First off, whomever coined the term “shadow government” for what is, in actuality, a backup government, ought to be sent to bed without supper. “Shadow government” conjures up images of the Illuminati, the Tri-Lateral Commission and the Masons running things behind the scenes. They do, of course, but that just makes it even worse to appropriate the term to describe the various civil servants who are off in bunkers now, doing their normal work on 90 day shifts but safe from some al Qa’eda maniac and a suitcase nuke taking out all of Washington, DC.
That having been said, here’s an interesting article from the WSJ about extending the concept, and how our current legal (and Constitutional) mechanisms for keeping the government rolling in case of disaster are, perhaps, obsolete and in need of replacement.