I think I must be just about the only columnist in the computer business who's never written about the year 2000 problem. That's because I really don't have the slightest idea what will happen when we get to Jan. 1, 2000. Will there be chaos in the streets, or is the year 2000 problem the loudest false alarm since the "energy crisis"? Got me.
I was explaining my ignorance to a politically active colleague, and because neither of us could say much of substance, we wound up parsing the politics of it all. We were particularly entertained by two questions:
- Why has there been so little stockholder and taxpayer outrage over the cost of the foul-up?
- Why has Al Gore chosen to go AWOL on the issue?
To understand the first question, suppose that only the government had failed to prepare itself for the year 2000. Think of the outcry, the jokes, the endless mockery of bureaucrats so stodgy and out of touch that they couldn't see the end of the century coming. Forget about $1,000 toilet seats and $100 screwdrivers; just think about how many school lunches could be bought for the $2.3 billion the government admits it will spend.
Back scratching
But because the private and public sectors have been equally culpable, they've somehow managed to shield each other. I'm amazed at how many times I've read that given the cost of computing in the 1960s, a two-figure date field really was a sound business decision. Never mind that there were those other decades -- the '70s and '80s -- when the issue was left to fester. It's hard to imagine a better example of the public and private sectors' ability to completely ignore a serious problem for as long as possible. Think safety and pollution.
It is certainly understandable why only year 2000 consultants seek to be personally associated with that issue. They can't lose. If all kinds of disasters do occur, they can say they warned us. If nothing happens, they can expect our thanks for fixing the problem.
In contrast, for business leaders and public officials, the issue has always been a loser; it's much easier to blame one's predecessors than to stand up and be accountable.
Nevertheless, the silence from the vice president's office has been particularly conspicuous. No one in politics has worked harder at developing a technology-centric image. Yet in what is arguably the biggest technology policy issue of the 1997-2000 period, Gore has uttered hardly a word.
What makes his silence so ironic is that the vice president clearly faces his own year 2000 challenge. As the almost certain Democratic presidential nominee, everything Gore does is aimed at winning the November 2000 election. Here the possibilities are rather delicious. Imagine that come Jan. 1, 2000, all kinds of weird glitches start driving the country crazy. What would Gore say out there on the campaign trail? After all, he will have been vice president and self-appointed technology czar since 1992.
In presidential politics, one generally can assume that all major decisions have been carefully calculated. Gore appears to be betting that year 2000 will prove to be no big deal, with the built-in hedge of not actually coming out and saying it. For his sake and ours, I sure hope he's right.
