"Continuity of Government" Is a Joke. Here's Why

What does the end of the world look like? We’ll immediately witness the collapse of central authority, and with it the concepts of government and the nation-state.

Governments exist to exist, and they all have contingency plans in case of a dire threat to its existence. They are prepared for threats ranging from an armed insurgency to nuclear war.

The United States government calls these contingency plans “Continuity of Government” (COG). There are rumors of an underground tunnel network under the Denver Airport as well as Washington DC.

The idea is that if the United States government came under direct threat, they – the White House, the Congress, the Supreme Court, the Pentagon, and the major federal bureaucracies -- could re-locate to a secret location, and continue the business of government as usual.

But just because they have plans does that mean these plans will work. In fact, if the world were to collapse, one of the first casualties will be government itself. Let me explain why.

Let us remember that government is a bureaucracy accountable only to itself. In democracies, there are elections, and every now and then the figureheads of different departments will change. But the mid-level bureaucrats – those most responsible for the day-to-day operations – have tenure, and are effectively a priesthood.

To understand how people with too much power in government think and behave, let us do a thought experiment. Let us imagine that a certain government department (let’s call it the NSA) has technological omniscience. They can track what citizens say online, where they are at all times, and whatever they buy.

With such omniscience, what will NSA operatives do? I’ll give you three options, and you pick which one makes the most sense to you:

1.) They will identify violent extremists among the population, and ensure that local enforcement is aware of these threats.

2.) They will use AI to identify patterns and trends so that the masses can be better controlled.

3.) They will stalk their ex-girlfriends.

If you picked #3, you have an intuitive grasp of how governments really operate.

Perhaps the NSA would like us to believe that they are engaged in #1 and #2. There are those on the Internet who spread fear that the national intelligence apparatus and their corporate allies (for example, Peter Thiel and Palantir) are evil geniuses hell-bent on world domination.

We know #3 to be true because of Edward Snowden’s NSA leaks https://www.wsj.com/articles/BL-WB-40005. That’s why the intelligence community wants to kill him. Snowden’s crime was not exposing intelligence assets or endangering national security. He took pre-cautions to prevent that. His crime – the worst possible crime – was exposing the laziness, incompetence, and corruption of the national security state, and that is unforgivable.

With all this in mind, let us do another thought experiment. There is a total collapse of society, and America’s most powerful politicians, generals, and bureaucrats have to re-locate to a secret underground city. What are they most likely to do while in this city?

1.) Work collectively to re-build the world. They will search for survivors, organize resources, and identify locations to re-build civilization.

2.) Develop and unleash powerful technology, such as Artificial Intelligence and trans-humanism, to re-make the world. In meshing man and machine, they will create the Singularity.

3.) Fight over sex harems.

If you guess #3, you’ve watched Stanley Kubrick’s “Dr. Strangelove,” the most honest film about government ever made. Towards the end, as nuclear doom is imminent, the President of the United States (played by Peter Sellers) and his war cabinet discuss options in their underground bunker. Can nuclear war be averted? They call in Dr. Strangelove (also played by Peter Sellers), who explains that after a nuclear holocaust everyone in the room (who are all men) will have a distinct responsibility to impregnate as many women as possible. The room becomes animated and excited, and decide that nuclear war is not that bad, after all. They’re wetting their pants when the whole world is destroyed in a nuclear holocaust.

If those in power had the humility and the foresight to understand the consequences of their actions, then we would not be in this mess in the first place. And it’s silly and ridiculous to think that those who got us into this mess are going to somehow get us out. That’s the biggest joke at the end of the world.

Who will survive the end of the world? Those communities that are most willing to make the sacrifices necessary to preserve the best of this world will survive it.

A deluge is coming. We must build the Ark.

In my next post, I’ll discuss how we can build the Ark.

Notes and References:

1. Unfortunately, this Wall Street Journal article https://www.wsj.com/articles/BL-WB-40005 detailing how NSA operatives stalk their ex-girlfriends is paywalled. But you can read this article detailing how NSA tries to catch terrorists by playing World of Warcraft: https://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2013/12/09/new-snowden-leak-reveals-the-nsa-planted-agents-inside-world-of-warcraft/

2. This is a fun interview

between Tucker Carlson and Catherine Fitts, who believes America spent trillions building underground cities for Continuance-of-Government purposes. I think it’s more plausible that all that money was spent on strippers and cocaine.

3. Kubric’s “Dr. Strangelove” is one of the greatest movies ever made. If you haven’t watched it, do it now. Here’s the clip in which America’s most powerful men plan sex harems after the nuclear holocaust: