I remember laughing to myself about mediots (media idiots) who castigated President Bush for not immediately flying back to Washington DC after the attack. I simply could not understand how anyone could concievably make it into US national media without knowing about the well oiled but never before used procedures which bind the President and other top federal officials during an attack.
Of course under most of the scenarios for which these procedures were created… most of the media, along with everyone else would have been too dead or occupied trying to stay alive to bitch that the President was carrying out his assigned wartime duty. Which is to stay alive and in communications… and issue those terrible orders which only the acting President may issue, using the codes available only to him.
Similarly, I find the bruhaha over the “shadow” government inane and a result of willful ignorance. There are very real fears of attacks on the continental USA by weapons of mass destruction. While on the face of it some might think losing Washington and all the federal government a positive good… I suggest you think again. I, for one, prefer civil over military government, however benign.
The Amygdala blog did a nice bit of research on the policies and procedures involved in Continuity Of Government. He referred to a web publication written by John Pike at the Federation of American Scientists (FAS). I’ll personally vet the source. I know John quite well and although we have very different politics and don’t agree on much of anything, he’s a good guy. He’s done me some seriously good turns in the past.
The purpose of Continuity of Government is to ensure that even under the direst of circumstances the United States remains under civilian control as mandated in the Constitution and does not ever fall under military governance by failure of the leadership to stay alive and in communication.
To put it bluntly, if you don’t like the dispersal of senior officials to not-so-secret locations, it is tantamount to saying you prefer the US Military keep order after we lose Washington.
And before this war is over… we just might.
