Lia Danks, a self-taught Y2K researcher and author of Building Your Ark, warns of catastrophic risks—64% of hospitals unprepared, 90% of doctors’ offices vulnerable, and $200B in Fed cash stockpiles despite Greenspan’s reassurances. She advises storing water (1–2 gallons/person/day), heirloom seeds, and barterable goods while dismissing urban evacuation as reckless without self-sufficiency. With telecom failures estimated at 15–35% and atomic clock-dependent systems at risk, Danks urges manual backups like portable stoves and hand-pumped wells, framing Y2K prep as a trustworthy hedge against systemic collapse. [Automatically generated summary]
The wonder of flowers to be covered and then to burst up through tarmac to the sun again.
Or to fly to the sun without burning a wing, to lie in a meadow and hear the grass sing, all these things in our memories all the youth become me,
Take a big roll, take my hand up my seat it's for me to trunk with Art Bell in the Kingdom of Nile from outside the U.S. First, dial your access number to the USA.
Then, 800-893-0903.
If you're a first-time caller, call ART at 702-727-1222.
From east of the Rockies, 1-800-825-5033.
West of the Rockies, including Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, and New Mexico.
Call Art at 1-800-618-8255.
Or call ART on the wildcard line at area code 702-727-1295.
This is Coast to Coast AM from the Kingdom of Nigh.
Leah Danks is here, and she's going to give you something we've never had before, a woman's perspective on what Y2K is all about.
She's author of the book, Building Your Ark, Your Personal Survival Guide to the Year 2000 Crisis.
So as you can imagine, you're about to go for quite a ride.
That's coming up shortly.
Listen, for those of you in Chicago that just joined, we are blasting off with a brand new technology tonight.
And not only can you now hear me, but you can see me do the show with motion.
That's right, kind of like TV, but not quite yet.
This is the latest, latest, latest technology from Intel.
We had John Kirby, the Internet Video Program Manager from Intel here last hour.
And we had Mark Cubin, president and co-founder of Broadcast.com.
And tonight, right now, we are unveiling this new technology so you can actually see me do the program.
All you've got to do to get in on this is go to my website, www.artbell.com, and click on download a G2.
Now, it's absolutely free.
It won't cost you a penny.
Free, free, free.
And then once you've got that in your computer, you come back again to my website, click on, what does it say?
Probably says something like a streaming video.
Click on that, and you'll go to the page.
You click on watch or whatever it is it says there, and poof, there I'm going to be.
It is, it's astounding, and we've been working on it for a very long time.
Technically, I want to thank Broadcast.com, who's had a first flight engineer here.
In fact, I should give his name.
I really should give his name.
Patrick Seaman has been here from Broadcast.com, patiently waiting through the miles of wires that I've got in order to install all of this brand new technology.
So if you want to see it, I'm telling you, get up there and get G2.
It's free.
Free O-charge.
And then you can even watch for free.
That is, unless the government gets in our way and decides they're going to charge for the internet.
All right.
Anyway, we're off into the frightening world.
It is a frightening world, too, because it's the unknown.
It's very likely going to be a little different than a man's.
Anyway, we're about to find out.
Well, there are thousands of you out there by now, and the numbers are going up fast accessing my video feed, which carries audio with it.
And so you will be seeing me with this weird little cup with a straw in it.
Well, you see, I wear a headset, and I drink coffee while I'm on the air.
I drink coffee, and I smoke cigarettes, too, by the way.
And so don't write to me about smoking cigarettes.
I don't want to hear it.
Anyway, I have a straw in my cup because, obviously, one cannot put a cup to their mouth when they have a microphone sitting one inch away from it.
That's why I'm doing that, in case you're wondering.
Visually, it's visual.
Now, in a moment, Leah Danks, one quick announcement.
The following announcement is not a commercial announcement.
All right?
It is not a commercial announcement.
You know I'm in love with time travel.
You know I'm in love with a movie called Somewhere in Time.
And that's putting it mildly.
I'm really just simply in love with that movie.
I always have been.
If you've never seen it, you've got to see Somewhere in Time.
It's awesome.
And I've been a fan for so long and thought about it so hard that in Somewhere in Time, you may recall, it was the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island in Michigan.
God, what a hotel.
And I am hooked enough on all of that that I am going to the Somewhere in Time weekend, October 29th through the 31st.
Ramona and I are going to stay in the Grand Hotel for the reunion of those who feel as I do about that movie.
So this is no commercial announcement.
I'm just telling you.
And this is the first time I have ever been motivated by a movie.
So motivated that I would actually do something like This.
Somewhere deep inside, that movie has great meaning for me.
I don't know.
And going to Mackinac Island and going to the Grand Hotel is just, it has.
It's a compulsion.
It's a compulsion.
All right.
Here we go.
If you're ready, let me warn you.
Let me give my standard warning.
And that is, if this kind of information scares you, if you have children in the room, I would say tune out.
Leah Danks is going to talk about Y2K.
Y2K, at one extreme, is very, very scary.
At the other extreme, it may be laughable.
And we're going to discuss with Leah which extreme or where in between she thinks all of this is going to fall.
It's pretty scary stuff.
I have begun investigating as a result of Gary North on my own, independent of Gary North.
After Gary scared the hell out of me, I went out and I began investigating myself talking to my bank and my power company and my gas company and people like that.
And I scared the hell out of myself.
That's why I'm continuing to pursue this.
Leah Danks, welcome to the program.
Hi, how are you?
Well, I'm a little on edge about this whole thing.
That's how I am.
Otherwise, I have recovered some health I did not have yesterday.
Boy, I had a bad day yesterday.
Leah, how about you?
How are you?
I know you were not so well when I spoke to you yesterday.
And, you know, when you do that, you start seeing the larger picture and how down through the centuries, humanity's always gone right up to the edge and fallen over sometimes.
And so when I saw what Ed Yorden was showing in this, the possibilities, I began to be concerned.
But at that time, this was nearly three years ago, nobody else was concerned.
