Hey guys, so a friend Tivo'd something over the weekend and showed me an interview of Ted Koppel yesterday talking about his new book.  it seems he went full on prepper buying everything for himself, his kids and his grand kids after he was "educated" by high ranking Govt officials past and present from CIA, Homeland security, etc.  

Basically what I took from his interview is this.

1. He's had his eyes opened to what most of us already knew, but he's what most of us would consider a washington inner circle liberal media man, what did he hear that's made him jump over such a high fence into "prepper land"?
2. He states that Russia and China and possibly Iran already have hack ability into our power grid to shut it down
3. Says government has absolutely no plan to fix this nor a plan to deal with SHTF (no shit)
4. Says current and former, secretaries of Homeland security, CIA, FBI, etc all tell him that we have no plan and that he needs to be able to take care of himself and it will be Katrina on steriods when (not if) but when it goes down.

So, for me this causes me concern as we all know the vulnerability here and what's gonna happen if the lights do go out, but what did Ted Koppel here that scared the shit out of him so much to leave the cushy cloud he was on and go full prepper to the extend to right a book about it?  Additionally I get nervous when people like this are talking about SHTF as it means things are slipping if ostriches like this are taking their heads out of the sand.

PS, interesting name for the book don't ya think? lol  Sounds familiar......

Anybody who looks at the situation objectively who has a modicum of intelligence can figure out that we are not in a good situation re. our power grid.

The infrastructure is vast, not hardened in any appreciable way, has been purposefully degraded due to environmental BULLSHIT and is in poor repair. Does any of that, setting serious intentional State Action aside make you sleep better at night? Now, add in the various terrorists and governments that we know have a robust Cyber Attack ability....All it takes is ONE of those to make the decision to hit us and we're in real trouble.

Is this the interview?
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/america-completely-unprepared-power-grid-cyberattack/

I assume this is his new book?
http://www.amazon.com/Lights-Out-Cyberattack-Unprepared-Surviving/dp/055341996X

Sounds to me like ole Ted needs to pay some royalties to someone we know if he chooses to use that as the name for his book.

Doc

I smell another Oprah moment....

I agree completely. And as we al know, its not just the Power Grid that Obama is targeting, its all of our institutions (Cue here his video saying he would 'fundamentally transform" this nation).
So like the Roman Empire, the rot, the primary danger, always comes from within.
But the fact is, our outside adversaries see this too. They are keenly aware of how our 'leaders' and our systems operate.
If we damage ourselves enough they may be inclined to 'flick a finger' and knock us over. Certainly if they have troubles of their own they need to distract from or they just get greedy, they may be motivated to take action.
So we are setting ourselves us up to either run ourselves into the ground or be in such a weakened state that outsiders are inclined 'help us along'.

I am no kind of expert on the electrical grid but I do see a fair number of articles from all viewpoints on the subject. Yet I do not get the sense that any significant work is being accomplished.
Some, by the Environmentalist Left are certain that the wind turbines and solar etc. can work with a 'new smart grid' funded by a new 'Manhattan Project'.
Other articles point out the 2006 (?) Bipartisan Congressional committee that made simple recommendations to strengthen the grid with existing technology for just $2 Billion - and yet nothing has been done!
The most recent article talked about advancements in battery technology (like Telsa) that could be added to the grid to provide improvements and buffers.
So apparently a lot of people are talking but I don't get the impression that anything is actually happening.
Are MIT and CALTECH and others getting R&D grants? Is the Market getting some Tax incentives to add in redundancy to the grid? Has any of the 9 Trillion dollars that Obama has borrowed in the last 8 years gone towards this issue?

And it does not have to be a sophisticated Russian or Chinese attack to hit us. 9/11 was done with 13 guys. 25 four man suicide teams could wreck havoc on our generating and transmission systems during midsummer or midwinter. Plant some truck bombs or IED's and move on to another target.  Add some individual guys hitting the big custom transformers with a few 30.06 rounds...

There will be equipment and system failures. There will be attacks. Nothing is going to prevent all of that, but we can make things better and limit damage. ANd the cost may be a fraction of what we spend on less important things.

Sorry, I don't get the reference?
Oprah's Book Club maybe?
Koppel writing a book solely for money?
Has anyone ever written a book and not been accused of only 'doing it for the money'?
Sometimes its for the money and sometimes its for 'the issue' and sometimes its both .

