Back in the day when I worked for National Steel I wanted to buy a certain machine which cost about $180,000. I had to write up specifications for it and send it to the home office so that they could send out for bids. I wanted a particular brand, so I wrote the specifications very narrowly so that only one brand could meet them and I could be sure of getting the one I wanted regardless of competitive bidding. The home office sent it back and said I could not do that, and that it was actually illegal, and I had to broaden the specifications to allow competition.
It had a happy ending though, and I did get the machine I wanted.
I thought of that in the past few days when various news shows have been discussing the “Obama Doctrine” for invading to prevent humanitarian crises. No two people define it the same way, but they all agree on one thing, namely that it sure as hell is not going to be employed very often. Actually, the consensus is that it will be employed precisely once.
Seems he wrote it for Libya, same way I originally wrote that machine spec.
how much you wanna bet that it gets expanded to meet other criteria? Just like your National Steel scenario. Call me cynical, but hey..
ReplyDeleteWell, the actual Obama Doctrine is that he will do whatever the hell he wants to do and that if he is challenged on it the challenger will get a word salad that will wear him down and cause the challenge to end out of sheer frustration.
ReplyDeleteSure sounds like a lawyer, doesn't he?
ReplyDelete