President Joseph Robinette Biden is talking about hardening the infrastructure. I won’t focus on how odd it is that when Democrats are pushing an anti-gun bill there are mass shootings and now while pushing a boondoggle infrastructure bill there is a well-timed cyberattack on oil pipelines. The timing is suspicious, but one wouldn’t want to be labeled a “conspiracy theorist,” right? Especially, when the Biden administration is talking about taking action against conspiracy theorists as a “danger to our democracy.” But, I digress.
I have advocated for hardening America’s infrastructure against foreseeable attacks from nature, enemy EMP blasts, sunspots and cyberattacks for the last 35 years. Never mind that Biden was in the Senate on the Intelligence Committee and vice president for most of that time. He has finally woken up and realized there is an issue. Yay.
We need to harden our electrical grid, natural gas, water, sewerage and gasoline and oil pipelines against EMP pulse weapons and sunspots. This has been brought to Congresses attention for three decades, and they have done nothing. This is a clear and present danger, and the issues I have been told can be solved for less than $50 billion. Even if it was 10 times that it would be a good investment.
We need to harden those same systems against cyberattacks. Yes, that will involve constantly evolving cybersecurity and cooperation in vital areas, like those above, between the federal and state governments and the private sector. Just as important, perhaps more important, than software security is hardware security. The United States who invented computers, microchips and microchip manufacturing have abandoned these endeavors because microchips, motherboards and computers can be made cheaper somewhere else, in this case, that somewhere else is our long announced enemy China. Naturally, and it has been repeatedly demonstrated, Chinese built chips, motherboards and computers that have “back doors” in them, allowing the Chinese Communist Government access. We need, for national security reasons, to manufacture computers here in the United States again, and allow only 100 percent U.S. or NATO nation supplied chips, motherboards, software and computers to be used in key critical installations such as water systems, electrical grids, pipelines, sewer systems, train systems, truck transport, telecommunications, and airport/airplane systems. You can have all the software specialists in the world, but if your enemy is making the hardware, they will always have entry into your system. The Biden administration doesn’t seek to solve the hardware problem and, therefore, cannot solve the software problem.
Biden has finally noticed that we are in competition with China. Of course, Biden claims we cannot win the future of the 21st century with infrastructure from the 20th century. Well, kinda. We can’t win, certainly with crumbling 20th century infrastructure. Biden as a Senator and as Vice President did nothing to maintain these critical systems, most of which date from the 1930s to the 1950s. They were due for major overhaul around 1980 and never got it. We need to overhaul and expand all of these systems.
When Biden and other Democrats talk about the infrastructure of the 21st century, they are talking about their vision of a green, non-polluting world of solar cells, wind towers, electrically-heated homes, with electric stoves, and water heaters, and all electric cars and trucks. They quite openly discuss the end of the fossil fuel economy. This is not a viable future for a nation of soon-to-be 440 million people. Whatever our future economy will be, it will have to include fossil fuel usage. This is not just because the Green New Deal vision is totally impractical and impossible, it’s because as anyone who has ever studied biology or ecology will instantly tell you — the key to the survival of any species is DIVERSITY. It turns out diversity isn’t just a touchy feely campus idea, or a hammer to be used against majority populations as a mantra promoting their exclusion, it’s actually a solid scientific fact and a damn good strategic idea. Diversity of fuels used in transportation, heating and cooling interiors and as many areas as possible makes the nation more resistant to attack. Imagine America goes mostly solar and some Chinese, Iranian, Russian or member of a terrorist group figures out a way to destroy solar cells. (Btw there are three existing pretty easy methods that I know of, so this isn’t a stretch at all) If the whole country is running on solar power we are screwed. Of course, if the country is on solar, hydropower, coal and natural gas and generation five or six nuclear power, we have a much more diverse economy and are less vulnerable. Yes, we need infrastructure development in the fuel sectors, no Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Biden, it shouldn’t be all solar and wind, it shouldn’t be all “green” under your definitions. It should be at least as diverse as the systems we currently have.
The threats to our highly technology-dependent civilization are very real. We have enemies, some who had the Biden family on their payroll for years, announcing that they intend to destroy our civilization through the brittle points of our infrastructure. It’s good Joe has woken up and finally realized something must be done. Sadly, his only response is to do something that will bleed the Treasury, enrich his friends and make us, even after all the money is spent, more vulnerable to our enemies.
Please send this to every elected whose email you have and May G*d Bless America.