Let's start with what Koskinen and the government DON'T know as of today:

They don't know whether ...
The grid will stay up
Russia will accidentally fire nuclear weapons
Terrorists will attack our infrastructure
Embedded systems will bring down oil wells, chem plants et al
Airports will be ready
Worried citizens will make a run on banks
... and so it goes

But most likely, they DO KNOW by NOW whether
The IRS is going to make it
Medicare is going to make it
The Post Office is going to make it
Defense systems are going to make it
The banks are really ok or not
And whether similar systems of our key allies are going to make it

Or, if they don't know for sure, they are very close to knowing, say, 30 days away, based on confidential estimates made by top systems people consulting to the government. With five months to go, the real status of these projects is now evident to those working them.

We won't discover what they KNOW from candid public pronouncements, but we may be able to infer what they know from the way that Koskinen and FEMA begin to reframe the public debate around mid-August. If Clinton enters the debate, it will be a very bad sign, indicating that he has decided that the risk of Y2K collapse is now great enough that he has to intervene personally to spin upcoming actions.

-- BigDog (BigDog@duffer.com), July 25, 1999

Answers

Good thinking,Big Dog.

My view is however,that the initial definition of mission critical systems may turn out to incorrect.This,together with the subsequent downward revision of the numbers suggests a probability of failure.In addition,if not enough time is left for testing & subsequent remediation..which is already apparent,even a so called compliant system may well break when under full working load for the first time.

Whilst we are all hoping this won't happen,Sod's Law implies that it will.

That's why I' m a cynical 9

-- Chris (griffen@globalnet.co.uk), July 25, 1999.

BigDog- That is a very interesting and unique approach to the question. I'm anxious to read some thoughtful responses.

-- CD (not@here.com), July 25, 1999.

(Chris- Sorry, I just noticed your post. I definitely did not mean to imply your post was not well thought-out. It definitely was.)

-- CD (not@here.com), July 25, 1999.

I think your right about watching Clinton and the spin docs response. They realize that this has happened on their watch and they will get the blame if they don't at least issue a real warning. The problem is that they won't do anything until at least August.

I'd forget about the Russians.. They literally can't even feed their own people. Their military has been strapped just sending the KFOR guys to Yugoslavia (read articles from CNN/MSNBC). I know from working on defense systems, that they require one hell of a lot of maintenance to remain effective. Russia doesen't even have the money for test firing anymore. I'm more worried about China. Fortunately even with our W8 technologies (thanks again Bill Clinton) it will take them years to make use of it.

-- Bryce (bryce@seanet.com), July 25, 1999.

BTW, my personal views of Clinton aside, this is not an anti-Clinton thread from me. I am speaking of "signs" to watch for IF the administration is receiving reports of a probable Y2K "collapse" (leaving that undefined here) from its own key information providers.

-- BigDog (BigDog@duffer.com), July 25, 1999.

Excellent point Bigdog, here is another thought along these lines. Are they even close to finishing systems like Medicare. Post Office and the IRS. In other words is it possible at some reasonable time in the future to complete the work or institute a permanent alternative?

Ray

-- Ray (ray@totacc.com), July 25, 1999.

Does anyone know if the Inspector General is scheduled to issue any more reports on the Post Office? The last one was dismal news. My father-in-law retired from working at the post office. All the people who used to run the place "manually" are probably retired now. He said that when he started there, he had to memorize all the names of the towns in Kansas and sort the mail going to that state. Amazing.

-- jeanne (jeanne@hurry.now), July 25, 1999.

An excellent insight! Of course the top levels of government are receiving candid reports and are making their plans accordingly. At some point, these plans will be put into action. But, consider what happened prior to America's entrance to WWII: the public was overwhelmingly opposed to getting involved in the "European" war then raging. FDR made a speech in Chicago which implied that the US should participate but had to make a hasty retraction when the press soundly trashed it. It was only after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor that public opinion shifted 180 degrees and ended all so- called isolationist feelings. Many revisionist historians feel that FDR had, if not advance knowledge of the pending attack, enough intelligence warnings to infer such a move by the Japanese was likely. Yet he did nothing. Why?

This history has relevance for us today, coming up on the Y2K rollover. Clinton has survived, in large part, by two factors: he enjoys the support of a liberal media and by being able to engineer one of the greatest equity booms, if not bubble, in financial history. It was in his interest to do so. Y2K is coming, and the administration knows it. The strategy was to publically downplay its potential for disruption ("prepare for a 3 day snowstorm," TM pending) so to buy time for the major corporations, especially the financials, to remediate their code. The offset was to have an essentially unprepared public, lulled into thinking it was either being taken care of or it will be just "a bump in the road," another TM pending phase.

It is my contention, that sometime soon, it will become in Clinton's best interests to let the stock market drop. Bank runs are nearly a mathematical certainly because of the lopsided ratio of deposits to currency. The public will only accept the kind of drastic, extensive, and statist controls envisioned by FEMA, et al, IF the economy is crashing. It is necessary for the Feds to impose these controls prior to the rollover date, while the intrastructure is still functioning.

This does not mean there is some grand conspiracy; rather it is the predictable responses of ruthless, power hungry men who lurch from crisis to crisis, unguided by any moral vision. Atlas Shrugged, by Ayn Rand, has a great insight to this kind of man and the woe he will cause. Clinton doesn't "feel your pain," you are being manipulated for his purposes. How many have died overseas in order to displace the American public's attention from his troubles?

If you are not preparing, and haven't taken your money out of the financial system by now, you are toast. Don't say you didn't know, or were waiting to see what will happen. Remember December 6, 1941.

-- Sure M. Worried (SureMWorried@bout.y2k.coming), July 25, 1999.

Big Dog:

Your observations call out for anything resembling a definition of terms. What you are calling for (perhaps unintentionally?) is a line of thought that goes:

won't "make it" = "failure" = totally nonfunctional.

Let's say the IRS "won't make it." In practice, does this mean minor problems not visible to taxpayers? Does it mean delays in normal processing? Does it mean some unknown frequency of errors in handling taxes? Does it mean the IRS won't be able to do anything at all?

I'll readily agree that the IRS (and everyone else) will still have a goodly number of y2k bugs come rollover. In this sense, nobody will "make it." What's critical is, How many people will be affected, and how will they be affected?

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), July 25, 1999.

Big Dog, that was an impressive post. I'm going to post it on Free Republic. Contrary to my expectations, a lot of newbies are starting to wake up.

-- Dog Gone (layinglow@rollover.now), July 25, 1999.

I specifically stated that my assumption for this thread is that their OWN consultants define a risk of "collapse." Why/how they might do that is their business, based on their assessment of those organizations and systems.

It is a red herring to debate that in this thread (how much failure, how would anyone know, etc) and is off-topic here.

As for "how they will be fixed ultimately, etc", that is also outside the scope of this thread. For all I know, they'll be fixed in three days. Anyway, I doubt that this FIRST analysis will focus on that so much as the immediate thread. It's possible that no one will know how long it will take to get them fixed post-rollover (know at this time).

This thread is speculating about PRE-ROLLOVER indications from the government that, if you like, THEY are scared about impact. I speculate that, if so, we will see a change in approach around mid-August (at the latest, September 1). Not must, btw: this is speculation. They might enter a state of great alarm and argue about what to do internally until mid-December.

-- BigDog (BigDog@duffer.com), July 25, 1999.

Flint, BD: The question is not whether IRS, FAA, etc will "make it". By now it is pretty clear that the task was overwhelming, the deadline too near, and the start date too late. The question is, will these critical services reach an Omega Point where the ability to create workarounds is essentially impossible because of

- the rate of new errors (buggy new code, corrupted data creating errors that are compounded with time, etc)

- the unavailability of basic resources (programmers, power, telecoms, etc)

- systemic problems (domino effect, suppliers, etc)

At that point Flint, I think we have to use the term "toast".