Koppel is a Lefty so I am skeptical of anything he puts out.
Even if he does honestly see a problem, what will his solutions be? More power to the government? Nationalizing the Power Grid?  Like (eventually) making doctors, nurses and health care professionals 'Government Employees' to solve health care problems? Like eventually Nationalizing all of our Law Enforcement?

None of the above.

It wasn't but a few years ago that "Oprah" did a show on bird flu. The "buzz" on many internet forums from a lot of metrosexual types was that their wives would now "let" them prep because Oprah said it was o.k to do. In other words, someone in "authority" on the TV gives them "permission" finally to do something.

I haven't had or watched regular TV since 1999 but I would assume Koppel doesn't have the cult following that "the Oprah" has. Probably the only viewers he has are older liberals. We have enough liberals in the survivalist movement now.

This would be about the third or fourth dozen time I can remember people getting excited thinking that preparedness was "going mainstream now." Don't believe the hype.

As to his information re: the possibility of an attack, I don't think that's news to many, is it???

Ted Koppel is still alive?

In GD somebody posted a video once that claimed if terrorists attacked a certain 8 or 9 substations in the US they could shut down power to like 90% of the country for 18 months.

https://www.ar15.com/archive/topic.html?b=1&f=5&t=1738247

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LmMxiZztxpY&feature=youtu.be


I dont know why the video wont embed.

I listened to the book on Audible this past weekend. The first half was pretty good with lots of interviews with top folks from the alphabet agencies basically saying we are completely unprepared to defend or fix the grid.  He covered EMP (very unlikely), cyber attacks, and physical attacks on the large transformers.  He also interviewed several top  CEO's of the industry and they stated that the worries are overblown.  

Having listened to his version of "both sides" it seems to me that we really are at risk of having a big region shut down for an extended period.  All of the top alphabet agency folks figured (depending on the person) between a 75% to 90% chance of an attack.  I don't remember what time frame they were talking about, but they are very worried that it will happen.

The second half of the book dragged a little for me.  In this part he spent a lot of time talking to folks in different communities - city, suburban, rural, and the Mormons about how they would ride it out.  Cities and suburbs are pretty much SOL.  New York has millions of MRE's on hand, but with 6 million people to feed, they won't last long.

All in all it was a pretty good read, but probably not a lot of new information for folks who have been following it lately.

Ted Koppel enough said,  Garbage!

So, a guy that was once against us, is now for us, and his message is garbage because he was once against us?  

All he did in this book was pass on what he learned from interviews and presentations by folks who know what they're talking about.  He doesn't claim he's the expert.  He's aggregating info from the experts.

The grid is old and needs money spent. And not to mention all the other threats. And now more load for electric cars, war on coal, etc.

Him and his wife pop up at charity/philanthropic events here in Southern MD from time to time, believe they have a place nearby.

I STILL think he's Alfred E. Neuman, never see them both together at the same time....

I think Ted has insight based on all that he's been told.  He's taken some steps to prepare for his family.  But having "stuff" alone really doesn't do much.  Does his liberal heart possess the strength required for the days ahead?  

My DGI sister and b-i-l saw this interview and asked me where I got my MREs.  I told them they would be better off with Mountain House food like this and show them the Just In Case... Classic Bucket I had in the garage.  .  They thought that 1 bucket (12 pouches) was all they need to be prepared.    
Then my b-i-l mentions that they had no way to boil water.  I suggested a small butane burner and I knew that I lost them.  Way too much work for them.

I'll read it.  The library has it and should be available in a week or two.   There are several youtube video's of Ted giving a couple minute synopsis.

Halfast needs to lawyer up and sue the scumbag for royalties.

Thing is, the notion that there is this monolithic "grid" that the .gov made but is just not keeping it up is simply false. Private firms own the electrical lines, power generating units, transformers, and the lot. Until these regulated monopolies are either eliminated or their corporate management starts caring more about the quality of the grid than the quality of the stock options, there's very little the .gov can actually do to improve "the grid".

I suppose if the usual collection of libtards sees a book written by one of their own, they may be more inclined to take the book at face value rather than one written by one of those "right-wing nutters".

Have to get rid of the "s" in https.

Ok thanks. Why does it work in GD without removing the s?

