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President Obama Orders Government To Plan For 'Space Weather' (nbcnews.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Network World: President Barack Obama today issued an Executive Order that defines what the nation's response should be to a catastrophic space weather event that takes out large portions of the electrical power grid, resulting in cascading failures that would affect key services such as water supply, healthcare, and transportation. The Executive Order ideally will coordinate the responses across government agencies such as NASA, the Departments of Homeland Security, Energy and others to help minimize economic loss and save lives by enhancing national security, identifying successful mitigation technologies, and ordering the creation of nationwide response and recovery plans and procedures, the White House stated. Further, the Executive Order will enhance the scientific and technical capabilities of the United States, including improved prediction of space-weather events and their effects on infrastructure systems and services. By this action, the Federal Government will lead by example and help motivate State and local governments, and other nations, to create communities that are more resilient to the hazards of space weather. The Executive Order reinforces the formal National Space Weather Strategy and accompanying Action Plan which were announced last year. It also bolsters other work such as the replacement of aging satellites that monitor and help forecast space weather, proposing space-weather standards for both the national and international air space, development of regulations to ensure the continued operation of the electric grid during an extreme space weather event, proposing a new option for replacing crucial Extra High Voltage (EHV) transformers damaged by space weather, and developing domestic production sources for EHV transformers, the White House wrote.
I guess he heard how many people were going to vote for Giant Meteor 2016....
Then you don't seem to understand what an "Executive Order" is. The constitution gives the President of the United States (POTUS for short) the right to act as the head of the executive branch. This means that the POTUS is allowed to determine how best to implement laws that are passed if they ambiguous when it comes to specific implementation details (Almost EVERY law out there).
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) has already ruled that executive orders are just the means by which the executive branch outlines the rules and procedures by which they want the executive branch to implement the laws as they were written.
If you don't like the fact that Executive Actions have a lot of potential differences in them, then you should argue that Congress should pass less ambiguous laws. (I agree with this too). But making blanket statements like this does nothing for the betterment of society other than you thinking you know better than the founding fathers/constitution/scotus... and that in and of itself might be the biggest problem facing our nation... People who don't actually understand how government works saying that what it does is bad/wrong.... but not being able to say 'how'. (At least make a coherent argument as to why the "Imperial Presidency" idea of the Nixon Whitehouse (Chaney, Rumsfeld, Wolfawitz (sp?), et. al. ) is harming our nation by giving the Executive Branch too much bilateral power.... Which -is- the point of what you said... but being stupid about it doesn't help things)
Yes.
http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/
http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/produ...
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled"
Given the increasing "it was the russians" rhetoric for everything, and the escalation in sword rattling (eg. military drills), this seems to me more like a preparation for the result of a nuclear exchange than obama actually caring about space weather (or space anything).
http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news/uk_news/Defence/article1618135.ece
http://uk.businessinsider.com/photos-russias-military-exercise-crimea-2016-9
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/08/22/east-asia-war-games-a-tour-of-the-hotspots-as-temperatures-rise-between-china-and-the-u-s/
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/clinton-us-should-use-military-response-fight-cyberattacks-russia-china-1579187
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-37605992
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/08/russian-stages-major-military-drills/
http://metro.co.uk/2016/10/11/gorbachev-warns-of-nuclear-war-risk-as-russia-america-tension-rises-6185847/
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-crisis-russia-idUSKCN0WL0EV
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/nato-risks-nuclear-war-with-russia-within-a-year-senior-general-warns-a7035141.html
You may have noticed, there are a lot of stories like the above. And aside from the hypocrisy of the US/West accusing the Russians/Chinese for hacking their infrastructure/banks/elections/whatever, whether true or not, the war drums are increasing in intensity.
So, we're meant to think Obama's concerned about space weather? Oh please.
No it does not require legislation, and it is not circumventing the constitution. Some aspects of this order may require appealing to Congress for funding. But to order the various branches of the Executive branch to plan for and prepare for such an event is fully within his purview. The agencies in turn will look at what needs to be done to make needed changes and will then prepare budget requests to fund such actions. Said requests then go to congress for consideration and will either be funded or not.
