Power Disaster

Power Disaster; Bush Failure

Power Failure Bush Disaster.

First we list a lot of links to coverage of this breaking news, followed by an op-ed by Rob Kall

Bush Lobbied Against Funding to Upgrade Power Grid in 2001. Republicans voted along partisan lines to block the funding. buzzflash.com

Blackout Hits 50 Million in U.S., Canada

Cause Unknown But Bush is SURE it's not terrorism. That's because he wouldn't admit it.

Map of affected areas

Canada Blames Lightning Bolt, but No Record of Storms

Lightning Map

Blackout Shows Vulnerability of Nation...
'It feels just like September 11 again' This is London

If blackout's 'not terrorism', what is it? Independent Online, South Africa Bush denies, but how does he even know already?

Fearing the Worst Power Outage Brought Terror Worries

• No Evidence of Terrorism in Blackout (AP reports) The FBI, the Homeland Security Department and New York City police all agreed there was no evidence of a terrorist attack or criminal act in the power outages affecting the eastern United States and Canada. "We are not aware of anything at this time that would indicate anything of a criminal nature or an act of terrorism," FBI spokesman Bill Carter said. Of course, we know that Bush has turned just about all government agencies into propaganda arms that corroborate the Bush party line, so, especially, since no-one yet can explain how the blackout occurred, it seems premature to so quickly deny a terrorist connection.

Outdated System's Crash Predicted "We're a superpower with a Third World grid," New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a former energy secretary, said yesterday. Washington Post

Outage Shuts Down Midwest It might take days to restore power to normal across the industrial heartland. Hmm. It's hitting the "red" states.

Power disaster hits North America CBC News, Canada

Areas Affected by the Northeast Blackout - Guardian

CHRONOLOGY-North American power outages

• Internet Survives Power Failure But some websites WERE down.

Maybe it's terrorism, maybe it's a problem in the power grid caused by a local Niagara Falls power generation plant.

Either way you look at it, this disaster, affecting over 20 million people, is a screaming example of the failure of the Bush administration to protect the people and resources of the US.

Assume the Bush Admin will deny any terrorist connection, since this would show total failure of the Homeland Defense Program. Of course , if it's not terrorism then it is due to massively incompetent energy system design and Planning-- also Bush's Fault.

Even if this massive power outage was totally innocent, due to a power grid problem that started at a local power plant, it is clear that the design and management of the nation's power distribution structure is seriously flawed. And this problem has to fall at the feet of the most incompetent, most poorly advised president in the history of the nation.

Even if this power outage was innocent of terrorist connections, it shows how amazingly vulnerable we are to terrorist assault. It is clear that a terrorist attack on a node like the power plant that purportedly set off the power grid collapse could have easily been accomplished.

There's been talk of building a protective web of cameras to guard our nuclear power plants. Now we know what a terrorist attack on the power grid can do to us-- shut down airports, wall street, cell phones, subways, work places, Wall Street...

Even if they turn the lights on in a few hours, we now know that almost two years after the horrible 9-11 attacks, the Bush administration has proven that it has left us frighteningly vulnerable to further attacks.

It appears that the official explanation will be a lightning bolt. You would think that lightning was a new phenomenon, that they were unable to prepare for a lightning bolt. Why not just say, as a number recent movie scripts have done, that "It was a miracle." Or why not say mice chewed on the wires and shorted them. It is astounding that such a common occurrence of nature could be the cause. The fact remains.... Either it was terrorism or massive incompetence.

If you think that the Bush administration would admit that there was any connection to terrorism, you have to be kidding yourself. They will cover this up and brush it off with vague references to power grid problems. We will never know, unless a whistle blower comes forward to reveal the truth. I fear for potential whistle blowers' lives.

And look at how the mainstream media obsequiously just passes along the reports from the government. No questions, nobody asking how such a massive screw-up could occur.

Of course, with the congress run by republicans who are dancing in lock-step to the Bush neocon-run cabal of trotskyites, it is unlikely that there will be the kind of in-depth investigation that should be done to understand what happened. Just as the Bush administration has impeded and blocked release of the 9-11 investigation, you can rest assured there will be a similar effort to prevent the truth on this management failure from surfacing.

Afterthoughts:

I am not one to omit any sleazy move the Bush/Rove administration might pull to manipulate the people and the media. Could this be a distraction from something else that gets bumped to page 12?

It's easy to say that we can't defend against lightning, except now we know it wasn't lightning. It might have been cyberterrorism. Like I've said, Bush would never admit it.

OTOH, the Washington Post says Bush has been pushing for upgrades to the grid for two years but the congress hasn't come up with the funds. So maybe it's Tom DeLay's fault. ON second thought, read this report from Buzzflash. It appears Bush did NOT push for upgrades. He blocked them, and so did the republicans, in a party line vote.

addendum: A reader writes:

Rob- Man, I HATE Bush, but your editorial on the blackouts was, to put it kindly, insanely stupid. You cannot possibly blame a system failure- in CANADA- on the US president. If this had happened under any other presidential administration, I doubt you'd be laying it at that president's feet. All you are doing is giving ammo to the people who say all we want to do is blame everything on Bush. These blackouts have occurred before and will occur again. They just happen. the failure of everything in the US to work perfectly is not a searing indictment of the bush administration. Did you blame the OKC bombing on Bill Clinton? Given all the shit Bush has tried to pull on this country, there's PLENTY of legitimate stuff to be angry at him for without getting petty and simply having the knee-jerk reaction to blame everything on him.<<

My reply:
First, I genuinely appreciate your letter. I want to know if I go too far in my balance between empassioned Op-Eds and over the top rants.


Maybe I wasn’t’ clear enough.
I can’t blame a system failure in Canada. I blame a system failure in the US that failed to deal with a predictable problem anywhere on the grid.

It’s not like lightning was just discovered.

And like I said, if lightning can do this much damage, then so could a terrorist.

Is that also insanely stupid.


I also blame Bush and Enron for the rolling blackouts that occurred in California.

Cordially, but possibly insanely stupid,

Another reader comment:

You didn't even suggest the most plausible conspiracy theory for the blackout--that it was planned and orchestrated for a certain effect. The promotional value of a blackout is if you're in bed with the energy industries and want to promote a vast new pork barrel of spending on your supporters- industry- cronies, you shock the public into thinking, gee we really need to give billions to this guy's cronies right away because it's crisis time again. We need to modernize the power system. This is just the scenario for a theory, not my alegation mind you. If we knew we'd be dead right? That might not mean the same to you as it does to them. They mean, bring on the fossil fuel and nuclear industry spending. To literate people, it would mean solar energy on rooftops all over America to decentralize power production and bring it closer to consumption, decreasing reliance on war to loot oil, alleviating the greenhouse effect, and providing good investment returns for average families who got the shaft investing in Enron but can now buy solar panels and lower their energy bills. Never happen in this Ameri\ca run out of a wasteland in Texas and various military bases.

And Another reader comment:

Rob Kall, OpEdNews.com

Rob Kall rob@opednews.com is publisher of progressive news and opinion website www.opednews.com and organizer of cutting edge meetings that bring together world leaders, such as the Winter Brain Meeting and the StoryCon Summit Meeting on the Art, Science and Application of Story. This article is copyright by Rob Kall, but permission is granted for reprint in print, email, blog, or web media so long as this credit is attached.

Other writings of Rob Kall