I agree that we could see traditional units disappearing from some consumer
goods if FPLA is amended (bottled beverages would likely lead the way
again), but I'm not so sure about your faith in the Democrats. Members of
Congress from both parties are equally beholden to lobbyists (that would
exclude USMA, unfortunately, leaving us effectively voiceless). The same
lobbies often contribute most to whichever party happens to be in the
majority.
It's also interesting to recall that Republicans Ford and Bush #1 took
pro-metric action during their administrations, while Democrat Clinton
signed some truly damaging anti-metric legislation on highways, even though
he could easily have sent the bill back to have those provisions removed.
--------------------------------------------------
From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Sunday, May 11, 2008 1:49 PM
To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[email protected]>
Subject: [USMA:40890] More hints of US companies' readiness for metric-only
labellng
USMA list:
I may have missed this change-over when it first happened, but I just
noticed today that the Oral-B dental floss that I bought is now labeled
with meters as the primary unit and the US Customary length in
parentheses afterwards.
I know that Glide dental floss (now also sporting the Crest brand) was the
first brand of dental floss to put metric in first position, but it seems
like this trend is spreading. Once we are able to amend the Fair Packaging
and Labeling Act (FPLA) to allow metric-only labels here in the States in
place of dual-unit labels (which I think will happen once Obama gets
elected along with increased Democratic majorities in Congress), I suspect
metric-only labeling will spread like wildfire because of the way it
simplifies manufacturing and inventories for US companies.
This might also give the UKMA and other supporters more ammunition to
convince UK companies and retail stores to drop "supplementary
indications" altogether even if they are allowed to keep them (assuming
the EU directive on units of measure is amended as proposed last year to
allow them to continue to be used indefinitely).
Ezra