Well, I'm a Texas gal and we've been here 18 years and we've lived in the country basically for 18 years.
And I've learned the hard way through a lot of power outages and cold ice storms and such how to take care of myself in non-electric situations, you might say, you know, in very simple living.
It isn't hard, but there are some crucial things you need to know.
And so I realized that there was a demand for this kind of information.
And the thing that really got me going on it was about this time last year, actually, I started looking for some of the resources I knew from back in the 70s and the 80s when I was doing a lot of simple living.
And I couldn't find them.
You know, they just sort of atrophied over the years.
And as we got into the 90s, a lot of that back to the land movement just went by the wayside.
According to all that you have researched, and I understand that you're just a housewife, but you've spent hundreds of hours researching, as you already mentioned.
And so this guy went through a long, you know, fairly technical article talking about fault tolerance, and at the end he just sort of summarized it and said, basically, everything's going to have to work to about 99%.
And when we are well into this, January 1st, 2000, now I fully understand that Y2K is not a singular day event, something most people haven't quite come to grips with yet.
Last half of this year, the first half of next year will contain the bulk of the trouble.
I've read that about 8% or maybe a little more will occur actually on the day.
In my book, I list some dates to be aware of that might be helpful.
Now, you know at the end of March, the governments of Japan, Canada, and the state of New York will roll their computers over to their new fiscal year, which will include the first three months of the year 2000.
And again, everybody, we have a live video running, streaming on the internet right now, and you can see it.
Just go to my website, download the G2 player, and take a look.
What can I say?
It's free.
You've got a computer, it's free.
Now, in the first couple of days, or the first few days of this, remember, we're doing something entirely new, and we may change things, we may make adjustments, so sort of bear with us.
This is experiment, brand new technology, and we may make changes as we go along.
I guess, Leah, if you think that, or you worry as I do, that it may be on the more difficult side regarding what we think is going to happen, let's get down to what you do.
Yeah, and basically all I can say and do say in my book is you have to make that determination.
That is a huge responsibility.
Every person has to face.
No one can tell you, you know, how much you should store.
But I look at my, you know, my family and I think, how can I look at them later, knowing I could have done something as simple as just making a few provisions.
Well, that is one thing I'm suggesting, but a person needs approximately one gallon absolute minimum, two gallons preferable a day for every person in your family.
And then you have to simply decide how many days you think you might be without it.
You can try and store water, and that's a good idea.
But a good water filter, I'm not talking about the little cheap things you get at Walmart.
I'm talking about a good expedition-type survival water filter, which are getting to be in short supply now.
And one of those, you can go anywhere just about and purify just about any kind of water.
Meaning I could go to the pond in the park, or you could go down to the swimming pool.
Now, if you're getting water out of really seriously polluted sources, and rivers particularly that have chemical factories or sewerage upstream, then you have to use a purifier.
And there's a number of different purifiers.
I go into this in quite a bit of detail in my book because it's so crucial.
But you've got to know your water source and you've got to know how to treat each time.
I mean, you can still, if you're on a septic tank like we are, you can still flush, but you've got to have the water.
You can use your drains, but the incoming water supply can be contaminated so easily.
I live in a rural area, and nearly every week there's a boiled water order in some little of the local, you know, rural water systems because contaminants leak in and things like that happen.
So you cannot be assured of having clean water in times of public problems.
Gary North talks a little bit on, you know, he scares me.
He says, look, if Y2K goes on for, you know, say more than a month or two months, he said, then the system may come to a point where it can't recover.
Now, I had, you know, a guest from Intel and a guest from Broadcast.com on, and they both thought that there would be disruptions, but that there would be workarounds.
In other words, people would go out, electric companies would slowly get themselves back into biz, your sewage would begin to run again, whatever.
It depends, I think, on a number of very complex things.
Here's the scenario that I can foresee.
If this all comes to a head, let's say, I know we're going to have some, I believe, some up and down problems all year.
But if it comes to a huge head in January, that's the middle of winter.
And here's the situation.
We all take it for granted that our 911 system, our hospitals, all of these places we depend upon, the fire department, are going to be fully staffed and manned and ready to go.
But these are folks just like you and me, and they have children at home and they have families.
And if they have to leave a cold, empty house, or, you know, dark house with their children at home, and if they haven't prepared and they don't have food and water, do you think they're going to show up at work?
Yeah, we're going to have to, each person, each family needs to take themselves out of the loop to the point that they can take care of themselves for a few weeks.
Think of the relief this will be to our infrastructure as it tries to bring itself back together.
It's interesting you should mention Chicago because Chicago last year, through part of the state of Illinois and Indiana, people got stuck on the freeway.
It was bitterly, horribly cold, and there were literally tens of thousands of cars that came to a screeching halt because some accidents occurred, ice was on the road, nobody could move.
These people, thousands of them, were stuck out there, running out of gas, trying to run their cars to get the heater to go, and a good thing happened.
All right, we'll talk more about that when we come back.
Leah Danks is my guest.
I expect you would want to see her website.
Well, we've got a link to it.
Just go to my website, www.artbell.com.
Go on down the web page until you see the name Leah Danks and click on her website.
Her book is Building Your Art, Your Personal Survival Guide to the Year 2000 Crisis, and you're going to hear a lot of valuable tips tonight.
By the way, to get a copy of this program, which might keep you afloat, you can call 1-800-917-4278.
But most of all, when you go to my site tonight, get G2 and watch our video.
We'll be right back.
unidentified
You get me running in and out of my mind.
You got me thinking that I'm wishing I'd drown Don't bring me down No, no, no, no, no I'll tell you one more before I get off the floor Don't bring me down You want to stay out with your fancy friends I'm telling you it's kind of easier Don't bring me down And
love, love, love, love To talk with ourselves in the Kingdom of Nine, from East of the Rockies, file 1-800-825-5033.
West of the Rockies, including Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, and New Mexico.
1-800-618-8255.
First-time callers may reach out at area code 702-727-1222.
