It may not be a bad idea to do a press release or something in response, but unless some newspaper decides to print the BWMA press release I wouldn't worry about it too much. I think they may be doing themselves more harm than good by publishing such a distorted and hysterical piece of junk.
A local newspaper ran an editorial about some citizens who were trying to raise money to defeat the Salt Lake City mayor. The editor thought the effort would be completely counterproductive, and he's probably right. He said: "Experienced politicians always have one eye peeled for the Law of Unintended Consequences...Backlash is a powerful political counter force, and calculating its potential is part of the business of all political operatives." It is entirely possible that people who see the press release (if anyone) will notice its inconsistencies and think less of the BWMA (I sure did). They might actually learn what the proposed rule change would do, and realize that there is progress toward metrication in the U.S. This also means that if we want to do something in response, we should pay attention to the mistakes of the BWMA. If no one is going to see either press release (the BWMA's or a response), why bother with one? If we do something, we should make sure it is a heck of a lot more factual and level-headed than theirs. And we probably wouldn't want to do something like post a response on the USMA website, for example, because that would probably just make people curious about what the BWMA is and look up their web site. (My grandparents now have about 70 descendants, all members of our church, and they might not have joined the church if my grandmother's minister had not made her curious by being so frantically antagonistic toward the missionaries. If you are against something, sometimes you just shouldn't give the other side any more publicity. Of course, I'm very glad this minister did what he did.) Carl
