Re: [OT] Happy New Year and E911

--- John Atkinson <johnmatkinson@yahoo.com> wrote:
> > John, why do you think you need a governmental
> > regulation before there can be corruption?
> 
> If there's no rules, you can't bribe people to look
> the other way when you violate 'em.

Well, sure, but rules hardly require a government to make 'em. 
Every company has their own procurement/purchasing procedures,
whether written or not, to protect their own interests if
nothing else (e.g., not paying too much for
equipment/components/whatever while their procurement decision
maker gets rich quick).

> > I suppose you can make the arguement that if there's
> > no rule against it, the person in charge of buying 
> > your equipment can simply go with whoever pays him 
> > or her the most -- but that's not all that likely to 
> > get you the best equipment, is it?
> 
> Ah, now military procurement (and the handful of other
> governmental procurement programs, most of which don't
> come near military expenditures) 

I don't think military was ever specified, though I suppose it
may be somewhat implied by the list. <shrug>

>have a rigorous
> testing and evaluation phase which make it very
> difficult to foist bad equipment on troops.  

Not *bad* equipment.  But maybe the equipment that isn't the
best bang for the buck, so to speak... even if it has more bang,
maybe it is actually more than you want/need?

But regardless of military or not, there is going to be some
kind of rule, even if it is as simple as "lowest price that
meets spec wins", even if something that is somewhat better than
spec and slightly more expensive is actually more cost
effective.  Of course, the problem would be if something *isn't*
more cost effective and costs more... possibly in the long run,
i.e. spares or expendables.  In such imponderables are the fuzzy
math of procurement, and why rules can be a very good thing --
though, tying in with the corruption thing again, such rules are
not (obviously) always followed.

As for secret police/enthusiastic newsies, it's your background,
you can certainly run it as you'd like. ^_^  I've just had a bit
more experience recently with corruption in real world
procurement than I would like....

'Til later,
			   Aaron Teske
			   Mithramuse@njaccess.com
			   aka Mithramuse@yahoo.com

__________________________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now.
http://mailplus.yahoo.com