President Obama has overstepped his authority many times but this is not one of them.
I guess you didn't know that it's already happened.
Should have been done years ago. Better late than never.
Greed is the root of all evil.
It's far more likely to be preparation against a false-flag "Russian" EMP attack on the USA. ... you know ... if the White House were actually concerned about bad weather and disruption, there might be a little more planning for hurricanes.
Just saying
So back in the early-mid 1990s when the Internet was a new thing to most people/organizations and US Government agencies started using their discretionary funds to build websites to provide information to Citizens, that was impermissible because there was no law authorizing it? Interesting. In fact, I'd be surprised if even today there is a specific law authorizing Executive Branch agencies to "build websites" or "use the Internet".
sPh
A lot of sick, sick burns from the ACs today. Try reading up on the Carrington Event and consider what a geomagnetic storm that generated visible aurora in southern Florida would do to a modern electric grid and telecommunication system. Not quote so funny.
sPh
Actually, in its response to the FERC's requirement to develop plans for geomagnetic events the US provision-of-electricity industry explicitly said that preparations for ordinary geomagnetic storms (say up to G5-) were its responsibility, but preparation for catastrophic events such as G5+ Carringon Events was not within its capability and should be undertaken by government.
sPh
And even worse: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
sPh
. . .or the even more powerful Carrington Event of 1859. If that event occurred today, estimates of damage range from US$600 billion to US$2.3 trillion in North America alone. . . .
Already with the denial?
The Department of Homeland Securty is supposed to help protect the US, as funded by Congress. The Department of Commence, of which NOAA is a part, covers space weather, as funded by Congress. There is an office of science and technology policy (funded by Congress) that has the job of advising the government regarding science. They are have been working together to make strategy (see this NATIONAL SPACE WEATHER STRATEGY document.
The executive (i.e. Obama) is telling the different parts of government to implement the strategy. It coordinates the different parts of the government on which parts should do which things. They already have the budget and legal authority to do the things, but it requires coordination. Which is exactly what a chief executive should be doing.
The more people I meet, the better I like my dog.
Do you really think that DHS is supposed to ignore a threat to the US? Space weather is not a new thing: See: https://www.dhs.gov/publicatio... . The Department of Commerce (i.e. NOAA) has been working on space weather for a long time. The Air Force has a whole group devoted to it. All these things have gone through the funding cycles and been part of the budget for a while. The executive order tells the different departments to coordinate and who does what to respond; this is all in implementation to a National Space Weather Strategy document which went through the normal cycle of drafting, public comments, and approval.
The idea that this came out of nowhere, is not funded, or is not part of the legally directed activities of the executive branch is just insane.
The more people I meet, the better I like my dog.
...there have been conversations about the consequences of such for 30+ years (certainly since the concept of EMP gained widespread understanding).
If the country's emergency planners haven't already taken that into account (insofar as they're able with whatever budget they're given) they should be fired.
-Styopa
Not true. Executive orders are permissible but only to the extent that they align agencies with existing public law.
Of which there are many. And presidents have always interpreted their authority under those laws broadly, with few challenges -- and even fewer successful. The most stunning example was the Emancipation Proclamation which interprets the president's war-fighting authority in a breathtakingly broad way.
It is of course possible for a president to take unconstitutional actions this way. But executive orders are not unconstitutional per se just because the president is not explicitly directed in legislation to do some specific thing. It would be impossible given the text of most laws to carry them out if that were what the Constitution required. What is more the President can use all the power this grants him to enact any kind of policy he wants, unless that policy is expressly forbidden by law.
This makes the office of the Presidency very powerful. The corresponding legislative check on this is Congressional oversight, which is similarly broad. The whole checks and balances thing only works when Congress effectively uses the tools the Constitution gives it; if Congress is ineffective, then the president will automatically be more powerful than the framers intended. That's unavoidable.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
No, he might be old.
Ten years ago most of the comments on this story would have been about how finally a government was taking the problem seriously. Twenty years ago many of the comments would have been from auroral physicists.
