RSS: We Have the Money, If Only We Didn`t Waste It on the Defense Budget
We Have the Money, If Only We Didn`t Waste It on the Defense Budget
On Wednesday, September 24th, right in the middle of the fight over billions of taxpayer dollars slated to bail out Wall Street, the House of Representatives passed a $612 billion defense authorization bill for 2009 without a murmur of public protest or any meaningful press comment at all.
by Chalmers JohnsonThere has been much moaning, air-sucking, and outrage about the $700 billion that the U.S. government is thinking of throwing away on rich New York bankers who have been ripping us off for the past few years and then letting greed drive their businesses into a variety of ditches. In fact, we dole out similar amounts of money every year in the form of payoffs to the armed services, the military-industrial complex, and powerful senators and representatives allied with the Pentagon.
On Wednesday, September 24th, right in the middle of the fight over billions of taxpayer dollars slated to bail out Wall Street, the House of Representatives passed a $612 billion defense authorization bill for 2009 without a murmur of public protest or any meaningful press comment at all. (The New York Times gave the matter only three short paragraphs buried in a story about another appropriations measure.)
The defense bill includes $68.6 billion to pursue the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which is only a down-payment on the full yearly cost of these wars. (The rest will be raised through future supplementary bills.) It also included a 3.9% pay raise for military personnel, and $5 billion in pork-barrel projects not even requested by the administration or the secretary of defense
RSS: We Have the Money, If Only We Didn`t Waste It on the Defense Budget
Let’s look at the issues: Energy
Let’s look at the issues: Energy
Independent Political Report September 29th, 2008
“……………………….Nuclear is the largest source of electricity that is not a fossil fuel. It does not generate any greenhouse gases, but the mining of uranium, which is used by nuclear plants, does considerable environmental damage. However, many environmentalists and policymakers still champion it as a solution to climate change, which it has the potential to be. Nuclear waste is also a problem with nuclear power, in that spent nuclear fuel has no safe place to be stored right now. Perhaps the greatest problem with nuclear power is the price to taxpayers. Each new nuclear plant built in the United States will cost at least one billion dollars in federal subsidies……………”
Let’s look at the issues: Energy
Tags: nuclear, antinuclear, uranium, radioactive
Asia Times Online :: Middle East News, Iraq, Iran current affairs
The next peace and false bells on Iran
Asia Times By Kaveh L Afrasiabi Sept 08 As the November United States presidential elections draw near, the issue of the stalemate in United States-Iran relations looms large, given the continuing Iran nuclear standoff, the stated commitment of both presidential hopefuls, Senator John McCain and Senator Barack Obama, to disallow Iran from “going nuclear”, and the spin by some pundits in the US and Europe that American voters should cast their votes for the candidate who can best handle the “unavoidable war with Iran”…………………………argument that Iran is two or more years away from getting its first bomb is deeply flawed. It is like saying that Japan or Brazil are six months or so away from building a nuclear bomb, simply because they have the fissile material and technological capability. W……………………………………………..the next chapter in US-Iran relations need not be written in blood and much good can come about by focusing on “the next peace” instead of the next war, even though peace is not half as appealing as war to some in the US corporate media…………………while there are no straight answers to the host of tough issues that bedevil US-Iran relations, but the necessity of avoiding another ruinous war in the troubled Middle East warrants a dramatic shifting of attention to “the next peace”.This can be done by exploring areas of (potential) agreement and shared interests and telescoping those to the fundamental question of how to recast US policy toward Iran in such a way that will replace the existing hostilities with sustainable peace. T
Asia Times Online :: Middle East News, Iraq, Iran current affairs
Tags: nuclear, antinuclear, uranium, radioactive
Nuclear energy is not the answer – General News
Nuclear energy is not the answer
ohmyGov 30 Sept 08 No matter how you pronounce the word..Every election cycle, many republicans and moderate democrats use their elevated soapbox standing to push a nuclear power agenda. With our “addiction to oil” growing ever less tolerable, rhetoric espousing the need for nuclear power to wean ourselves off of oil is growing faster than China’s female gymnasts.The problem is, and always has been, that U.S. dependence on foreign oil has little-to-nothing to do with our use or non-use of nuclear energy.
