The time to build (a wireless-mesh replacement for the Internet, sets of encrypted radios, or for that matter, any subversive technology) is now, rather than when martial law is declared - and we are shipped off to the camps before our soldering irons can warm up.
How many people even own dead-tree versions of essential engineering references? Most people have abandoned even dictionaries in favor of the web. We have grown utterly dependent on a rather surprisingly fragile medium with plenty of government tentacles wriggling in assorted orifices.
