In response to your appeal about what should be said to the Senate about y2k, I am posting this thread. If you like the input I give here let me know and I will privately e-mail you with my proper e-mail address and we can continue to brainstorm for solutions together.

For the record, I feel that we have run out of time to expect that y2k will not have an extensive negative impact on national security, banking, manufacturing, international trade, finanical markets and the critical infrustructures of this nation. Y2k poses a great potential risk of damage to the environment and serious massive loss of life if it is not met with the utmost national resolve by our nation's leaders.

The only way we can successfully weather the upcoming storm is if we (our government)is honest with the public about the threat the world is now facing, and if we pledge that we will put all of our nation's resources at the ready to minimize any distruptions that occur in order to protect our citizen's safety, freedom and dignity. We need to mobilize all of our nation's best talent to effectively resolve disruptions as quickly as possible. We must work hard with all the other nations of the world. It will be in our mutual self- interest to work out an international contingency plan that ensures that no nation feels militarily threatened. If possible, we need to promote a plan that ensures that no nation in the world will suffer famine or massive epidemics because of y2k disruptions. We must ask that nations put aside their disagreements and work together with cool heads. We can conqueur this challenge if we all work together as a team. We need to remind the world (as well as Congress) that people functioned quite well before the advent of computers and that it is possible for our society to function smoothly even with massive computer failures. However, we must have commitment from our government not to bury the truth about what areas will be the most effected and to generate a public plan so we the people are not kept in the dark as to what options are open to us. If each community can respond in a coordinated manner, we will raise our nation's survivability to the highest level possible in the time that remains. We also must stand down from all military confrontations, now, while it is still possible. We should be saving whatever hardware is y2k compliant for our OWN protection, next year. Some suggestions for specific advise to the media concerning preparation might include some of the following: 1.Have the banks publicize that: no records of anyone's balances will be lost, contingincy plans are in place and are being rehearsted, and that they are prepared to continue operating normally but with the old manual system. 2.Have the Federal government encourage the formation of local y2k emergency community response teams with funding made available for the printing of and the community-wide distribution of preparedness materials. A fund should be made available immediately for communities to draw from for costlier preparations such as the drilling of water wells,the creation of alternative backup power sources, seed banks, preallocation and storage of fuel and critical bulk food supplies for emergency use. A waste disposal plan in the event of water and sanitation plant failures. A security plan that addresses the possibilty of civil unrest without abridging our constitutional rights . I wish you Godspeed. Our prayers are with you. Our children's future is at sake,make them understand what you know. Be responsible,stay cool and be y2k prepared should be the message delivered to the public through the media. y2k aware mike

-- y2k aware mike (y2k aware mike @ conservation.com), May 09, 1999

Answers

Mike, Much too rational. this is the GOVERNMENT we're discussing here, remember?? But, we can always hope they lapse into expedient rationallity.

Chuck

-- chuck, a Night Driver (rienzoo@en.com), May 09, 1999.

Mike; Excellent post, but I'm afraid I have to agree with Chuck. Just by the tune of your post, you sound like you are what I call, real people. Sadly, government officials from ANY country are not! I also agree that, we survived without puters for a long time. However, there are very few people, corporations, et.al that, in the blink of an eye, could do it today. It's like the old joke, I can't even boil water without burning it. That sounds funny but, there are many people out there that couldn't even lite a gas stove if the power went out. That may sound funny also, but it happened to me. Last summer, after a bad thunderstorm, the power was out. My wife ask how she was going to make supper, the stove would not lite. (electronic ignition) I told here to get a match and lite the damn thing. She said she didn't know she could do that. The sad part????? We had a stove, that you had to lite with a match before this one. It only took 6 years to forget. What about the 20 somethings on down that never knew? What about the people that have lived their entire life in a city, and didn't need to know. What about a railroad worker that has never seen a manual switch. What about a young bank clerk that can't add without their calc. What about the store clerk that couldn't count you back change manualy, if her life depended on it. I could go on forever with this.

-- FLAME AWAY (BLehman202@aol.com), May 09, 1999.

y2k aware mike,

The simple and brutal answer is they want y2k to be as chaotic as possible - I'm coming to that conclusion - the silence is deafening from DeeCee, we have little time left, and it is obvious that Al Gore, the Internet Inventor, is not going to come riding in on Hillary and rescue us.

Why, you are probably asking yourself, would they want this chaos?

The answers are out there mike, on many many recent threads on this forum alone. A clue, listen to Dr. Lorraine Day on a recent Jeff Rense archives show at www.sightings.com. Buy David Icke's latest book "The Biggest Secret"...

Later,

-- Andy (2000EOD@prodigy.net), May 09, 1999.

Another pointer for you

http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=000o6j

-- Andy (2000EOD@prodigy.net), May 09, 1999.

Andy,

While I don't necessarily buy into all the conspiracy theories floating around, I am starting to agree with you that the government, or at least those in charge, WANT chaos to result from Y2K. They have access to information that we can only speculate about. I think anyone except a die-hard Polly would agree that Y2K is going to cause substantial problems, at best. So the only rationale I can see for the silence and positive spin being put on Y2K by the government is that they KNOW it's going to be bad and they plan to use the chaos to hold onto power. Apparently their power is more important to them than the welfare of the American people. Oh well, we as a nation have gotten what we wanted.

-- Nabi Davidson (nabi7@yahoo.com), May 09, 1999.

Very good post. Andy, I wonder whether we're closing in on a time when we should encourage people to take measures simply to survive, regardless of causality. Nabi: you are absolutely right: our 'leaders' (another once useful term no inverted by lack of vigilance) care only about aggrandizing their power, the people be damned. Just look at their multi-trillion dollar foreign machinations that few of the people support or encourage. Corrupted by ambition, they sell the welfare of their countryman to please their mentors, the international money interests. And to FlameAway: hilarious anecdote, but sadly too true. Our dependence on machines, whether to replace muscle or neuron, has weakened us. We are mordant, propped up by our canes, bolstered by images of celebrity, the tattered relics of freedom dangled before our helot eyes. (Huh? Oh, and to everybody, Happy Mother's Day, assuming we all had one [Mr. Huxley, call your office]). Motherhood embodies all the virtues humanity must rediscover, if we are to survive the coming epoch. Motherhood, the embodiment of unconditional love. (Move away from the keyboard, webhead...keep your hands up...)

-- Spidey (in@jam.com), May 09, 1999.

Although I like a good conspiracy theory when I can find one, I'm not so sure that the "bump in the road" positive spin BS that the gov't is feeding us is just an attempt to obtain chaos. Rather, I think that they have absolutely no idea of what to do if things were to truly be bad. Faced with the overwhelming, to them, imposibility of attempting to keep the population alive and functioning in the event of widespread trouble, they are hoping that all will be mostly well and that the three day prep BS will suffice more or less.

I think they figure that this is their best hope. If they were to admit to the possibilities, the stock market would crash, the banking system fail and widespread panic would occur. So- in the hope of keeping things humming along as long as possible, they are doing spin control.

-- anita (hillsidefarm@drbs.com), May 09, 1999.

Soon to be spin in the grave cower.

-- Leska (allaha@earthlink.net), May 09, 1999.