Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!clyde!att!rutgers!mailrus!purdue!decwrl!spar!snjsn1!bilbo!greg
From: greg@bilbo (Greg Wageman)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Re: Silly Int'l Posturing
Message-ID: <599@snjsn1.SJ.ATE.SLB.COM>
Date: 1 Dec 88 17:44:32 GMT
References: 
Sender: news@SJ.ATE.SLB.COM
Reply-To: greg%sentry@spar.slb.com (Greg Wageman)
Organization: Schlumberger ATE, San Jose, CA
Lines: 35

In article  gtww2z9z%gables.span@umigw.miami.edu (Jason Gross) writes:
>All this stuff about whether or not Canadians should be making comments
>about a system they don't pay for is totally pointless.  If you need
>justification for Canadians to comment on *our* space program, them let me
>remind you that we use a particularly long part of hardware from Canada in
>the shuttle: The CanadaArm.
>
>Besides, to exclude comments from other just becuase they dont "pay" for
>the right to do so is limiting and prevents us from hearing potentially
>useful information.

The reason some people got upset is that with all the recent press
coverage of some Canadians shouting vehemently about not wanting to be
annexed by or dependent on the United States, it seems rancorous to
have another Canadian making strong statements about what the United
States ought to be doing in space.  The gut reaction is, "If they
don't want us to mind their business, they oughtn't to mind ours."

We tend to oversimplify and view all citizens of a country other than
our own as being all of the same mind, when we know from our own
country that this is never the case.  The results of the recent
election in Canada indicate that the isolationists were not in the
majority.

Personally I find Mr. Spencer's comments to be generally constructive;
however it would be politic for him to moderate his tone at times when
a great deal of anti-U.S. invective is being hurled from north of the
border.  It would behoove American readers to bear in mind that one
man's opinions do not echo those of all of his countrymen.


Greg Wageman			ARPA:  greg%sentry@spar.slb.com
Schlumberger Technologies	UUCP: ...!decwrl!spar!sentry!greg
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