dark days ahead?

Stock up on ammo, food, and cash. Get ready.  Pistol strapped to his hip, a member of a group that calls itself the Missouri Militia warned a friend of dark days ahead. He believes that either just before or just after the election, martial law will be declared. The first thing that will happen, he says, is that cellphones and the Internet will go black, crashed by electromagnetic equipment perfected in China. Then the electrical grid will go down. The governor of Missouri will mobilize the militia. They are very well organized and just awaiting orders, says the Iraq War veteran.
   It reminds me of the conspiracy theories and fear that surrounded Y2K in these same circles in this same area 20 years ago. One guy I know gathered his whole family from Ohio onto his piece of the Ozarks in the middle of forestland for safety. I assured him that the grid was not going to go down, and that the UN was not going to use the collapse as an excuse to take over the U.S. He assured me it was a given. I said, "OK, I'm going to come in from New York and spend New Year's Eve with you, and we will see who's right."
   So on New Year's Eve, we gathered with his parents and brother and sister-in-law. He kept an AK-47 leaning on the sofa next to him. Every few minutes he would go to the phone and call friends who lived around the country. "Anything happening yet? The roads blocked off? Power out?" Nada.
   At midnight New York time, eleven o'clock Missouri time, journalist friends called me from Times Square as the ball dropped. No military action there either, just celebration. As we saw in the New Year in the Ozarks an hour later, he realized that none of his predictions were coming true.
   To his credit, he claimed to be happy that nothing bad had happened.
   To my credit, I didn't say I told you so.