Just to be clear, you're saying that the EMP Commission is wrong?
You might have to learn to live a nineteenth century lifestyle for a few months, but that's hardly the end of the world!
I don't mind doing without my cellphone and car, provided the food trucks run, the hospitals are on backup generators, the pharma plants are operative, and our military retains the ability to obliterate the culprit and stop any major funny business that might be planned while we get back on our feet.
But if the hospitals are closed and the food trucks don't run and the heat is out for 24 weeks, my part of the country would be a total write-off.
Now the Congressional EMP Commission says that I'm right, and you're wrong. I understand that there could be some folks looking to scare us into spending trillions of $$$ on schemes that happen to get them rich quick (Gorebull warming, anyone?). I hope that people like you would do some serious work (papers, Congressional testimony, actual science, etc.) to debunk their claims.
Let's put it this way, whatever information the congresscritters used to draw their conclusions contradicts what we used in the military. Who do you trust more, congress, or the guys whose lives depend on being right?
I don't think we really disagree on the effects of a powerful EMP on our technology, just the size of the bomb required to create such an event.
(I'm guessing that this 10kt figure is now being used because that figure is one they've used for a few years now as an estimate of what the terrorists might be capable of.) So yeah, it might very well be a new pitch for research funding!
As for debunking the extreme alarmists, I'm doing my part right now; there are far better qualified individuals than I to correct congress.