2012: What about us?

In the latest episode of Jesse Ventura's Conspiracy Theory, Jesse and his team investigated claims that wealthy individuals and the government were building underground bunkers to prepare for a disaster that may occur in the year 2012.

It's no secret at all that there are people building underground bunkers in preparation for 2012.  However, the government isn't quite so forthcoming about what they are building their underground bunkers for.  It was reported that the government has been building an increasing number of underground bunkers over the last 10 years.

Hmm...the Cold War ended nearly 20 years ago.  So why would the government have embarked on a bunker building frenzy during the last 10 years?  What is it they are afraid of?

This episode wasn't your typical run-of-the-mill 2012 documentary though.  They didn't mention anything about the predictions of ancient oracles or the I Ching, and they barely even mentioned the Mayan calendar.  Jesse and his team focused on scientific data regarding expected solar storms in 2012.  It's alleged that the solar storms could be powerful enough to knock out the power grid, cutting off electricity throughout the nation.

So the conspiracy theory aspect of all this is that the government is allegedly building these bunkers in preparation for problems occurring as a result of solar storms in 2012.  I'm not surprised that politicians and elitists - the epitome of greed and selfishness - would only be concerned with saving themselves, but what about us?  What would the rest of us do if we woke up one morning and there was no electricity anywhere in the nation?

Here's some things to consider:

• Not only would your appliances not work, but you wouldn't be able to turn the TV on for news reports.  The TV station may have back up generators to power their equipment, but if you didn't have a generator of your own, that wouldn't do you any good.  Even if you did have a generator of your own, the solar storms may knock the television satellites offline too.  So even if you had a way to turn on your TV, there may be nothing transmitting.
• Landline telephones probably wouldn't be working.  Your cell phone may be battery operated, but the cell phone towers may be offline.  So you might not be able to call anyone.  
• Even if your laptop still had battery power, the internet may be offline, but even if the internet itself wasn't offline, if you didn't have electricity to power your modem, you still wouldn't be able to connect to the internet.  And even if you used an aircard sold by cell phone companies to connect to the internet, if the cell phone towers were offline, it wouldn't do you much good.  
• Radio stations may have backup generators, but it's possible the solar storms could interfere with radio transmissions too.  
• If you couldn't get your phone or the internet to work, the only people you would be able to contact immediately are your neighbors and anyone you know within driving distance.  Keep in mind that you would probably only be able to drive as far as the gas in your tank would get you because without electricity, gas pumps would be offline.  
• The nation would probably be in a state of martial law.

So what would happen after people started realizing that the power outage wasn't just limited to their street?  I imagine different people would react differently.  Many people probably wouldn't bother going to work.  For some people, there probably wouldn't be much point in going to work if they worked in a field where electricity was necessary to do their work.  Many people would probably be focused on contacting their family and friends.  A lot of people would probably sort to looting.  It would probably be a good idea to avoid looting though.  For one, looting a 65 inch TV and a $4000 computer isn't going to do you much good without electricity, and two, a looter that is bigger and faster than you might take offense if you took the 65 inch TV he was coming for.  

Of course, there is also the possibility that it wouldn't be safe to go outside at all.  The radiation from the storms may be unhealthy.  But you might not have any way of knowing that, and you might not have much of a choice either.  

So what should we do if such an event were to occur?  It's difficult to plan ahead of time since you don't know what kind of situations you may be presented with.  Ideally, I'd hope that people would focus on meeting up with their friends and family and then deciding what to do from there.  There would probably be a lot of people looting, but let the looters fight amongst themselves.  It could take months or years for power to be restored.  You might have to adapt to living without electricity for a while.  

Hopefully people would see it as an opportunity to come together and get along with each other.  Looting might happen in the beginning, but hopefully people would eventually see it as an opportunity to share and help others in need.  If faced with such a situation (and assuming the radiation itself wasn't deadly), people would have the opportunity to turn what appeared to be a bad situation into something good by spreading good will.  

But it would it only be an opportunity.   People would have to decide for themselves if they wanted to take that opportunity.