The gratitude of the American people will be overwhelming. The elections could translate into a Democratic landslide, at least for Mr. Gore. This scenario may sound too Machiavellian for an administration characterized more by incompetence than savoir faire . It will strike some as unfairly attributing to the Clinton-Gore team a ruthless willingness to subordinate the national good to individual political advantage. Still, the foregoing theory appears a good candidate to fit the available facts.
Republicans obviously have an interest in assuring the failure of such a strategy.
More importantly, however, every American irrespective of party affiliation should want to see the country spared the dire conditions that might be exploited in this way by the President and Vice President. That leadership can only be expressed by visible, authoritative and energetic warnings about the gravity of the danger and by demonstrations of the determination of those at the highest levels of government and private industry to ensure that corrective action receives the priority it deserves, and must have. At the recent summit on the Y2K Crisis sponsored by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, it was revealed that Mr. Koskinen's office has something like four full-time employees, himself, a secretary and two interns. The Center's publications are intended to invigorate and enrich the debate on foreign policy and defense issues. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of all members of the Center's Board of Advisors.