In this and other forums I have read reports and rumors that the government is attempting to guide media coverage on Y2K along the lines they find most acceptable. These reports and rumors don't seem outlandish or incredible to me in any way. The US government has a long history of appealing to the "patriotism" as well as the self-interest of the media as a way of managing what the public sees and hears.

It is no great stretch to think that Mr. Koskinen has engaged in quite a few private briefings of newspaper publishers, editorial boards, television executives and producers, and other "opinion leaders", in an attempt to guide their judgement and elicit their cooperation. If no such orchestration exists, Koskinen is not really doing his job, which is mainly to do PR for the official point of view -- the "three day storm" scenario.

My question is: will the official government line change before December 31, 1999? Will they start to "inflect" the message and (carefully) get more specific about what they expect to happen and what people should do?

Will Koskinen and the media recommendations begin to reflect the more sobering and detailed information contained in the Senate and State Department reports? If so, when?

Or will it be "3 day storm" right up to rollover?

All bets taken at current Las Vegas odds.

-- Brian McLaughlin (brianm@ims.com), November 01, 1999

Answers

I personally believe that the Gov. made a call on Y2K well over a year ago. When they started shutting down certain military web sites, and classifing as secret or needing pass codes to enter other sites in regaurds to Y2K remediation efforts. It dosent take a rocket scientist to understand the security issues, in this country, and in the world if the US military is unable to fix most of its stuff. Im sure the Gov only looks at the Main Stream Media as a very useful tool, to ultimately help them achieve there goal. If Y2K is as big and as bad as the Doomers say, and this happens also to be the opinion of TPTB in the GOV. Then telling J Q Public would never have been up on the play table to begin with. The Public is just another obstacle among many in the over-all game plan. So the media tool is then to be used to calm the masses, one less obstacle. If however and assuming that the Govs over-all stratagy is to deploy troops by the years end, they would use there Media tool to explian the prudent rational of there over-all contingence planning. If we knew 5 years ago, what we now under-stand today and that includes the Gov. maybe JQ Public would have been notified then. But with all the recent discoveries and acknowledgments about how deep and vast this problem is, there is no-way the Gov will use the Media for anything more then to tell the Public to get out of the way. The sad thing perhaps about that is that its the right thing to do...---...

-- Les (yoyo@tolate.com), November 01, 1999.

Les, I think you're right.

-- Mara (MaraWayne@aol.com), November 01, 1999.

Brian,

Two years ago, the "Big Boys" of corporate America instructed the Executive and Congressional branches of the U.S. Federal Government to butt-out on Y2K, it wasn't a "legislative" problem. Clinton (and Congress to a large extent) were all too willing to let corporate America handle fixing this problem on their own, as much as possible. This is the only logical conclusion I have as to why Clinton and Congress haven't been publically critical of the Y2K "remediation fantasy" corporate America has been feeding the government and press. (The press is legally and openly owned by corporate America so they are not a problem to control.)

HOW THE "Y2K REMEDIATION FANTASY" BECAME REALITY

The "fundamentals of thinking and reasoning" corporate and government leaders apply in decision making are different today compared to what they were just 20 years ago. It use to be, decisions were based upon physical reality. Not any more. Today, "perception makes reality".

Corporate and government leaders have embraced the "perception makes reality" fantasy, and taken the U.S. to soaring heights with the biggest peace time economic expansion in history. To find proof of the great U.S. "fantasy in reality" just look at the dollar and how it's value is determined. It isn't based upon anything tangible. It's based on a plan, on mental ingenuity to keep it strong. On being the biggest and the best so everyone else envies us and wants what we've got. But what is "what we've got" based on, in reality? Nothing, except for our ability to convince every other nation on earth that our "perception is reality".

"Perception is reality" is fine and works great when dealing with the subjective, such as the stock market, interpretation of laws, the value of the dollar, politics and the meaning of the Bible. As long as you understand that PHYSICAL OBJECTIVE REALITY still exists and are able to differentiate between it and playing the perception makes reality game, everything's fine.

But a catastrophic error in judgement has been made by TPTB in dealing with both the Y2K bug and the American people. They have applied "perception is reality" in dealing with and solving both. The American people bought it, but the Y2K bug didn't. Uh ohhhh....

I think our corporate and government leader's mental ability to distinguish between fantasy and objective reality has flown the coop. No matter how many times they say "All is well", the remediated code still isn't going to work correctly, the systems are not going to be compatible and the mission critical embedded chips that were overlooked, misidentified, botched in remediation, and taken at the vendor's word to be compliant (which some % are NOT), are ALL still going to fail, resulting in massive worldwide slow downs and shut downs, leading into TEOTWAWKI around January 25th, 2000.

No matter how much "Happy Talk" or denial that these problems don't exist, they are not going to go away. Computer code and embedded chips do NOT function by "emotion". So no matter how much "Happy Talk" you engage in, every single code and chip problem that is going to happen, IS GOING TO HAPPEN!!! And most of it IS going to happen during the last two weeks of '99 and the first two weeks of '00, for the most part.

So here we are with 45 days until the beginning of confusion, with 99% of Americans living in the corporate and government induced "perception is reality" fantasy that "All is well", placing them in DIRECT CONFLICT WITH REALITY. And we all know what happens when what people have been lead to believe will happen, doesn't, but instead something worse happens...people freak out. THIS IS WHAT OUR GOVERNMENT SHOULD BE WORRYING ABOUT NOW!!!

Damn the Y2K bug, FULL SPEED AHEAD!!!!!!!

-- GoldReal (GoldReal@aol.com), November 01, 1999.

So far, three votes that the government stays "on message" with the 3-day storm right up to the moment of truth. No ifs, ands, or buts. No added sugar or salt. No dance of the seven veils. That's their story and they're sticking to it.

OK.

Any other takes on this, or can this one be filed away under Conventional Wisdom?

-- Brian McLaughlin (brianm@ims.com), November 01, 1999.

According to Hamasaki, Kosky's girl said the story would change by mid October. So far, nothing has changed at a time when two weeks is an eternity.

This is November 1st, 1999, to state the obvious. I believe the next window will be surrounding that Movie on T.V., if only to "spin" it. If nothing changes then, this Administration will "...Drive the ship into the iceburg, saying nothing until the screaming starts, and then saying it did everything it could..." Question...do they burn in Hell?

Stay tuned...

-- K. Stevens (kstevens@ It's ALL going away in January.com), November 01, 1999.

It makes no sense for the gov't to change their story at this point. They have a majority believing them and will have a majority defending them right up until the beginning/end. In order for people to believe that Y2k will be seriously problematic, they would have to make a massive lifestyle change and most people aren't willing to or can't do that. I expect both the gov't and the people (majority of the US population) sticking with the story until bank runs begin in South America or other developing countries, triggering big swings in the markets and eventual clearing of liquidity from the US banks. By then it will be too late for Mom and Pop and Main Street to empty their accounts. Woops..how'd that happen? Hillary? ... Alan?..Larr?

-- Mark (info@gasmasks.com), November 02, 1999.