Let's See If I Can Scare The Heck Out Of You | Eastern North Carolina Now

    This is another Blog Posting from the past. It is from 2014. I usually support my offering you old postings to read by saying it is still Relevant and it is still Funny. This time I can only say it is still Relevant because it is Not Funny.     ------------------------     For centuries explorers have searched in vain for the mythical Bottomless Pit and it has been right in front of their weary noses all this time.

    The Bottomless Pit is an integral part of how our 9% Approval Rated Congress goes about governing us folks here back home.

    No finer illustration of the use and function of the Congressional Bottomless Pit exists than how Congress has addressed (actually not addressed) the dangers posed by an Electro-Magnetic Pulse (EMP) Attack.

    America's Electrical Grid is vulnerable to an EMP Attack. Did I just hear some of you say, "What the heck is an EMP Attack?" (I thought you would never ask.)

    An EMP Attack is a nuclear explosion in the high atmosphere that would destroy electrical wiring and hardware across the Good Ole USofA, excluding Alaska and Hawaii.

    Why is Alaska and Hawaii exempt? This is not fair. Congress ought to pass a law that they suffer as we suffer after we are attacked.     Here Comes the Scary Part     If an EMP Attack occurred right now...
     We would have no lights.
     We would have no refirieration.
     Most of us would be walking everywhere since many cars and gas pumps would be disabled.
     Our cell phones and iPads may turn on but could not be recharged.
     Our computers and laptops would not work.
     Cellular Networks and the Internet will likely have been destroyed.
     We would have limited water since electricity runs the pumps that deliver most of our water.
     We would have only the food and bottled water we have stored in our houses (on average about three days).
     Our ability to operate hospitals would be severely limited.
     The great majority of us would die from lack of food and water, or from diseases associated with lack of sanitation, medicine, and temperature control.
     We would suffer a general social breakdown.
     In no time at all there would be a complete absence of civil authority.
     There would be no good way to prevent our nuclear power plants from melting down, since they require electric power to cool their reactors.

    Did that do it? Are you scared? I will now give you hope, but I warn you, I will the snatch that hope away from you before this posting is done.
    ------------------------     This EMP phenomenon has been well understood since the 1960s so our Government has been busy addressing the issue...Or has it?

    There are workable proposals to harden the electrical grid against damage. The Secure High-Voltage Infrastructure for Electricity from Lethal Damage (or SHIELD) Act was introduced on June 18, 2013 (https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/house-bill/2417) by Arizona Congressman Trent Franks. The cost would be less than half a billion dollars (that's 500 million dollars) this is a drop in the bucket in an economy of over $16 trillion (that's 16 thousand billion dollars). Yet the bill remains in committee.

    I know you have been trained by me to be observant so I know you now see the Bottomless Pit...Or do u?

    The operative word used to see the problem is "committee". The real problem is our Congress equates sending something to committee with fixing the problem. I went to D.C. last week and interviewed many members of Congress about this dire situation and here is a sampling of what I got from them...
     Why are you so concerned about this impending disaster? Don't you understand it is in committee?
     Why are you asking me when it will come out of committee? Don't you know that things do not come out of committee? They just go into committee!
     Don't you dare say anything bad about our committees! Don't you know that committees are the life blood of what we are about? If it were not for committees, we would have to take positions and actually go on record by doing something about some things. We would be exposed to the wrath of the voters by allowing them to see us for what we really are.

    Did you also take note that I said above that we have been aware of this impending disaster since the 1960s but Congress has not acted until June 18, 2013? Even then it did not really "act" because it only sent the fix into committee.

    If you have a short memory and can't remember what it means to "Go To Committee", scroll back into this posting and read what I pecked out above about the Congressional Committee System.

    What's that you just said? Did you really just say you don't have time to scroll back up because you have got to go get dressed so you can go to the polling place to vote back into office your Incumbent Congressman and Senators because they are all Good Guys?

    Sometimes I wonder why I bother.

    Would I kid u?
    Smartfella

    Lagniappe: I tried to get an update to this issue and I found a Wikipedia entry that was last edited on 22 January 2018. In it I found these ominous words, "In 2013, the U.S. House of Representatives considered the "Secure High-voltage Infrastructure for Electricity from Lethal Damage Act" that would allow the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to order emergency measures to provide surge protection for some 300 large transformers around the country. The bill was introduced and referred to committee, but proceeded no further."

I underlined the "but proceeded no further".