And you may call out on the wildcard line at area code 702-727-1295.
To rechart from outside the U.S., first dial your access number to the USA.
Then, 800-893-0903.
This is Coast to Coast AM from the Kingdom of Nye with Art Bell.
Back to Leah Danks, who has written a book which you might well get hold of called Building Your Ark, Your Personal Survival Guide to the Year 2000 Crisis.
All right.
This is actually addressed to me, Leah, but I'm going to let you tackle it, too.
It says, Art, what are you going to say to your listeners when the substitute brown stuff here doesn't hit the fan on January 1st, 2000?
You know, I'm open-minded to this situation, but suppose everything's okay.
You've got people listening to you and might spend their last time on MREs and such for nothing.
I would think your guest book better make its million by the 1st of January because if everything turns out okay, the book is just wasted pulp, Dave in Houston, Texas.
I couldn't agree with you more, and I'll tell my audience this right now.
I'm no expert in this.
I only know what I know from having talked to the people I've talked to.
I am preparing.
I suggest that you, if you are my personal friend, this is the advice I'm giving my personal friends and my family.
And so I've debated heavily with myself about what my presence on the air should be about this, Leah.
And I'm giving the advice on the air that I give to my friends and my own family.
And I don't know what else I can say if nothing happens.
You know, good.
Now, here's just one other fact, and then we'll dive back into it.
This says, this is from Charles Osman, who's been a guest on the show.
He says, hi, Art.
Thought you might be interested to know I was a featured guest speaker at the 8th Biannual Futurist Conference on Telecommunications in Los Angeles, October 14th and 15th, specifically on the subject of Y2K implications.
It was an invitation-only RSVP event.
I sat on the International Policy Review and Imperatives Board along with a number of individuals, including a senior member of the World Bank.
This event was attended by two U.S. congressmen and a number of CEOs and policymakers from the U.S. and abroad.
What was most interesting here at the event was that the entire focus over eight hours of presentations was in the arenas of risk modeling, risk containment, and liability exposure.
Many of the attendees and some of the speakers were from major insurance providers and banks.
If anything, I was mildly chastised after my presentation for too conservative in my calculations and projections on the interaction of economic and strategic implications of Y2K.
So when they get behind closed doors, Leah, the big guys seem like they're concerned.
These are things that somehow a lot of people don't want to hear.
They just simply don't want to hear it.
And they don't believe.
I've been an advocate, Leah, of it wouldn't cost our government that much money if our government would provide a round-trip ticket to some third world country of the person's choice for one week, and every citizen got to go visit a third world country and see how everybody else lives.
It would change the way people think about this country entirely.
I know that's one of our weaknesses, is that we just do not want to admit that change can come.
And this is what Gary North and I discussed briefly, being both historians at heart, is when you look back over the long time of history, every great civilization has always believed they're the latest, most modern, the most powerful, and that they will go on forever.
Yesterday, the three major networks, all three of them, at dinner time, did a story on Y2K.
And I've asked everybody I've talked to about this, Leah.
I was on this and I've been on it for a long time.
All of a sudden, after the new year, it's like somebody, boom, threw a switch, and all of a sudden, the mainstream media began to get involved all at once.
Yeah, CNN started January 1st with a feature which I have taped up here on the Y2K.
I thought it was a very well-reasoned 30-minute feature, but yeah, they started about then.
And I just, when you get on the net and you surf around and you see what's there, there are people who are very serious and very experienced, who are very responsible and they're concerned.
And then you see, you know, every other thing from the fringes on out.
But then you wonder why the media is not really approaching this more seriously, because a lot of the things are done very tongue-in-cheek.
And they're making anyone who is prudent enough to prepare a little bit.
They make them look like radical wild-eyed survivalists.
So in other words, a lot of the preparations that we might discuss tonight, Leah, would do you well no matter what happens to you in life if Y2K comes to a bunch of nothing.
I'm not asking anyone to buy a lot of exotic equipment.
Basically, the things you would put aside would be some extra water, some water purification supplies, some food, a few health supplies, and I would like to connect it about the health situation.
I have a long history in food preparation, and I've worked in the industry before, in the natural food industry, and I love to cook, so that's my specialty.
Yeah, see, Sam Walton with Walmart started this way back when, when he began to have just-in-time inventorying.
And this allowed a merchandiser or retailer not to have to stock a lot of products.
And so every couple of days, they get trucks full of products.
And they don't even have a very large back room anymore where they store things.
So in a couple of days, your grocery store is going to be empty.
And the thing is, in a couple of days, so is the grocery store's warehouse.
Because our entire food supply system now depends on just-in-time delivery, which depends on the global positioning satellites for the trucking industry, which depends on the fuel being, you know.
I got a fact the other day from a trucker who said that he and his truck sat for hours and hours and hours at a pickup point, and they could see what they were supposed to pick up.
It was sitting right there, piles and piles and piles of stuff that were supposed to be loaded on their semis.
And he said the computers were down, and until the computer said the food was there, it didn't exist, and they couldn't touch it.
And there have been some, and I think this is criminal in a sense, there have been some occasions of computers indicating that certain food was out of date when it wasn't and it was destroyed, you know, tons of food and things like this.
That isn't actually that necessary if we know it's going to be a couple of years in the future, you know, this year, next year, maybe the next, that we need to prepare for.
Then most foods will, if properly packaged in dry environments, then it'll last that long.
You don't have to necessarily get professionally packed foods, but you do have to know what you're doing.
So that's what I try to do, is educate people about how to do it yourself.
If you eat, if you try to canned foods and you do it the wrong way, but basically, most foods, as they're packed and stored, I learned in my years in the business, even when the date goes out, if it's not meat or dairy, it's not that deadly.
You know, if you've kept it cool and dry, it'll last.
But you can use a combination.
You can get some pre-packed foods and some foods locally.
I'm a big advocate of the natural wholesale warehouses because anybody can buy from them, and you can get bulk seeds and beans and grains really cheap.
