While misogyny is a common feature of the men who do Japanese martial arts, do we need to espouse it as a virtue? (From context, I assume that Hanshi Steve's comment about E-budo people sounding like old women is intended as a calumny rather than an admission that grandma is often pretty canny.)
As for Tuttle, while it publishes many worthwhile books, it also publishes Peter Urban's "The Karate Dojo." A fun read, perhaps, but as Gogen Yamaguchi said about the book in 1974, "Peter exaggerates."
Translations mean little, either. I mean, my articles have been translated into Swedish, Spanish, and Portuguese. Doesn't mean they're any better as a result, only that somebody had way too much time on his or her hands.
So I suppose the real question is whether you should believe Hanshi Steve or Professor Friday (see the review at http://www.uoguelph.ca/~iaido/bookreviews.koryuken.htm ) Personally my money's on Professor Friday.
But let's see what others think. As a general read, translations of Musashi rate 4.5 out 5 stars at Amazon.com. The exception is Hanshi Steve's, which rates 3 stars. (Basically, people either give it 1 star or 5, there isn't much middle ground there.)
Going through the lot, the Harris translation is #1 with the readers. Indeed, it's Amazon's #873 seller of all time. (Wow.) The Nihon Services Corporation is #7,034 seller of all time. Buyers of these two books tend to go for academic and military topics. The Ochai translation is #10,699. (Personally I would have thought that Ochai was a martial arts type, but according to our Mortal Kombat expert, Hanshi Steve, he's not.) Buyers of this book tend to buy Korean MA topics. The Cleary translation is #55,228, but in fairness note that it also competes with its own abridged version, which comes in at #62,999. Thus combined sales of Shambhala's Cleary translation are quite strong. The readership is that same generally academic/military bunch.
And, as noted above, all these translations average 4-5 stars from readers.
Now we get to Hanshi Steve. As noted above, he rates 3 stars, and comes in at 98,581. Many of the favorable reviews of this book at Amazon state appreciation for his having slanted the translation toward the karate community, as that makes the text so much more intelligible to them.
Bottom line? If you can't read old-style Japanese, then read every translation available. Compare, contrast, and use exegesis, and by the time you're done, you ought to have a fairly good understanding of the topic.
(PS. If you buy from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Chapters, etc., remember to buy through the click-through links of your favorite website, as that gives them a percentage of the sale, which in turn helps keep their sites open.)
Now this is interesting -- Hanshi Steve's translation of Sun Tzu is subtitled "The Definitive Translation." Perhaps this is true, as it sells better than his Musashi translation. Be that as it may, I'd personally recommend Samuel Griffith's translation of Sun Tzu, which is the #91 seller at Amazon.com. Versions of Cleary's translations again compete with themselves, but cumulative sales are probably comparable. The overall rating is 4.5 out of 5 stars. Judging from the online reviews, soldiers rate Sun Tzu higher than businessmen, who complain that while it's a great book, it's geared toward military rather than business strategy. Well duh.