Brilliant satire, John!
Gene.
---- Original message ----
>Date: Sat, 12 Jun 2010 20:52:53 -0000
>From: "Michael Payne" <[email protected]>
>Subject: [USMA:47753] Re: UK Transport Minister banishes metric in all
>official communications
>To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[email protected]>
>
> Oh I love it............! Very good!
>
> Mike Payne
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: John Frewen-Lord
> To: U.S. Metric Association
> Cc: UKMA Metric Association
> Sent: Tuesday, 08 June 2010 09:01
> Subject: [USMA:47561] Re: UK Transport Minister
> banishes metric in all official communications
> I've just sent off the following letter to
> Hammond, cc to David Cameron (prime minister),
> Nick Clegg (deputy PM) as well as my own MP (also
> anti-metric). You might notice a trace of sarcasm
> here and there...
>
>
> Philip Hammond: Secretary of State for Transport
>
> Houses of Parliament
>
> Dear Mr Hammond:
>
> I have just learned that you are proposing to ban
> all metric measurements from our road
> transporation system. What a simply brilliant
> move! We've had far too much of this
> metric nonsense. I must say, your proposal has
> already excited my friends and colleagues in
> Canada, Australia and South Africa, all of whom
> have emailed me and asked me to
> confirm that this is true. As you may know, all
> these three countries (and I believe about 189
> other countries) use the metric system on their
> road signs. How silly is that?
> But then they're all foreigners, and as you and I
> both know, foreigners are ignorant. We should
> have made Canada, Australia and South Africa and
> all the countries we once owned
> stick to their imperial road signs - let them know
> that it is us Brits who know what's best for them.
> Cheeky upstarts, the lot of them. I will admit
> that my Canadian,
> Australian and South African friends and
> colleagues wondered whether this was a good thing,
> given Britain's precarious foreign trade situation
> and all that - one even suggested
> that this could hurt our exports! What rot!
> These people need to understand that the world
> NEEDS British imperial-designed things - far
> superior to all that metric designed foreign
> rubbish.
>
> Now, having decided that our entire road system
> will, quite rightly, remain in imperial units, we
> should do the same with the vehicles on those
> roads. I mean, it doesn't make
> sense to have metric cars, buses and lorries on
> imperial roads, does it? So I believe you should
> take the next logical step, and allow only
> imperial designed and manufactured
> vehicles on British roads. THAT would stop all
> those nasty foreign vehicles cluttering up our
> roads - and rejuvenate our car manufacturing
> industry at the same time. Now I
> admit this will be a bit of a challenge - every
> car manufactured anywhere today, including in the
> USA, is designed in metric. Even our British
> manufacturers of the day agreed
> to go metric - how unpatriotic is that? So there
> might be a few problems (all the bits that go in
> these cars - things like tyres, light bulbs, minor
> things like that - are all
> currently made to metric standards). But nothing
> that, I'm sure, a goold old bit of British knowhow
> and ingenuity can't overcome. Show johnny
> foreigner a thing or two, I'll
> wager.
>
> Of course, with our imperial-only roads and the
> imperial-only vehicles on them we will have to
> educate the rest of the world in imperial units -
> if they want to sell their nasty
> German, American, Japanese, Korean, French and
> Italian tin boxes here, that is. What a golden
> opportunity for our universities! Hundreds of
> thousands of foreign engineers,
> designers, professionals of every kind, who all
> now need to know how many inches in a mile and how
> many yards in a foot. We all know British
> education is the best in the world
> - this will REALLY prove it to all those ignorant
> foreigners who don't know the difference between a
> stone and a furlong. Did you know that there are
> 5.7 billion metric-only
> foreigners in the world, many of whom now might
> need to learn imperial measurements? I bet they
> can't wait to get started!
>
> Finally, as you are firmly convinced - and the
> entire rest of the world will agree with you -
> that we British should revert to the 19th century
> imperial measuring system for our
> entire transportation infrastructure, we should
> bring back some of the 19th century traffic laws
> as well. The worst thing we did was repeal the
> red flag act in 1896 - the one,
> you may recall, that required a man with a red
> flag to walk in front of every powered motor
> vehicle. Do you know what the repeal of that law
> did to the flag industry in this
> country? It decimated (sorry, wrong word) - it
> all but destroyed it! Factories up and down the
> country making red flags had to shut down. Now,
> if we brought back that law,
> all those foreign countries that never had a red
> flag act would see how wonderful it would be
> (especially in terms of traffic deaths - we all
> know that speed kills, don't we? I
> see signs everywhere telling me so). All those
> silly metric countries will now enact their own
> red flag laws, following our superior British
> imperial lead - and will be beating
> down our doors wanting to buy our superior,
> imperial red flags. What a golden day for British
> industry that will be.
>
> Mr Hammond, your proposal to revert to
> imperial-only represents a truly brilliant piece
> of strategic thinking - the kind of thinking that
> we British are noted for. It sends a
> clear message to the rest of that horrible metric
> world out there - and will certainly make the rest
> of the world sit up and take notice! It makes you
> proud to be British!
>
> Well done, sir, and a jolly good show!
>
>
>
> (With hopefully enough sarcasm to show that I am
> not serious.)
>
> John F-L
>...