Let me tell you what we're going to do, and I think this is pretty sneaky.
If you have space in the backyard, get an old abandoned refrigerator or freezer, sink it in the ground, have a hole dug, sink it in the ground, cover it over the top with a couple of bales of hay, and you've got a 50-degree cooler there.
Yeah, the ground maintains a reasonably cool temperature down there, and if you sink it down four or five feet in the ground, down in there, you've got a little miniature cellar.
And then, of course, if you should get bad or tainted food and you get sick, really sick, and services are down, then you're in really deep doo-doo because you can't call a doctor.
You can't go rushing off to the hospital.
In all likelihood, it's jammed and you might be on your own.
So we'll talk a little bit about what you might do if you do get sick.
And a lot there with special problems.
In fact, I've got a report I'm going to read here in a moment on the pharmaceutical companies.
I'm Art Bell.
Leah Danks is my guest.
We'll be right back.
unidentified
We'll be right back.
If you could read my, my love, what a tale my thought could tell.
Just like an old-time movie about a ghost from a wishing well.
In a castle dark or a fortress strong with chains upon my feet.
You know that ghost is me.
And I won't ever be set free as long as I'm a ghost you can see to talk with Art Bell in the kingdom of Nye from outside the U.S. First dial your access number to the USA, then 800-893-0903.
If you're a first-time caller, call ART at 702-727-1220.
From east of the Rockies, 800-825-5033.
West of the Rockies, including Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, and New Mexico.
Call ART at 1-800-618-8255.
Or call ART on the wildcard line at area code 702-727-1295.
This is Coast to Coast A.M. from the Kingdom of Nigh.
and a lot of people even in the in the in city do a backyard but if you live in a high-rise And I don't have any brilliant solutions to this, unfortunately.
Do you expect this is a difficult subject, but a lot of people who are in the cities, if they begin to see a protracted or serious problem, are going to want to get the hell out.
All right, and let's talk about another serious problem, and that is for everybody, and that is supposing you store food and you don't do it well and you get sick, or supposing your food is just fine and you get sick anyway.
And he was on the strongest antibiotics they have by drip intravenously for a week before that thing even began to go down.
Now, if this had been a period of crisis and there was a shortage of antibiotics and people were much sicker and much more desperately injured than he was, they'd have sat him in the corner somewhere and said, we'll get to you later.
And he would have died.
That really shook me up because I saw how crucial good health is.
Well, I'm not trying to advocate any particular healing method, but I have recently discovered colloidal silver, and it apparently does destroy over 650 pathogens, and it's harmless to the body.
And every time I take an airplane flight, you know, I go to the other side of the world somewhere on vacation, I get sick every time, every single time.
And so this one time I thought, boy, somebody sent me coiled silver, and I started a regimen of taking all different types of it, really well done.
And then I even took it with me and inhaled some of it on the airplane, and I got sicker than a dog.
Well, 90% of the doctors simply aren't aware of what the problems are going to be.
They say federal payments systems for Medicare and other health insurance programs are behind schedule for repair.
And their final statement in this segment says the health care industry is one of the worst prepared for Y2K and carries a significant potential for harm.
And, you know, in your basic health, eat really well, take lots of vitamins, build your immune system up, and sterilize everything you get your hands on.
So by the time something happens, if it does, and I'm not saying why 2K is going to happen, maybe it'll be a big nothing, but let's operate under the assumption that something will happen.
And you have food.
And you have water.
And you have all the things you need to stay alive.
But what happens when people come and knocking on your door?
There's a big unanswered question in everybody's head, and this is the biggest fear.
One of the things I am suggesting is if there's any way that you can possibly afford it, and God knows beans and rice are cheap, stock up enough for one more family, just in case.
Because if somebody comes to your door with hungry kids, what are you going to do?
At least you can give them a bag of beans and rice.
I mean, I don't know what else to say.
I'm trying to work with churches and suggest that pastors and their congregations get together not only to support themselves, but to set up soup kitchens.
I've thought about it, and, you know, in my more macho stupid moments, I say, somebody coming across my property line, I'm going to put a bullet through them if I have to.
Right.
We're really getting down to the frank bottom here.
But then another part of me says, you know, would I really want to live shooting people for food?
Well, I know, and I foresee the next few years as being a very interesting period in the sense of may you live an interesting time in the ancient Chinese curse.
But there are going to be some serious polarities within families.
There are going to be major moral decisions that people will have to make if this all comes about.
And I don't think it's going to be an easy time for anyone.
And we have to at least be as well prepared for it psychologically as anything.
I have a chapter in my book about change.
And, you know, people don't want to change.
They don't want to deal with the fact that their world may change.
But if you're a little bit prepared for it, you might get through it easier, more easily.
But I don't have any sharp answers on that one.
I wish I did.
In fact, my fears about all of this is what drove me to write the book, just to do something positive.
I have an answer for people who come to me and say, what will I do?
I have met in my local area with a lot of various business and utility and banking officials, and they're sincere people, and they're trying, but they will not and cannot give me the answers I want for many reasons.
I mean, there's legal reasons, and there's just plain practical reasons.
But basically, if you don't have a way to feed yourself next year, you know, I mean, you can take a very small spot of ground and grow an awful lot of food if you know how to do it and if you have the seeds.
Well, seeds are not supposed to be stored in an oxygen-free environment, but if you store them in a dry environment and cool, they'll last for some years.
If you want to know more, there's a link on my website to Leah's.
Take a look there.
You can also go to Amazon.com through my website by clicking on Leah's name and go get her book.
It sounds like it's good sound advice.
I'm Art Bell, and this is Coast to Coast AM.
unidentified
Well, it's all right, it's coming on.
We've got to get right back to where we start to come on.
Nothing's good, nothing is wrong.
We're starting to get right back to where we started from We're starting to get right back to where we started from From the Kingdom of Nive, this is Coast to Coast AM with Art Bell.
From east of the Rockies, call ART at 1-800-825-5033.
West of the Rockies, including Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, and New Mexico, at 1-800-618-8255.
First-time callers may reach Art at Area Code 702-727-1222.
I work in the technology field in Phoenix, and I don't know how to get a point across to ask my manager more or less on the Y2K problems, but I see it all around me.
Everything that's coming on, like in your book, The Quickening Art.
Yeah, I'm asking you more or less, like, as far as the population outbursts.
I mean, there are supermarkets up here, and you really can't tell from a global standpoint if you just go out and, you know, you don't notice it like you do.
Yeah, and obviously everybody can't vacate the cities.
And the best thing to do is find a group of people, either your church group or a social group of some kind, that you can work with and feel supported by.
I was at the epicenter of the 94 Northridge earthquake, and we had catastrophic problems here.
And what happened here is I'm in a wheelchair, and we had a lot of problems as far as mobility.
And we left the city and had to get...
Yeah, we drove out of here.
I drove by a car on fire with a person in it where water was shooting out, and it was just mayhem.
And as far as sharing our supply, we came back and forth, my wife, from Santa Barbara back to L.A. after the earthquake and shared our supplies with different people in our immediate area and brought groceries to our neighbors.
But there wasn't the anarchy and we had a lot of really wonderful people that came together and our neighborhood.
In other words, Northridge, as awful as it was, was pretty much A, confined to the Northridge area.
B, communications came back up pretty quickly and you found out that, gee we have trouble here in Northridge, but everywhere else seems to be okay, and help began to pour in.
unidentified
Help was really slow in coming, believe it or not.
Oh, I believe you.
There was a run on food that was in four or five hours, there was nothing on the shelves.
But my main point is when the Y2K rolls around, those of you that have friends and acquaintances that are disabled or wheelchair-bound will not be able to use elevators.
And that was the case here for quite some time.
And making sure that loved ones that are in an apartment situation, they're going to be stuck there.
This is something that we're going to have to come to grips with.
Either we're going to all separate into little bastions of defensive, you know, gun-wielding groups, or we're going to have to work together.
And I think we need to address this as soon as possible, because after the fact, it's a little late.
And that's one of the reasons I'm trying to promote my book and this information, not to scare people, but to let them get prepared and to help people think about things they might not have thought about.
Yeah, I cover personal safety for people who want to do the nonviolent aspect, but I did not go into weapons because I figured that people who are going to do weapons already know pretty much about them.
I saw some coverage on CNN of apparently the Red Cross was all set to get involved in this preparedness thing.
And then they found a webpage that had links to groups that were talking about guns, and the Red Cross just pulled right out, wouldn't have anything to do with it.
And, you know, it's because that's not, they say that's not what they're all about.
And people who are normally not violent, if they're faced with becoming violent to feed their children, I think you and I both know that a good majority of them would do so, and nobody in the world would blame them.
I'm a single mother living with two young daughters, and I live in the country in a single home.
And the moral question I've already thought of, of what I do, if someone came to my house and it was between my two girls and them, I think I would choose my two daughters.
Suppose you, as a single mother, are not prepared and you have to feed your children.
What would you do to feed your children?
unidentified
Right, I probably would go out looking for food for them.
But I'm preparing now.
And my question is, most people I talk with, pastors, neighbors, friends, family, they poo-poo the subject and it's difficult to speak with them about it.
And I would like to get the word out there to speak with them.
So I'm making tapes of Gary North and Leah's, I'm going to make tapes of Leah's show and Ed Jordan's and pass them out.
And the question I have is, I have a well in the backyard, and if there's not electricity, how do I get the well to work?
That brings up something I wanted to, I would like to make two comments to Robin.
One, I was speaking recently at a local group, and I asked, it was a fairly large group, and I asked them, who among you has family or friends that thinks you're crazy for preparing for the year 2000?
And every single hand in the room went up.
And so don't get discouraged by this, because I think that what you have to say is important, and I think the more that we talk about it and get the word out, if we do it in a non-aggressive and a non-radical way, it's basic common sense.
And I think it will start the dialogue going, we've got to start that kind of discussion of these hard subjects.
Do you think that the regular American media, I'm talking now about the networks, even CNN, as the year moves on, will ease people into instructions with regard to preparation, or are they going to keep their respective heads buried in the let's don't panic anybody sand right up until the last moment?
On the one hand, I tell the way I say it is, I'm telling my friends and my relatives to have some extra cash on hand.
Now, that's a fine line, Leah, because when you say it on the air to millions of people, as you pointed out, they've got about 2% reserves.
So I don't, you know, I'm scared to death of this, and I'm scared that even if Y2K doesn't happen, the financial mess that would result from even a fairly healthy portion of people going to the bank to take out money would ruin us.
Now, CNN's running surveys that say about 46%, I believe, of the American people plan to take extra money out of the bank for Y2K.
Well, I've got a sentence in my book about, and this was last year, even way back then, 37% or 38% of the financial planners interviewed were planning to remove their investment.
And somebody said that's like watching the pilot of your plane heading for the door with a parachute.
I'm not a financial expert, so don't take my word for it.
But, you know, gold usually goes opposite the stock market, and it's up to gold, it's down.
So right now it's reasonably priced.
But I think if we do have financial difficulties, to put it mildly, that of course gold will increase in value because it's always carried the value of money through hard times.
And that's a pretty technical question that a programmer would answer, but he's absolutely correct.
A lot of people who think that there is no problem with their computer have not even begun to consider an area of their computer that they don't deal with, and that's the bios.
And it's kind of technical stuff, Leah, but suffice to say that what it really means is that a lot of people who have computers, who think they're clean without a problem, are going to get a very sad surprise.
I think you should be very thankful for people like Leah Danks, Gary North, Ed Yorton, Dr. Yardini, the Senate people that have been speaking up, whether or not something happens.
If it doesn't happen, then all of us can stand the cat calls, I'm sure.
I certainly can.
If it does, then I guess I'm just thankful that we were able to reach the people that we were able to reach, because they'll reach out and help others, hopefully.
So I think people like Leah Danks and others who are speaking out on this issue are courageous and don't deserve cat calls because it might not happen.
But people will be as people will be, I suppose.
And you know something?
The people that you've got to really watch out for the most are probably the scoffers, the ones who now get angry when they hear this, or they think people are just trying to rip them in some way when they're talking about preparation.
Those are going to be the most dangerous people out there if it really happens.
Otherwise, they'll just be the I told you so types, which, as I said, No problem.
I can absorb that because I know it might not happen.
All I can tell you is that with the investigation I've done privately, not based on what Gary North said, but based on the fact that he said it, I set out and did my own little investigation, my personal investigation, as best I could.
And the answer I came up with is that something is going to happen.
That's my personal answer.
I'm not preaching to you.
I'm just telling you what I found out.
And I would invite you to do your own investigation.
It's the best thing you can do.
Go to your bank.
Ask your bank.
Kind of get somebody at the bank off on the side and ask them.
Go to your power company and ask them.
Go to your gas company and ask them.
Do your own little investigation.
Talk to people who probably know what they're talking about in these areas.
Telecommunications.
Now, there's one we haven't even covered yet.
So Leah Danks will be right back.
Stay right where you are.
By the way, we're going to tell you how to get her book in a moment.
Let me tell you about something that I probably ought not tell you.
I'm not going to give you specifics, all right?
I have talked to a power company, not necessarily mine, and most power companies, rural cooperatives and power companies, that serve local areas, are making behind-the-scenes preparations to provide what service they can disconnected from the grid.
Do you understand what I'm saying?
In other words, if the grid fails, they obviously have a local responsibility to continue to supply power.
They cannot talk about this and will not talk about this for legal reasons.
In other words, they are committed to service the grid.
But if the grid fails, you can bet just about every last dollar you have that communities are going to do what they can to get their own service back up.
And a lot of them are going to do it, but they're not going to be part of the grid.
This is what, see, I'm nervous about a lot of this for these reasons.
You can start investigating, and the more you find out, the more nervous you get.
But here's another scenario I'm wondering about, and I don't have a good answer.
If they have to take down 20% of our electric supplies in July, and most of the nuclear plants provide the large east and west coast cities, then they're going to have to get that electricity from somewhere.
Now, I'm in a little rural electric area.
We don't count if you put us up against New York City or Washington, D.C. or Los Angeles.
I can see the government having to nationalize the electric grid in order to have a fair distribution because they can't afford for us to pull out and for New York City to go dark.
They're going to have to force the electric utilities, I would think.
We've been hearing lately that Alaska is pretty much done with their stuff, and they're supposed to start their testing in June.
But anyway, a few of my comments was my husband found this YTK in November of 97, right after my sister bought me a brand new Gateway 2000 for Christmas.
Once we found that, we started to do a little more looking, and I turned around and sold my Gateway for close to the price I paid for it, and we started getting prepared back then.
And so a comment on that medical alternative.
If people, some people like we have, we've gotten a few herbal medical remedy type books, and plantain is a very good infection fighter for topical.
You know, one of the things I'm advocating, and I really hope people will do this, is to practice ahead of time making nutritious one-pot meals and getting a little stove.
There are several neat little stoves that you can get that you can prepare food on very, very inexpensively.
It's the only one I know right now of that is specifically geared to the Y2K.
And there are some really good books out there about emergency survival, but a lot of them advise that you buy a lot of equipment that you may never need and that could really deplete your finances because the Y2K, we know when it's going to happen.
And long-term preparation for possible disasters, like weather disasters and so forth, is a little bit different.
And so we have some specific parameters here that we're working with.
And so this gives you specifically a 40-page checklist in the back.
And as you read each chapter, you just check off in the checklist what you need, what you want, write down where you can get it, the catalog you may have to go to to get it in, and the whole thing.
So it's a step-by-step workbook that if you have it, that's all you have to do.
You just go through it, fill out the checklist, and do it.
Yeah, and you better learn because if you go out there, for example, where I live here in the desert and you pick the wrong thing and eat it, it'll kill you.
unidentified
Well, you might get to a point where kids will be so hungry they'll want to pick up things.
I can't foresee them nationalizing or rationing gasoline simply because the 911 services, the fire departments, and the hospitals who have generators in the communications, who have to use gasoline-powered generators, they have to have the gasoline.
And I have a suggestion for people.
Almost invariably when I speak with people, they say, oh, I'll get a bucket of wheat and a generator and I'm fine.
And my suggestion is backing down to a generator, unless they're in a condition where you are, like they have a propane generator and they have a big tank and all of that.
Just getting a generator is a half step down instead of a whole step.
They're still relying on a technology that will possibly run out of gas and oil.
And generators are notorious for going out.
And a really interesting story from Omaha last two years ago when they had a very serious winter storm, a lot of people were taken to the hospital with carbon monoxide poisoning.
when they found out what it was, people had been running their generators in the garage and it had been seeping into the house, the fumes, because if they put the generators outside, they got stolen.
Why do people continuously tell people to get great big fats of rice when you can get rice that you can cook for your whole family in a dinner, low salt in boxes that will keep for three years in 10 minutes, when you don't have a lot of space and you don't have a lot of time and a lot of gas, you've got to cook things fast.
And those are going to definitely be the answer for a lot of people if they'll stock them.
You know, there are other people like me who like to play with their food, and I enjoy putting up food and drying food and, you know, all that whole process.
So I have the time and I have the luxury of doing that.
But people who don't, yeah, mixes work.
Sure.
They're not as high nutrition as some of the more organically grown products.
If you were in one of those countries that he's thinking about right now, you had a chance to come to America, you'd be here and you wouldn't look back.
To me, the irresponsible thing is to not talk about it now.
You know, to sort of just let everybody sleep along until mid-year or three-quarters of the way through the year when the real...
There's going to be...
There are a lot of people who want to talk to you.
We'll get to the phones, right back to the phones.
But there's going to be a sort of moment that's going to come along where the public is going to suddenly become aware, despite the best efforts of the media not to make them so, that there may be a problem.
And I'm not sure when that moment is going to be exactly.
Maybe something will key it, some major failure will key it, or just as it gets closer, there'll be a magic point.
I'm not sure when that is, but that'll be a serious point when a lot of things are not going to be available because they're all bought up.
Well, yeah, if I were to guess, if it doesn't happen the 1st of April, as we mentioned earlier, the rest of the states, 46 of the 50 states, computers roll over to their fiscal years in July.
And then in August, of course, we have the global positioning satellite problem.
So I think by the end of summer, we're going to have some serious public awareness.
I'm a communications engineer, and I've got a real quick story about how things could go wrong, and then kind of a question I'd like to ask.
Okay.
You just had a frame relay T1 line put in there for your video feed that you're using right now.
Yes.
And by the way, I like the South Park t-shirt.
But all of our phone calls and all of our telephone and all of our data communications now goes over digital phone connections and fiber optic connections.
And the faster those connections get, The more reliant they are on really accurate clocks, like atomic clocks.
And the phone companies don't like to buy atomic clocks because they're real expensive.
Okay, my question is, is I live pretty close to an urban, you know, I live close to a large city.
And if things do go wrong, I want to get out of here.
But the question is, is where do you go to?
I mean, have you thought of where you would go to, where you could live off the land, but it's inhospitable enough that no one else would want to go there?
I think our only safety is in numbers in the sense that if you can band together with others of like mind, either along, you know, social, cultural, religious lines, and you can support one another and contribute your various skills to the group, people are ingenious and there's a lot of talent in the world.
And I think groups can do more for themselves and for others than isolated persons here and there.
And if we could sort of coagulate into various groups that could assist one another with tools and equipment and skills, I think it's going to be a regionalization to some extent.
I'm sure there are some kind of siphons that you can use to suck them out of the underground tanks, but I don't know how much you can get out that way or how fast.
They've taken the manual handles out on a lot of the new ones.
A lot of the new pumps are just basically computers sitting there.
And the old-fashioned pumps you used, you could open them up and put a handle in and crank the gas out.
And so there may be a lot of gas in the tanks, and they may just not be available.
And one of the things which we work with is the fact that we're fairly certain that there are going to be interruptions in service.
one question I have is I have relatives on the other coast or Midwest and trying to figure out a reliable means of communication other than the telephone systems simply because there's going to be a lot of interruptions in that and a lot of incompletion of calls.
And I pray that radio stations around the country right now are at least gearing up to be able to broadcast at some level to their local communities because they're going to be a link that will keep people from doing things they ought not do.
It was a good analysis of the problems in the communications.
unidentified
Yeah, there's the problem with the communications industry isn't so much just like a total failure, like a power outage.
I mean, there are backup systems, electrical and so forth.
The problem is that there's so many small components that will have small failures that that compounds and compounds and compounds until you get a large failure.
I don't know if you've ever been in an area like in the Midwest where you'll have power outages or you'll have weather emergencies, and you'll get a lot of times even all circuits are busy on those phone systems.
Yeah, if you multiply that times how many ever that you're going to be looking at with larger failures, you can start to see where the problem comes in.
Yeah, and we have been contacted, and I don't want to give out my organization's name, but by several of the larger institutions reference extra deliveries for this problem that you're talking about.
One of the organizations was the Federal Reserve, which is trying to establish if we can bring on additional trucks how many times a week.
They're quite concerned that they're not going to be able to meet the demand to get to the banks, and people really don't realize that those funds need to get from point A to point B and what the demand might be for organizations Like ourselves.
I know from talking to banks, if you can get a banker to level with you, which is not exactly an easy thing to do, they're scared to death about a run.
What I think everybody's trying to do is to walk a very fine line between instilling a little bit of fear in you and getting you to begin to prepare and recognize that that might be a good thing to do, but not panic you.
And that is, in fact, the most efficient way for you to operate.
Have a little bit of motivating fear.
Don't panic.
Simple start to the right things.
If you do that and you can help a neighbor, then we might all get through it if, in fact, it happens.
And I just don't know what else to say.
Leah Danks does.
She's got quite a bit of information for you, and we'll continue in that vein in a moment.
It's from Bill in San Diego, who loves the video streaming, but goes on to say, the Fed is stockpiling cash for Y2 Panic.
They are now talking about an extra $200 billion in cash in anticipation of year-end bank withdrawals by Americans concerned about the year 2000 problem.
But Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan says people should feel safe leaving their money in financial institutions.
The most sensible thing to do is leave it where it is, he told the Senate Banking Committee on Tuesday.
There's almost no conceivable way that computers will break down records of people's savings accounts would disappear.
Well, you know, it's very interesting because I have quotes from him in my book and on my webpage that are somewhat at variance with what he's saying now.
They have no choice but to make these kinds of statements and do the best job they can to see to it that a bank run doesn't occur.
That is their job.
And if they were out there scaring people, they would if look, if Greenspan were to open his mouth and say, look, your bank account records might disappear, you wouldn't have to wait for July or August or October.
And as soon as somebody says the king has no clothes, then it all starts toppling, and that's what they're trying desperately to prevent because the other scenario is too horrible to contemplate.
So if you were in that position, you'd do the same thing.
And I wanted to let you know that you're correct and that banks do are concerned about runs.
And we're not so much concerned about 1-1-2000 because we know, as do people who are informed, that our industry is probably the most prepared of any industry in the country.
However, October, November, and December are the times when we're concerned that others won't believe that.
And some of the things we're talking about are really what are you going to do with cash after January 1 if there is a problem.
You can't eat it.
It's a lousy heat source for burning.
And really, if you're really that concerned about a problem, then perhaps you should be using your cash to buy what you think you might need after 112000 before that.
And that way you'll keep the money circulating in the banking system, and we wouldn't have to worry so much about rents.