Consider the fact that nuclear energy, unlike oil, cannot power an automobile, and save for submarines and other large marine vessels, is only useful for generating electricity…………………………Given the uncertain techniques, high costs, risk of having nuclear secrets fall into the hands of extremists, and NIMBY (not in my back yard) issues for storing and securing nuclear waste, it is mind-numbing that anyone even suggests this strategy as a serious means for reducing foreign oil dependence. Yet every election cycle, the policy reemerges from the dusty shelves of history like a stalker in a cheesy 1970’s horror flick.
Last week, John McCain was that stalker, offering up nuclear power as part of his plan for eliminating foreign oil dependence. …………………….
A smarter strategy than using nuclear energy to power electricity lays in increasing the use of renewable energy technologies like wind, solar, wave energy, and geothermal energy – by far the most underrated potential energy source. If that seven percent market share of the electric power grid can’t be completely replaced by these clean fuels, clean coal and natural gas could easily fill in the supply gaps.
There is no need for nuclear power; like the steam engine, it’s time has passed.
Nuclear energy is not the answer – General News
Tags: nuclear, antinuclear, uranium, radioactive
Land claim determination closer – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
Land claim determination closer
ABC News 29/9/08 The Aboriginal land commissioner will today move a step closer to resolving the last land claim to be filed in central Australia.
In July, justice Howard Olney travelled to the northern part of the Simpson Desert, seven hours drive from Alice Springs.
He heard evidence from Eastern Arrente traditional owners and visited sacred sites in the area, one of the most remote in Australia.
The claim covers 18,000 square kilometres of land south of Atula homestead, some of which was part of an earlier land rights claim.
Today, the commissioner will sit in Melbourne to hear from anthropological experts.
Justice Olney will then call for written submissions before making a determination on the claim, which is expected to be the last for the central Australian region.
Land claim determination closer – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
Tags: indigenous, aboriginal
Bloomberg.com: Australia & New Zealand
Australia Could Get 35% of Power Supply From Waves, Study Shows
By Angela Macdonald-Smith Sept. 29 (Bloomberg) — Australia could economically get 35 percent of its needs for continuous power supply from energy generated by waves, helping cut greenhouse gases, said Carnegie Corp., an Australian clean-energy technology company.The country has a wave energy resource in near-shore areas where water is less than 25 meters deep of about 171,000 megawatts, Perth-based Carnegie said today, citing a report. That’s about four times total installed power generating capacity, it said, citing research from RPS MetOcean, a unit of Abingdon, England-based RPS Group Plc.
Bloomberg.com: Australia & New Zealand
Tags: renewables, renewableenergy
The Associated Press: New nuclear commission set to meet in Sydney
New nuclear commission set to meet in Sydney
By ROD McGUIRK 27/9/08 CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — India and Pakistan will attend an international nuclear disarmament conference for the first time in Sydney next month, Australia’s government said Friday, even though the nuclear-armed foes have consistently shunned a nonproliferation treaty.The 15-member International Commission on Nuclear Nonproliferation and Disarmament will meet Oct. 19-21 to “shape a global consensus” on improving the 28-year-old Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty before it is reviewed in 2010, the government said in a statement.”The commission’s two-year mandate is to reinvigorate the global debate on the need to prevent the further spread of nuclear weapons and for nuclear disarmament,” Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd was quoted as saying……………………The 190-nation nonproliferation treaty was established to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons and technology and to further the goal of nuclear disarmament. It is reviewed every five years.
Under the treaty, only countries that tested nuclear weapons before 1967 are allowed to remain nuclear powers. India and Pakistan would have to disarm if they were to join.
