Thank you for the very interesting info on the fed. contracting principles. I am sure that this is the way it works, otherwise we had seen by now some sensible improvement in the metrication efforts in this country. My comments: This sounds very much to what I saw today on the news that the US is preparing a declaration for China that in English would come short of apologizing but when translated in Chinese it would become an apology. What a bunch of nonsense! This is exactly how the old communist block was working. (Reminds me of my youth). We called it: "stealing your own hat". We make laws and directives only to show that we are dedicated to a goal and then we twist our own words to do just the reverse. This is some garbage that can go on forever spending tax money on worthless paperwork and legislation. So, in other words unless the DOD or NASA contractor can sell metric tanks respectively metric space shuttles at KMart, the DOD and NASA are not allowed to order them! I must be having a nightmare! A> PS> Mike, I have to apologize for my ironic tone. Nothing personal. It's just that... it really sounds to me that we have a veeeeery long battle ahead. ------Original Message------ From: mojo <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: April 9, 2001 4:59:00 PM GMT Subject: [USMA:12100] RE: Misguided NASA official >===== Original Message From [EMAIL PROTECTED] ===== >It seems that Dr. Edward J. Weiler, NASA's Associate Administrator for >Space Science, doesn't believe that NASA can't "tell" American businesses >to use the metric system. Dr. Weiler is responsible for providing overall >executive leadership of NASA's Space Science Enterprise, and with the >attitude voiced in the NPR report, NASA won't provide much leadership to >America's metric-based space science activities. Jim M, This is a *very* common theme, here in the DOD too. It goes hand in hand with the COTS mentality. It's not that we can't tell the contractor what we want, it's that we aren't allowed to tell the contractor to do anything that the contractor can't also sell in a commercial product. The idea is that the government saves the taxpayer money by not developing specialized, one-off products, but instead the vendor develops products for the general market and the government only has to pay extra for what it really needs. It's not as brain-dead an idea as it may sound at first, but so far as I've seen it has not been implemented well enough to have the proper effect <"my opinion and not my employer's &c.">. It does make us focus on the one or two fondest wishes, and get rid of a lot of things we really can't justify the need for. Unfortunately, it also makes it harder to get in the things you really need but that are unpopular. So, even though there's not yet a mass market for Mars exploration, it's likely that Dr. Weiler (or the reporter, I didn't read the referenced article) is saying that the government won't pay for the aerospace contractor to use units other than those it uses in other, commercial aerospace applications. This is consistent with the general attitude wrt government acquisition (at least from my end of the world). Jim F - I don't think there's any Buy American requirement (but wait a few minutes... ;), but anything that has anything to do with space almost certainly carries national security concerns, so it's unlikely NASA would look outside our borders for a prime contractor. I'm not saying I like it, folks, I'm just saying it is indeed the present climate. Mike ______________________________________________ FREE Personalized Email at Mail.com Sign up at http://www.mail.com/?sr=signup