-- a (a@a.a), July 25, 1999.

Big Dog:

OK, I agree that it will be interesting to see if there is any shift in emphasis away from remediation and toward contingency planning. You'd expect some shift in that direction in any case. The form it takes (if it happens) will be instructive.

'a':

I agree with you entirely. The question of how many will reach the Omega point (and why) is why I'm here. Probably that's why most of us are here. The sum of current indications is that point is receding, but not as far or fast as any of us would like.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), July 25, 1999.

The next few weeks will prove interesting. The GPS will be a sideshow, indicative only of whether poeple take computer deadlines seriously. I hope they do, and that there is nothing to report.

However, it is clear that not enough people took Y2K seriously in time to prevent disruptions. The Senate hearing yesterday was filled with admissions by our own government that this is the case.

So Big Dog's original point is very valid. How do the real powers in the government prepare the public from this point on? How they do it will be a real barometer as to the upcoming "three day snowstorm".

Or do I mean, "five-year shitstorm"?

-- Dog Gone (layinglow@rollover.now), July 25, 1999.

Who cares if the IRS is ready or not? As far as I am concerned they do not even need to exist so that's good news to me that they may not be ready. BTW, I have relatives that work for the IRS and they have stockpiles you wouldn't believe. They tell me that it's worse than what the government is telling us. Who cares if Medicare is ready? I don't believe anyone will be turned away from getting emergency medical help, better hope that hospitals are ready. I don't care if the banks are functioning or not nor does a lot of other people I know because they don't have a lot of money, the live pay check to pay check. The biggest concern of mine will be telecommunications and electricity. If these stay up all the other stuff can be fixed--eventually.

-- notscaredatall (notscareatall@notscared.com), July 25, 1999.

God help this country if we have to navigate a major disaster under Bill Clinton. Even assuming that the boy wonder really means well- I'm being generous- so few people trust him that no one would believe anything he had to say. It's one thing for the public to let him slide on his sex life, but his compulsive lying is well known, and when the issues are serious, life or death scenarios, the public's tolerance will be gone. So will the economic "miracle" that has propped him up all this time. Our congress is bought and paid for, it doesn't represent us anymore, and we can't trust it to protect the Constitution or our interests. Get ready for trouble. My prediction is that if y2k breaks out badly, niether Gore nor Bush will be President.

Forrest Covington

-- Forrest Covington (theforrest@mindspring.com), July 25, 1999.

Id continue to watch...

 The new programs started up or existing ones activated in the Emergency Management fields and organizations around the country, especially the Red Cross and HAZMAT response groups.

 FEMA mobilization.

 Any new Presidential Executive Orders.

 The National Guard, the Naval War College, the Marine Warfighting Lab web-sites (may continue to prove insightful).

 Any unusual DoD troop movements getting ready to protect water supplies or critical infrastructure sites.

 State legislation... much like Californias recent pre-emergency powers acts... see...

California proposed bill to give governor power to declare state of emergency prior to any actual crisis

http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id= 0015Hc

 United Nations global contingency planning and readiness activities that fall outside the norm.

 Sufficiently unexplained HAZMAT and related oil refinery and/or chemical accidents etc.

 Maritime shipping and transportation--another global trade vulnerability. (And government/military actions taken at potential choke points like the Panama and Suez canals).

 Military readiness and deployment actions in foreign countries-- like Canada, England and Germany--and around the worlds oil supply areas.

 Anything that smacks of preparation for food supply rationing at state and local levels. (Think Eugene, Oregon).

 Nuclear Power Plant and NRC actions taken in November.

 What the increased national versus local newsmedia stories are focused on. We KNOW the writers will be more active this fall. The key is HOW are they active, and WHAT the stories are about.

