Date: Wed, 13 Jan 1999 03:46:57 -0500
To: izaac@setec.org
Subject: y2k part2

"We need to prioritize and recognize this as a major emergency."

          CONGRESSMAN STEPHEN HORN (R-CA), June 2, 1998

"The American people expect reliable service from their Government and
deserve the confidence that critical government functions dependent on
electronic systems will be performed accurately and in a timely manner.
Because of a design feature in many electronic systems, a large number of
activities in the public and private sectors could be at risk beginning in
the year 2000... Minimizing the Y2K problem will require a major
technological and managerial effort, and it is critical that the United
States Government do its part in addressing this challenge."

          PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON, Executive Order, February 4, 1998

"The bottom line is we have to inoculate the public against the perception
that all systems will work. They won't. We just hope the right ones will."

          JOHN KOSKINEN, Chairman, President Clinton's Council on the Year
2000 Conversion, May 18, 1998

"It is entirely possible that every organization in America could get its
own computers fixed ... and still have major problems. When people say to
me, is the world going to come to an end, I say I don't know. I don't know
whether this will be a bump in the road ... or whether this will in fact
trigger a major worldwide recession with absolutely devastating economic
consequences in some parts of the world." . . .

          SENATOR ROBERT BENNETT, (R-UT), Chairman, Senate Special
Committee on the Year 2000 Technology Problem, June 1998

"It is dawning on the United States Senate and other branches of our
government just how large a problem this could be." 

          SENATOR GORDON SMITH, (R-OR), July 1, 1998

"When you consider how important our electric utilities are to everything
we do in life, then you'll recognize that if we do not have our compliance
for the Y2K and as things fall apart, it's going to be devastating in our
entire society." 

          CONGRESSWOMAN CONNIE MORELLA, (R-MD), June 1998

"The Year 2000 (Y2K) computer crisis is now upon us and the federal
government is even more woefully unprepared than the rest of society. The
implications are ominous. Medicare, the IRS, the Federal Aviation
Administration and other basic agencies are operating on utterly
out-of-date technology. It doesn't take much imagination to see how
dreadfully wrong things could go." . . .

          STEVE FORBES, May 15, 1998

"The risk of the journey (to 2000) is unknown. We face economic
instability, factories shutting down...foreign banks are at risk. Civil
stability, which we don't normally think about here, is at risk..."

          JOYCE AMENTA, DIT, United Nations, June 30, 1998

"I believe that corporations are not disclosing enough information about
Y2K. Nearly all the statements on the subject are only two or three short
paragraphs, at most. The basic message is an optimistic one: 'We expect to
have the problem fixed, but our operations could be disrupted if we don't,
or if our vendors fail to fix their Y2K problem.'" 

          ED YARDENI, Chief Economist, Deutsche Bank Securities, June 10, 1998

"We're concerned about the potential disruption of power grids,
telecommunications and banking services...especially in countries already
torn by political tensions."

          SHERRY BURNS, Central Intelligence Agency, May 5, 1998

"...despite the rising din of warnings, surveys indicate that too few
managers in business and government recognize how little time is left to
complete the task."

          U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, June 8, 1998

"...the largest public companies in the US have made remarkably little
progress on Year 2000. This conclusion applies across all industries
represented in the top 250."

          STEVEN HOCK, President, Triaxsys Research, June 10, 1998

"In my own view, it is a particularly large global disaster in the
making...I am convinced the problem is vastly underappreciated."

          JERRY JASINOWSKY, President, National Association of
Manufacturers, June 30, 1998

"Electric power is the critical utility. After more than about three days
(of failure) everything just folds up. Trains, heat, refrigeration, water
supplies all go. We'd be straight back to 18th and 19th century, and it
would take 20 years to regain the lost economic capability." 

          ROSS ANDERSON, Cambridge University, June 1998

"Our entire way of life, in essence, is at risk... We don't know the [Year
2000] status of the federal government with any real precision." 

         RONA B. STILLMAN, Chief Scientist, General Accounting Office, June
1998

"Year 2000 poses the threat that common mode failures...or the coincident
loss of multiple facilities could result in stressing the electric system
to the point of a cascading outage over a large area..."

          MICHEHL GENT, President, North American Electric Reliability
Council , June 12, 1998

"...evidence suggests that some companies still are not disclosing
information concerning Year 2000 problems, while others are disclosing only
very limited information, or are providing only boilerplate statements that
carry little content. This sort of nondisclosure of material information
can ultimately have a very detrimental effect on investor confidence in the
stock market in general, and on stock prices in particular."

          LYNN A. STOUT, Professor of Law, Georgetown University, June 10,
1998

"What we do know is that every company, every government agency, and every
organization that has looked into the (Y2K) problem has found that it is
more complicated, more serious, and more costly than originally estimated." 

          WILLIAM E. KENNARD, Chairman, Federal Communications Commission,
June 1998

"Think about half of the assets of the US middle class being moved around,
and half of that taken out of the system completely over a period of six
months...It would be a disaster. I certainly hope the bankers are thinking
about it, because the ice here is not very thick."

          GARY J. BEACH, Publisher, CIO Magazine, June 1998

"What nobody, not even Koskinen, knows is how bad the crash will be. So why
doesn't he press the panic button during speeches and interviews? 'Would we
do better if I stood up tomorrow and said this is a national crisis?' he
asks in reply. Probably not. But it might get the bureaucrats' attention."

          TIME MAGAZINE, (TIME.com), June 15, 1998