Today it's mostly political bullshit.
Actually, the President is supposed to do this kind of thing - direct the executive branch to have plans and prepare for things that can negatively affect the well being of the country. It only oversteps constitutional authority if the Constitution (or other laws passed by Congress) say they can't; or if they want a single penny to enact these plans that hasn't already been appropriated by Congress.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
This is another attempt by President Obama to circumvent the Constitution for the purpose of increasing government spending.
It's alarming as well as amusing, that people get quite so annoyed about trying to mitigate extreme threats.
I guess it's just another example of why we're doomed as a species.
I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
The Executive is charged with defending the country against "all enemies, foreign and domestic." Since space weather is not a State, and is not sentient, it cannot be classified as an enemy. An enemy is one who plans or conspires against you. Not having a conscience, space weather can do neither.
I would have thought that preparing for space weather events would also have a dual role of hardening the infrastructure somewhat against nuclear EMP attacks. So there could be a loophole right there.
Ezekiel 23:20
They did. Last year they passed this:https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/house-bill/3410 which was an extension of the original 2013 CIPA and included language about 'space weather'.
And as directed the WH released in October of 2015 their directive to DHS and other departments to develop a plan for studying the impact of such an event.
This year the amended 2016 bill https://www.congress.gov/bill/... stalled (from what I can tell) and the WH issued an executive order to develop a plan for responding to such an event as directed by congress.
I know, particularly on sites like /. that it's cool to throw stones at the government and cast the rest of the world as incompetent but this is an example of government working, not government failing.
Right. So leaving the country completely helpless in the wake of Carrington event has no defense implications.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Actually, after getting a peek at his two potential successors, I think Obama's popularity will be on the rise in 2017. As will GWB's.
The next 4 years may be quite bad.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
The EPA did a good job of cleaning up the air after the 60s and 70s showed just how bad it could get. The NTSB does a good job of forcing transportation failures to get fixed so they do not re-occur. The NiH does a good job of fixing diseases so you don't die from them, sure the job remains unfinished but they've had many successes. SS as fixed Grandma coming to live with you because she has no other means of support. The FDA does a good job keeping Joe's Bait and Wholistic Drug Emporium from selling you rat poison disguises as children's gummy bears. Need I continue?
I don't care. I'm just trying to give them advice on how not to get killed. Setting up a tempting camp with their fishing buddies is not going to help them.
The only survivalists that I think have a chance in that environment are the ones who have prepared hidden spider holes and can exist almost invisibly. If they can hold out there, more power to them.
No it does not require legislation, and it is not circumventing the constitution.
Stop right there. Take a step back and inspect. Discussing whether preparing for an extinction event is constitutional? Let me frame this in context right here. If an extinction event occurs, the entire context for the Constitution (human governance) has been lost. The Constitution is as good as cosmic toilet paper at that point. The level that people have taken polarized politics to is remarkable. We probably will go extinct because at some point in the future Congress will need to make a life or death decision that determines whether the human race survives and they will be in gridlock unable to agree while the extinction event occurs. And you know what? We'll deserve it for our failure to cooperate with each other for the benefit of humanity.
We'll make great pets
I'd mod this up if I could.
It's absolutely in the interests of US national security to keep the power grid keep working.
It's a perfect example of a situation where private industry cannot be counted on to prepare, as there is no motivation: There's no competitive advantage in taking any precautions - there's literally nothing to sell until after a Carrington event, and the odds of that happening during any company's lifetime is nearly zero.
Best case scenario: Your company did prepare, but everybody else didn't. So now the people in your service area can still buy power -- nothing has changed at all for you. But you can't grow into areas your competitors didn't service, because everybody that was in your competitor's area is fraking dead of dehydration, starvation, and diseases prevented by sanitation.
It's shocking how few people truly appreciate the way the refrigerator and pumped water changed our lives. It's what made our population growth possible.
The electrical grid is not a convenience. It's a life-critical necessity, without which most of us will die in weeks.
-- Sometimes you have to turn the lights off in order to see.