 Any fall flurry of corporate press releases claiming 100% compliance, without backing up those claims for public scrutiny. (Continued legal-speak). Think mission-critical suppliers. And contrast those P.R. statements with the corporate contingency plans and stockpiling actions. Watch the corporate command bunkers.

 Last minute mergers and acquisitions in the Banking, and other related industries.

 Local IT whistleblowers deciding their communities and families are more important than their jobs, especially if local repercussions could be life threatening.

 High profile CEOs, COOs, CFOs and CIOs leaving a troubled corporation.

 Cancellation of large millennium parties.

 Major airlines announcing the curtailment or grounding of international flights, or to specific domestic airport destinations.

 U.S. State Department warnings for travel restrictions in certain countries.

 Unusual actions in the health care and production/manufacturing industries. (Think pharmaceutical supplies and process control equipment).

 Watch Senator Bennett.

 Observe the actions of the the Year 2000 Information Coordination Center (ICC).

Thats all I can think of right now.

Diane

-- Diane J. Squire (sacredspaces@yahoo.com), July 25, 1999.

Big Dog - I doubt that the first inferences of a govt sea change will be those of public pronouncements. More likely will be an initially subtle ramp up of the emergency response mechanisms as outlined in the following Executive Order - http://www.pub.whitehouse.gov/uri-res/ I2R?urn:pdi://oma.eop.gov.us/1994/6/7/20.text.1

The following executive order - http://www.info-sec.com/pccip/web/ eo13010.html also pertains to national emergency, but the one from 1994 has the beef.

Given that many of the main Fed Agencies are now armed and by law can step in and become local law enforcement agents it would be a simple deed for FEMA to position local units. The question is - what would this ramp up appear like to those of us "on the street?" Each industry and sector is scheduled to be administered by different Agencies, so a blanket "this is proof" won't wash with this writer. A ramp up might be a slight increased presence of Dept Agents - agents who are normally present anyway. However this increased presence might be indicated as something special by new vehicles with perhaps slightly different painted logos, designators, etc, with a greater tendency of the agents toward law enforcement rather than their usual area of action, and the agents would probably not be from the local pool but will be from out of region, in other words agents unfamiliar with the locals and locals politics.

Personally I see no reason for the govt to change its present attitude. I see no reason for Clinton to change his mind and to begin letting the air out of the markets. Look at the heat Blair and the BOE is taking for selling gold! And Congress is NOT in the mood to OK IMF gold sales.

Aug 22 will be a key date, one way or another. And I seem to remember that the US Military will be put on alert beginning in Sept, the alert ending in March 00. Contrary to some assertions that fiscal year turn-overs were a non-event, and the JAE was a fizzle, neither of these assertions are true if you, your business or associates, or city were caught up in these different events.

I say I see no reason for the govt to change its party line because unless there is a major failure involving a considerable portion of the population our govt and news bureaus will bury the small failures in non-reporting & spin, relying upon apathy, lack of attention, and general information overload to help them to make any small failures fairly invisible.

Big Dog, your point that they must know the state of their own critial structures and that that incontrovertable knowledge will push them to change the rhetoric assumes that those in power are somehow different than the average Joe. Those in power, other than those who are specially trained either professionally or thru their own self- interest, are no different than the average Joe. They still are relying upon TV to tell them what to think, they rely upon polls to tell them what the pulse of the population is, they rely upon management to give them reports, they will experience denial in the face of an event which will most likely remove them from positions of power.

Additionally I doubt that the govt party line will change because of the very late time frame we are now in in terms of large numbers of people preparing - the system would have a difficult time ramping production. And if you pay attention to the FRB speeches and Koskinen and the few big business and banking leaders who have spoken re y2k it is very apparent that banking and markets currently rule this roost. The word has been "do nothing to disturb the delicate balance of currencies, trading, financial mechanisms, futures, and general population mis-conceptions of all the above including y2k."

The current function of govt is to provide a docile, ill educated, arrogant, debt-ridden, wage slave, consumer population for the benefit of international banking, trading, and business.

Our govt, "for the people, by the people", is a farce and our govt is selling our future living for what is now just about 5 months of continuing a monstrously unstable status quo for the power brokers and themselves.

Very short sighted policies on both the parts of govt and business.

I'll be surprised if govt says anything re y2k different than now, even of the market bubble pops prior to y2k. I do expect them to _do something however, & it is my belief that that _doing is in process.

-- Mitchell Barnes (spanda@inreach.com), July 25, 1999.

I think the continued SILENCE from Clinton/Gore is very important. If things were getting fixed, they would want to trumpet the news (as they did with the - questionable - SSA). No news is NOT good news, me thinks. There is no incentive for them to come out and give BAD news because of the risk to banking/markets. Only AFTER a serious market downturn or "liquidity crisis" does it make sense that they will speak out - and then it will be to explain the new regulations they have implimented to "restore order". Apparently the Sunday London times article about Britain pulling out 1/2 their troops from Kosovo to deal with 9/9/99 was a bogus story (so where did it come from, and was it a trial balloon?).. but I wouldn't be surprised to see something similar that would provoke some EARLY and SMALL stampede, which would allow the imposition of banking regulations.

-- Linda (lwmb@psln.com), July 25, 1999.

Mitchell -- Apart from the Clinton speculation, you'll note it was Koskinen and FEMA I focused on. We're in basic agreement, though your post is excellent and more sophisticated than mine was, thanks.

On another front, it is possible that Greenspan is starting to take some air out of the market with a view to a "landing" that is coming in any case, but hard to know whether this is either (a) a fact or (b) a first signal of the kind of change I am referring to up above.

The only real hole in my reasoning, if there is one, is that the power guys may be more clueless than we imagine. But (I would still insist), they have smart IT guys reporting confidentially who do now know the score, BASICALLY, on government status, overall. That remains the real core of my original post.

IOW, the gov can now receive reports from guys that have SEEN the projects that say, "it's too late, we're screwed," rather than, "things look bad, but there is still time remaining." One would imagine this having concrete effect not only on planning but the taking of concrete actions over the next few months --- and you can bet Clinton is in the loop. Koskinen is his boy.

-- BigDog (BigDog@duffer.com), July 25, 1999.

Diane: ---- That was a great post. Thank you very much. A great post.

-- thinkIcan (thinkIcan@make.it), July 25, 1999.

Diane said: "Id continue to watch...

" The new programs started up or existing ones activated in the Emergency Management fields and organizations around the country, especially the Red Cross and HAZMAT response groups."

My little rural county of 35,000 (countyseat of 10,000) recently called for Red Cross "disaster training" volunteers -- I signed on. I was one of two who was recruited, and the other was a kindly retired lady who is trying to boost her volunteer "hours".

No mention was made of y2k, but several references to "technological problems".

The regional Red Cross wants our county prepared for "mass care" of 2,500 individuals.

Just look at those numbers: county of 35,000, biggest town of population 10,000; care for 2,500....that's 7% of a mostly-rural county -- or 25% of the entire town -- expected to be in need of "mass care".

Ignore the fact that there are absolutely NO facilities in this area that could house/feed/provide restrooms for that number of people in a clump.....that the local Red Cross consists of a small handful of retired ladies....that there are NO other disaster coordinating groups in this county (I asked, several times. What about the churches??? Hospital? Nothing being done....)....

The local Red Cross ladies have decided, instead, to set up a series of shelters to hold a maximum of 100 individuals. To date, the preparations consist of (I am NOT exaggerating) three plastic tubs with PAPERWORK to record names and particulars of the people in the shelters. THAT'S ALL!!!

Diane, you're right. The Red Cross here is ramping up the IMAGE of preparedness.....and reports about our local compliance (hey, we just enlisted an RN to run one of our shelters!) are feeding back up the line.

But the reality is whole other story.

Anita Evangelista

-- Anita Evangelista (ale@townsqr.com), July 25, 1999.

And Big Dog, don't forget that little "off the cuff" comment Koskin'em made to me last week.

They KNOW...

-- Dennis (djolson@pressenter.com), July 25, 1999.

Big Dog, I broached the subject of your interesting post with my husband, mainly because he did work in military IT areas for many years before he retired from the service, and he also developed and managed a state wide military database with the attendant input/interaction from state and federal levels. In his time he was also involved in higher level strategic emergency planning on the state level. This was almost a decade ago, that is a caveat which should be kept in mind. However, it is also very unlikely that some basic things have changed at all in the interim, i.e. how the bureaucracy functions.

After I asked him what he thought about the quality of IT information which higher government people would get, his first response was a long pause to consider, and then he enumerated several standard background conditions which must be taken into consideration in order to understand the context of his opinion. (He went into what I call his teaching mode, where I imagine him behind a podium giving a class..*smile*)

First, IT people in the military and in state/federal GS (Government Service) agencies have pay scales and benefits which can be attractive for _entry_ and lower level positions when compared to civilian jobs in many areas of the country. However, almost without exception, any higher level pay rates for those with comprehensive skills and expertise are _far_ below what can be earned equivalently in a civilian job. The legally mandated pay scales do NOT promote either the acquisition of or retention of those with high expertise. This can be clearly understood when you consider that civilian IT salaries are highly reflective of market and new technology pressures and are often swiftly raised to acquire/retain a high level of compentence in major businesses/consulting firms. All government pay scales are dependent upon political law making functions and budget considerations. We are all aware that any government bureaucracy is _slow_ to adapt to changes.

Second, for the same budgetary and procedural considerations, the software and hardware acquired by government contracts are most often from the lowest contract bidder. Also, the people responsible for deciding on the need, extent, and specifications for contracts are generally bureaucrats whose expertise is more in knowing what forms and regulations need to be followed, rather than the subject matter of whatever contract is being considered. (The computer jury rigging he's seen -and participated in- is rather phenomenal. Just find a way to make it work somehow, with no budget for upgrades or anything else. Unfortunately, when a system does break down, it's usually a real mess, and figuring out who did what, when, why or how is like traversing a maze. )

Third, in both the military and government service agency sectors, there is a chain of command through which information passes. This is, of course, true in civilian business sectors also, but in government this chain of command is a very strict one, set in place by decades of protocol. Inherent in part of this protocol, most specially in regards to the military, is an underlying "can do" thought pattern, bred into them from boot camp. In other words, the expectation is that if a problem is voiced, it should be accompanied by (or followed shortly thereafter) with offered solutions to that problem. To a lesser extent, this is also true in government agencies, and those willing to offer potential solutions in either military or GS, are well aware that they will most likely be the ones then chosen (honored with the responsibility?) to implement those solutions and make them work! Basic common sense is enough to foresee the potential for detriment in this system.

With the background out of the way, my husband stated that he didn't want to imply that there weren't competent programmers or IT people in the military. He has personally known quite a few. (All in civilian sectors now.) However it was his opinion that there has not been and very likely isn't now, any comprehensive quality of staffing in information systems. By that he specified that while there may well be many individuals who know how to perform the specific tasks they have been trained for very well, there are few who have any understanding of how systems work, integrate together, or who have a good knowledge of how various systems might fail.

The summary is that, based on his experience, the people in power most likely ARE more clueless than you suppose. They may have a _general_ sense of what goals have been accomplished in set time frames and what haven't, but it's very doubtful they know _how_ any goals were accomplished (a form sign-off is often taken as gospel) and it's also highly doubtful they have any kind of privileged foreknowledge about system details.