I think investing in a lifestyle is very wise at this point, in hard goods and things you can eat and use and sell or barter or help others with.
unidentified
But I don't want my comments to confuse you that I am concerned, because personally I am not concerned.
And I read a lot of things on the other side of it that say, sure, there may be some problems, but it won't interrupt the major systems within power companies and banks.
And I don't want anyone to confuse my comments with the industry's panic because there isn't that much panic within the industry after 1-1-2000.
It's such a fine line to walk because even you, sir, point out that while there might not be a lot of use for cash, there certainly is going to be use for cash in the last two or three months of the year, even if it's just to go out and buy things with.
It is our general understanding that banks can cover about 2% of cash requests.
unidentified
Yeah, but if you're going out and buying things, you're recirculating that money.
If the problem protracts and there really is a problem, cash is going to be less useful every day that goes by after the power goes off if that were to happen.
What will be of use will be things.
Things you can eat, things you can drink, things that you can trade.
Good advice.
Wildcard line, you're on the air with Leah Danks and Art Bell.
I've seen it in one of the either Layman's or Cumberland General catalog.
They're both mentioned in my book, How to Get Them.
And I believe there is a way that you can, even in a small opening well, you know, that was drilled for electric pumps, that you can lower this by hand and raise it.
It would be laborious, you know, and it would take a long time to get much water up, but yeah, you could do that.
Well, here in Peramp, to give you an example, even though they drill down to about 160 feet, they actually hit water, or the water level is much higher than that.
And so the water level in the well actually rises, I think, to, I'm no expert in this area, but 90 feet, 80 feet, something like that.
unidentified
Well, Art, there's someone that's talking about some kind of device that you can use.
I think a good well and also a large filter, we've gotten the largest filter that they make that'll do 13,000 gallons for it needs a change of filters.
And I figure that even if you don't use that yourself, you can always provide others.
And you know, it would be wonderful if people could call from that area because I heard some amazing stories about people's ingenuity, how they survived that period of two months without electricity.
But there were things that people did that were not good.
Like one man put a roll of toilet paper in a drum and he put some sort of lighter fluid or something on it and he was trying to keep himself warm with that.
And people were setting their houses on fire.
So what you say is very true.
They need to think about these things and think about a way of preparedness.
Okay, I want to take one second out, Leah, to promo a couple things before the show ends.
One is that I'm going to be doing Dreamland later today with Brad Seiger.
That'll be at 1 o'clock Pacific time.
1 o'clock Pacific time today, I'll be doing an interview with Brad Steiger, and I believe that Broadcast.com is going to carry the real video, real video, the G2 video as well.
Now, I'll have to confirm that.
But either way, the audio certainly is available.
So if you have Broadcast.com, you're going to want to be here at 1 o'clock Pacific Time for Brad Steiger.
And should you call in, you can then hear yourself on Sunday as it is broadcast nationwide.
So glad to have you.
Join us if you wish, 1 o'clock Pacific Time today for Dreamland.
And then one other thing that I need to promote is what we're going to do tomorrow night.
This just came up at the last minute.
We're going to have Kenny Young here.
Now, you may recall in the wonderful communion show on NBC.
Confirmation, excuse me.
You may recall one of the most dramatic stories was Trumbull County and the police in Trumbull County.
Remember that?
Well, guess what?
The audio tapes from Trumbull County actually ran about an hour and 10 minutes, an hour and 15 minutes, somewhere in there.
We have, I say we, my guest will have, the complete Trumbull County tapes, and we are going to broadcast them tomorrow night.
You're not going to want to miss that.
All right, back to the phone lines, and west of the Rockies, you're on the air with Leah Danks and Art Bell.
Hello.
unidentified
Hello, Art and Leah.
It's good to talk to you.
A couple of quick things.
I've been in contact with a couple of people I know that work for some large telecommunications companies.
And one of the things that they're worried about, and these are people that plan for contingencies and whatnot, they're worried about the government coming in and possibly confiscating their generators once they've all been upgraded and taken care of and compliant and whatnot.
And that's a pretty major thing that they're concerned about.
And then the other thing I wanted to mention, which is interesting, the state of Alaska, by the way, I'm Keith in Anchorage.
I do have a friend fairly well placed in high circles who emailed me last fall that the president had already signed six or seven documents that would allow them to nationalize anything they wanted to.
So that's already in place.
Now, whether they will or not and why they will, I don't know.
Gary North, and to be fair, not just Gary, but a lot of other people, say that it doesn't hope that it's all going to get fixed because the code is broken, period.
There is not time to fix it no matter how hard we work.
This is an event that is going to take place, like it or not.
There's no stopping it.
I don't know that I'm that sure, but I suspect he's right.
Well, I just think it's up to anybody that has any intimation of a problem to get the word out and not to worry about what people think about them because if I'm wrong, I'm more than willing to be wrong.
I'm not attached to that at all, like you said.
But I certainly don't want to look back and say I could or should have done something.
I've got some courses in electronics, and I've set up a system to where I've taken a standard automotive alternator and it has a built-in regulator, hooked it up to the battery, and mounted it to a belt and one of these small bicycles that you ride at home to charge the battery back up.
And if something does happen, at least we can ride the bicycle, charge the battery up, and power a few things around the house.
And another, you know, you mentioned another valuable resource, and that is the UPS that you use for a computer backup or whatever.
If we experience rolling brownouts, then you would have an opportunity during the time when you had power to charge a UPS, which would give you some limited, not current stuff, but, you know, certainly something that would keep a light going for a while, that kind of thing.
There's a lot of very clever people out there, and I think if we can get, you know, via the internet, especially people to exchanging and talking about these things, a lot of people can come up with some good ideas.
I don't really want to sound too negative, but I think if you're prepared to live all the time in the fashion that could sustain you that far out, then you'd probably be able to get to the year 2000 that way.
But if you just leave the city and go out into the countryside at the last minute, you know, you're going to be in trouble.