The Associated Press: New nuclear commission set to meet in Sydney
Tags: nuclear, antinuclear, uranium, radioactive
antinuclear
Running on empty Beyond Nuclear Linda Gunter 26 Sept 08 With the retreat of the “Gang of 20” in the Senate last week – where a bill that would have included unlimited federal loan guarantees for nuclear energy was never introduced
– will the failing economy now spell the end of heavily subsidized nuclear energy expansion plans?
Not necessarily.
Although the push for unlimited loan guarantees has been staved off, the previously approved nuclear loan guarantees lurch forward. The Energy Policy Act of 2005 approved nuclear loan guarantees, and in December 2007, Congress and President Bush approved $18.5 billion in federal loan guarantees for new reactors (and an additional $2 billion for new uranium enrichment)………………………
DOE admitted this week that $18.5 billion would build just two new reactors. However, DOE seems poised, along with the nuclear power industry’s army of lobbyists, to continue to seek expanded, or even unlimited, nuclear loan guarantees..
For example, Platt’s reported this week that, given the crises on Wall Street, DOE’s assistant secretary for nuclear energy, Dennis Spurgeon, said that “government” (meaning taxpayers) may need to take on an even bigger role in financing the “nuclear renaissance.” ……………………….
Despite what’s being described as a financial “meltdown,” the real risk of meltdown – due to expanded nuclear power in this country propped up by multi-billion dollar taxpayer subsidies – is routinely ignored in the press.
All the more reason to remain vigilant lest the nuclear industry and its friends in government attempt quiet money grabs as part of the Wall Street bailout plans, or hidden in energy or climate bills.
Tags: Althoughthe push for unlimited loan guarantees has been staved off, the previously approved nuclear loan guarantees lurch forward. The Energy Policy Act of 2005 approved nuclear loan guarantees, and in December 2007, Congress and President Bush approved $18.5 billion in federal loan guarantees for new reactors (and an additional $2 billion for new uranium enrichment)………………………
Sale of energy giant to French firm puts our future supply in jeopardy – Scotsman.com News
Sale of energy giant to French firm puts our future supply in jeopardy
News.scotsman.com : 26 September 2008The consequences of the government’s effectively pushing British Energy (BE) into the arms of the French state-owned EDF (your report, 25 September) are profound.
The United Kingdom, which was once at the forefront of civil nuclear technology, has handed over control of virtually its entire nuclear power industry not only to a foreign company, but one 80 per cent owned by a foreign government.
Tags: nuclear, antinuclear, radioactive, uranium
Fire at Nuclear Plant Prompts Special Investigation | Occupational Health & Safety
Fire at Nuclear Plant Prompts Special Investigation
Occupational Health and Safety 25 Sept 08 The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is conducting a special inspection at the DC Cook Nuclear Power Station to review circumstances around a turbine generator fire and degradation of the fire suppression system. The two-unit plant is operated by American Electric Power and is located in Stevensville, Mich.
On Sept. 20, a malfunction in the Unit 1 turbine generator resulted in a fire and caused the operators to manually shut down the reactor.
Fire at Nuclear Plant Prompts Special Investigation | Occupational Health & Safety
Tags: nuclear, antinuclear, radioactive, uranium
WXOW News 19 La Crosse, WI – News, Weather and Sports |Nuclear Trash
Nuclear Trash
BARNWELL, S.C. (AP) WXOW19 26 Sept 08 – Low-level radioactive waste is piling up at hospitals and research labs around the country, and that’s worrying experts who fear some of it could be stolen by terrorists and turned into dirty bombs.
The items include radioactive seeds the size of a grain of rice used for treating cancer. There are also pencil-thin nuclear tubes used in industrial gauges. And there’s an array of small capsules and pellets with medical and industrial uses.
For years, truckloads of material from 36 states have been shipped to a landfill in rural South Carolina. There, it was all sealed in concrete and buried.
But effective July 1st, the state ended nearly all disposal of radioactive material at the landfill. That’s left it piling up at the labs, universities, hospitals and businesses where it’s used.