What those in power ARE aware of, however, are those very background situations mentioned above. Those in the areas commissioned for such studies, can and do extrapolate scenarios taking bureaucratic functions into consideration. So while detailed or comprehensive systems knowledge is out of the picture, they are able to formulate _possibilities_. One of the comments posted above which touched on "average Joe" was close to the mark as far as one area of my husband's outlook goes. There are just as many in the public sector who have the ability to formulate "possibilities" as there are in government; probably more. And there are just as many in government levels of power who are clueless, as there are in the general populace. His experience tells him that those in power will have developed all kinds of scenarios and the contingency/implementation plans appropriate to the various scenarios, but they will have no more real knowledge of what will happen at rollover than you or I do - and perhaps less. Ironically enough, a lot of the tenor of government response to the issue will be a mirror of the tenor they get from corporate American sources. They know that's where the majority of the technological expertise is. We think they'll be extrapolating from them.

Of course, I have no way of knowing for certain if my husband's opinion on this issue is a clear sighted one or not, and I only offer it to further the discussion. I will say, in my biased position (wink), that he's been right on government/political issues far more often than he's been wrong over the last 35 years. I've lost many a bet with him, darn it!

-- Bonnie Camp (bonniec@mail.odyssey.net), July 25, 1999.

Anita, without giving your actual location away, could you tell us if you live in a warm part of the country?? Does that county have a large city nearby??

The first intuition to jump at me after reading your post is that maybe, just MAYBE, the 7000 would NOT be locals but would be refugees, or detainees, or others being relocated if your climate is warm, like some parts of the South or Southwest.

Perhaps 7% is the overall "rural carry rate" and 25% the small town carry rate?? If so, perhaps they really expect to move lots of people around!

-- K. Stevens (kstevens@It's ALL going away in January.com), July 25, 1999.

If Memory serves Anita is in Wis or an equally cold climate.

Anita, you have received Red Cross's Mass Care Course, which consists (or did a few years ago) of Which Forms To Fill Out and When! (This is the Red Cross, there are Forms, to paraphrase a Doonesbury Cartoon Panel)

what you may NOT have had, and should CAMPAIGN FOR MIGHTILY is the Shelter Manager's Workshop, where you get some more forms, a 1950'ish book (VERY GOOD AND VERY WELL WRITTEN, BTW) on nutrition, and THEN you get to do the Shelter Identification Inventories, and the other stuff you EXPECTED was part of Mass Care.

Chuck, a LONG time ARC volunteer.

-- Chuck, a night driver (rienzoo@en.com), July 25, 1999.

Anita, we must have been typing at the same time, because I didn't see your post until after I'd put my previous one in. This is going to sound much less idealistic than most want to hear, but I know exactly whereof you speak. Many years ago I got my "Certified Disaster Shelter Traning" card from the Red Cross. I even used that training in a hurricane evacuation shelter once.

Actual involvement in such processes tends to quickly wipe out expectations about the efficacy of community preparedness. Part of me feels some amount of guilt that I disengaged myself from such organizational disaster planning after a couple of years; the rest of me cannot deny the pragmatic lessons I learned by experience and which convinced me that family/personal preparedness is the only approach which has any real practicality to it. A sad situation, but true.

-- Bonnie Camp (bonniec@mail.odyssey.net), July 25, 1999.

I'm located in the Missouri Ozarks, south central MO, in "the richest county" in the region. Typical winters are "mild" compared to WIS or MI -- some snow maybe, ice maybe, temps in the teens, but we've had minus 18F, years with 2-foot snows, and last year we had ice that knocked out power to 3/4 of the county for around 5 days. No way to predict what kind of winter comes with the rollover.