I'm pretty sure it doesn't.  However, you do not always get an https URL when doing a copy/paste from youtube, so that could be the randomness you're seeing.

Alright thank you.

For what? One book is fiction and the other is non-fiction. There is at least one other fiction book out there with the same title. I don't think he has a case for a suit.

12 days w/out power during Hurricane Wilma in 2005 changed my power outlook..

Even now with three generators (big 6k, medium 2k, small 1k) a small solar system on the camper (& batteries) and a tiny wind generator....I still feel vulnerable!

My sentiments exactly.

He had to know about the existence of the other book.

Lifting the title and claiming it as his own - without even so much as an attribution or acknowledgement - is the kind of thing that only a classless shitstain would do.

Did David lift it from the radio show or the 2001 book?  I mean a quick Google search would have turned those up...

You guys are being ridiculous.

In any case I would have expected survivalists to have open minds and realize that there is a plethora of good information out there from a variety of sources.

Once again we prove that if the survival information doesn't meet some arbitrary  arfcom approved criteria it is without value.

I'm happy he has added some 'credibility' on this issue.  Many politicians and a large portion of the public do no give much weight to thinks they have not heard on TV shows on in the mass news media.  The risk is very real and the consequences of not being prepared are more than anyone can calculate.

Avramel

Interesting to see a person with his history not prepping before this. I read the book over the last several days and found it lacking in "what you should do" it did give a lot of facts to the point that it will happen in the future. the Metcalf substation shooting was the most important item discussed. I took it for the Team, don't buy it.

It's by Koppel so it goes in the fiction stack IMHO.

nope, gotta spend the money on social security and welfare bennies

spending money on this doesnt buy votes

Does not matter.

America is living on borrowed (literally borrowed monetarily) time.

We have far, far out paced our ability to afford the burdens we have willingly placed upon our back.

Think of your family. Now imagine you borrow a million dollars but your whole household only makes $70,000 a year. And you keep opening up charge accounts to pay just the minimum payments on that main loan......time will catch up and you won't be able to afford even the minimum payments on even the minor CC payments.

Well, I will say this.  I don't happen to listen to sources that,  in my opinion, have proven themselves unbalanced and biased.  Sorry, no more.  I choose my sources and validate them....I'd no sooner listen to what Mr. Koppel has to say on the subject than I would listen to Saul Alinsky wearing a wig tell me how to prep.  These media liberals are finally figuring out that they are just as vulnerable as the rest of us when TSHTF, maybe more so.  Just like the famous TV fat girl who proclaims we must eliminate all guns, except for her personal security service, and we must do something for the homeless, like kick them off my lawn when they sit on the curb next to my house.

Nosireee, no thanks.

 
Ever see GD go into the boltface infringement meltdown...

Lol

I just started reading the book this morning and the first dozen pages lay out the likely sources of this threat and the immediate results if successful.

So far, so good.

started reading the book about 1/3 tg
through it is a factual and credible investigation as to how cyberattacks are the new batlefield and how we are looking at another pearl harbor only with all of america under attack.  

and can be done with very little in the way of equipment, just expertise and a a will.

alex

read first half, there is no plan to manage a cyberattack on the power grid that causes a medium to long term outage. no way to feed the cities or provide water to the cities,  the fist half o the book interviews a lot of govt officials  and they have no way deal with this type of calamity there is no extra large transformers that would be damaged during an attack and may take 18 months to build.

prepare accordingly.  you will need to make your own power source your fresh water, feed yourself.

alex

I caught a few minutes of Ted on the Diane Rehm show, should post here within a day or so: https://thedianerehmshow.org/.  One listener email asked if he had read One Second After, Koppel said he had, he liked it, and found it realistic.

Another email questioned if he knew anything about the topic the rest of us don't and literally accused him of "terrorizing people like ISIS does".

Hell he's even on NPR today pushing it, I wonder how many liberals just shit their pants.

He acknowledges Halfast's book in the Audiobook and said it was well written and credible/believable. Ted's book is non-fiction and designed to walk through what government is doing or not doing as the case may be. He focuses a bit much on the LDS church but does make the point that their organizational skills could be useful for government agencies trying to set up a good response to a cyberattack on the grid.

I did not realize that high voltage power lines sag and potentially snap when overloaded with electricity. That was news to me.

Interesting, was unaware of that as well.  Here is a demonstration with a miniature mock-up of power lines: