Part 140 (2/2)
”Jacobs He seereed Phil nonchalantly ”He just won a ot security back under his thumb A nice politi- cal coup”
”No, not that,” Henry said cautiously ”It's just that I think he's acting too ade Do you knohat I hed Phil ”He's just playing it his way, not anyone elses C'uess”
”Besides, Henry,” he said glancing at his watch ”It's getting to be that tireed to watch the speech from the sidelines, so they could see how the President's coreeted by the press
”Ladies and Gentlemen, the President of the United States” An assistant White House press agent ton press pool The video was picked up by the CNN cameras as it was their turn to provide a feed to the other networks Sunday evening was an odd tiood idea that the subject was going to be coovernment comments on the crisis had come from everywhere but the White House
The President rapidly ambled up to the podiulasses and stared at the caan this ithout a prean- nounced subjectthe Cold War to experience a sinking feeling in their stoht about the unthinkable As usual the press corps was rapt with attention
”Good evening,” the President of the United States began slowly
”I areat concern to us all A subject of the utency to which we must address ourselves immediately
”That subject is, information The value of information
”As I am sure most of you are aware, one man, Taki homosoto, threatened the United States this last week It is about that very subject that I wish to speak to the country, and the world”
The President paused He had just told the country what he was going to say Now he had to say it
”For all practical purposes, the United States is undergoing an electronic Pearl Harbor, and the target is one of the ments of our way of life: Information
”Information What is information? Information is news Infor- mation is a book, or a movie or a television show Inforesture Inforht A pure idea
”Inforle commodity, a common denominator upon which all industrial societies must rely Data, facts, opinions, pictures, histories, records, charts, numbers Whether that data is raw in nature, such as naovernies and policies or proprietary business details, infor block upon which modern society functions
”Information is the lifeblood of the United States and the world
”As first steaas and oil, now infor force of the econoin to collapse How can modern society function without information and the computers that er any nationalistic boundaries that governlobal commodity What would our respective cul- tures look like if inforer available?
”We would not be able to predict the weather Credit cards would be worthless pieces of plastic We would save less lives without enough information and the means to analyze it We need massive aoverner transfer money because the comput- ers were eer records? What good is an insurance company if its clients names are nowhere on file? If there was no phone book, who could you call? If hospitals had no files on your medical history, what treat- ine how difficult it would be to run this planet without inforlobal and a national strate- gic asset that is currently under attack
”Infor industry has coross national product; indeed, the e live as A in the world, is due in large part to the extraordinary ability of having infor ant in the forht into our homes; cable television, direct satellite connections froress, and a thousand and one other sources of infor room chair
”Without information, without the machinery that allows the information to remain available, a veritable national electronic library, the United States steps back thirty years
”Inforic weapon in today's world as is the gun or other conventional aranized data banks and analytic tech- niques Governht, on the premise that one side has more accurate informa- tion than its adversary Certainly academia requires the avail- ability of inforeneral relies upon widespread dissemination of information for even the simplest day to day activities
”It is almost inconceivable that society could function as we knoithout the data processing systems upon which we rely