As far as using our area for refugees? Hmmm. Surrounding counties have NO disaster plans/preparedness (another big topic at the Red Cross meeting), but the region's highways often become impassable in winter due to lack of snowplowing equipment, steep hills, rivers washing over them, etc.....it isn't an area that would easily accommodate, say, folks in buses from St. Louis (4-5 hour drive in good weather), or Springfield (2-3 hours in good weather). Surrounding counties, many with towns of 150, 300, 1200, might be better off just sharing homes with folks who heat with wood.

I know that if St. Lou/Cape Girardeau are hit by The Big One from the New Madrid Fault, the refugees are to be sent on to Springfield, not down here in hillbilly country.

On the plus side for this little county, we are saturated with country boys, true hillbilly-types who heat with wood right now and who live in circumstances that most cityfolk would think of as 3rd world, thousands upon thousands of (edible) cattle, as well as a genuine we're-all-in-this-together spirit. When we moved in 15 years ago, a retailer said that the Ozarks never really recovered from the Great Depression.....

Maybe that will be our local saving grace.

Still, it don't look good.

Anita E.

-- Anita Evangelista (ale@townsqr.com), July 25, 1999.

BigDog, if Clinton starts issuing televised Y2K speeches, then observe how many times he itches his nose. And if he starts wagging his finger at the camera, then that signals the BS quotient is high!

-- Randolph (dinosaur@williams-net.com), July 25, 1999.

Bonnie --- good post and very on-topic. But let me be more clear about my specific assumption (I admit it is only an assumption), which is somewhat off to the side of what has most likely taken place within the remediation orgs themselves over time.

I assume that Koskinen has long since personally "retained" several top consultants (probably from industry but maybe one military, one internal gov) whose sole job is to give him completely confidential assessments of "real" progress. If he hasn't, he is an utter nincompoop. I mean, doing this in mid-1998 is a total no-brainer.

It is these folks who have the capability of making a judgment about project status and "will they make it"? Again, if I'm Koskinen, I KNOW that "no one" knows: I'm expecting these guys to stake themselves to the ground and give me their best "gut" on what WILL happen.

As I said, with 5 months to go, the remediation result is already more-or-less "in".

This is what would get passed to Clinton.

-- BigDog (BigDog@duffer.com), July 25, 1999.

big dog,

i could be way off base here... but when koskinen got on the community awareness revival campaign in the guise of "community conversations" i was of the opinion that they were starting to 'run scared.'

what do i mean by that? i felt that the consensus of opinion at higher levels had deduced that we were not getting as far as they thought we would, as fast as they initially had hoped that we would,and realizing this and also the fact that they had encouraged 'minimal' preparation to the public sector in order to mitigate panic now put them in a very unenviable position.

it was when they started making 'noise' about the lack of preparation at the 'local' level and actively encouraging same that i felt the s*&# was starting thtf.

-- marianne (uranus@nbn.net), July 25, 1999.

Regardless of the explicit disclaimers made in its Summary, I see the Naval War College International Security Dimension Project as a workbook designed for domestic planners at the highest levels. Had this been only a pro forma, public relations project, it would not have commanded participation by individuals of the status and influence of those listed.

Given that reading, I have to assume that federal planners requested the NWC work. Given the known inertia of the federal bureaucracy, it seems reasonable to assume that elements of DoD will be assigned operational management of whatever coping schemes are adopted.

-- Tom Carey (tomcarey@mindspring.com), July 25, 1999.

Speaking of the naval war college scenario study, it seems to that it strongly suggests that there there is a "public transcript" of happy talk and a "private transcript" of efforts by industry and government behind the scenes to prepare for stormy weather.

-- robert waldrop (rmwj@soonernet.com), July 26, 1999.

Tom, I would agree with you that Barnett's effort is "hiding in plain sight" ("transparent", to use his word). He is a paradigm (if not possibly a main player) on the .mil side in the equation I mention above myself. I am intuitively certain there is at least one "Barnett" on the corporate side who is advising Koskinen as well as one inside the gov agencies.

-- BigDog (BigDog@duffer.com), July 26, 1999.