Bug#365647: "error while loading shared libraries" Does libc6 2.3.6-7 break Sarge?

[Gary V <lists@johnmecham.com>]

Package: libc6
Version: 2.3.6-7

I am somewhat of a noob so I hope I'm in the right place (and
not totally off base).

I installed Debian Sarge with the i386 2.4.27 kernel. I use 'stable' for
most of my system but install a few packages from 'testing'. I
installed a program from testing (mdadm) that brought libc6 version 2.3.6-7
along with it. Now I cannot run some programs, for example:

~# mkinitrd -o temp 2.4.27-3-686
/bin/bash: error while loading shared libraries: libdl.so.2: \
 cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

I thought this might be because the new libc6 is not compatible with
older kernels, so, as a test I installed sarge kernel 2.6.8:
apt-get install kernel-image-2.6.8-2-386

but this did not help. So I tried installing:
apt-get install linux-image-2.6.15-1-486

(Note: In my experience migrating from kernel-image kernels to linux-image
kernels tends to break RAID.)

but I still get the same error. I think this problem may break a lot of systems.

As another test I upgraded initrd-tools to the 'testing' version and got
these errors:

mkinitrd -o temp 2.4.27-3-686
/bin/bash: error while loading shared libraries: libdl.so.2: \
 cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
sort: error while loading shared libraries: libc.so.6: \
 cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
awk: error while loading shared libraries: libm.so.6: \
 cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
grep: error while loading shared libraries: libc.so.6: \
 cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

As a final test, I did an:  apt-get -t testing dist-upgrade (which I
had problems with - had to install x11-common with force overwrite).

During the dist-upgrade, because of this same error:
Using /usr/sbin/mkinitrd to build the ramdisk.
Full list of probed ramdisk generating tools : /usr/sbin/mkinitrd \
 /usr/sbin/mkinitrd.yaird /usr/sbin/mkinitramfs.
/bin/bash: error while loading shared libraries: libdl.so.2: \
  cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
grep: error while loading shared libraries: libc.so.6: \
 cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
sort: error while loading shared libraries: libc.so.6: \
 cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
awk: error while loading shared libraries: libm.so.6: \
 cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

Trying to upgrade the kernel once again resulted in this:
Could not find mkinitramfs-kpkg mkinitrd.yaird. at
/var/lib/dpkg/tmp.ci/preinst \line 236, <STDIN> line 9.
Done.
Setting up linux-image-2.6.15-1-686 (2.6.15-8) ...
Running depmod.
Finding valid ramdisk creators.
Failed to find suitable ramdisk generation tool for kernel version
2.6.15-1-686 on running kernel 2.4.27-3-586tsc in mkinitramfs-kpkg mkinitrd.yaird

Any simple way to fix this issue?

Gary V