet lines of their own.
Both Motorola and HTC's sales and profits are depressing. Motorola was bought by Google for its patents, not because it's such a healthy company.
Amazon and B&N don't share any data regarding their Android offerings, we have no idea if they are making any profit off it. Also, they're not exactly using stock Android — they're building platforms that have nothing to do with Google, its Marketplace, or any other Google services and apps.