State and federal authorities says the waste is monitored, but they acknowledge checks are infrequent. Government documents show that thousands of items have been lost.
WXOW News 19 La Crosse, WI – News, Weather and Sports |Nuclear Trash
Tags: nuclear, antinuclear, radioactive, uranium
Fars News Agency :: US Seeking to Hijack IAEA to Pressure Iran
US Seeking to Hijack IAEA to Pressure IranTEHRAN (FNA)- Iranian Ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency Ali Ashgar Soltaniyeh said Washington is hijacking the UN nuclear watchdog for an anti-Iran campaign.
“Today, it was made clear to the Board of Governors that the original documents and even their duplications regarding alleged studies have not been presented to the International Atomic Energy Agency,” Soltaniyeh said on the sidelines of the IAEA Board of Governors meeting in Vienna on Monday.
During the meeting the IAEA chief had urged the Islamic Republic to be “transparent” and provide the agency with “credible assurances about the absence of undeclared nuclear material and activities in Iran.” ……………………………The IAEA report confirmed that Iran has managed to enrich uranium-235 to a level ‘less than 5 percent.’ Such a rate is consistent with the construction of a nuclear power plant. Nuclear arms production, meanwhile, requires an enrichment level of above 90 percent.The Vienna-based UN nuclear watchdog continues snap inspections of Iranian nuclear sites and has reported that all “declared nuclear material in Iran has been accounted for, and therefore such material is not diverted to prohibited activities.”
Fars News Agency :: US Seeking to Hijack IAEA to Pressure Iran
Tags: nuclear, antinuclear, radioactive, uranium
Australia’s radioactive migraine – On Line Opinion – 26/9/2008
Australia’s radioactive migraine
ON LINE opinion By Scott Ludlam 26 September 2008 When the Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Management Act 2005 was forced through the Senate, Labor accurately described it as, “extreme, arrogant, heavy-handed, draconian, sorry, sordid, extraordinary and profoundly shameful”.
Why? Because it wiped out Northern Territory laws prohibiting transport and storage of nuclear waste. The legislation also squashed Aboriginal heritage laws and the Native Title Act, overriding procedural fairness.
Amendments passed in 2006 explicitly stated that site nominations from Land Councils are valid even in the absence of consultation with Traditional Owners. These amendments were also opposed by the Greens and Labor opposition………………………………..Most importantly, we must ask why we are producing this waste at all. Yesterday we saw public acknowledgement that the research reactor in Sydney is still leaking, despite having been shutdown for 11 of the 14 months since it first opened. The first step in dealing with our 60-year radioactive migraine is to stop producing this waste in the first place, and divert the substantial resources consumed by this substandard facility into the many alternative technologies for producing radioisotopes.
…………………………Repealing this legislation will pave the way for a new approach to the management of Australia’s radioactive waste. The Territory Government, the Traditional Owners and the broader community across the NT were never asked if they wanted to host a dump for Australia’s most intractable waste. The Prime Minister must now be called to account: this was a very clear election promise, and it is time it was honoured.
Australia’s radioactive migraine – On Line Opinion – 26/9/2008
Tags: nuclear, antinuclear, radioactive, uranium
Uranium export value tipped to fall 8pc – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
Uranium export value tipped to fall
ABC News 26 Sept 08 The value of Australia’s uranium exports is forecast to drop by 8 per cent or $60 million this financial year.The Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics (ABARE) says that is because of a significant fall in spot prices, due to an increase in world production.
Tags: nuclear, antinuclear, radioactive, uranium
Nova Scotia News – TheChronicleHerald.ca
Threat of nuclear annihilation still hangs over world
The Chronicle Herald By RUTH BISHOP and NANCY COVINGTONTue. Sep 23 – 5:59 AMTHIS WEEK, one of the world’s most famous anti-nuclear activists will address the people of Halifax. Dr. Helen Caldicott of Australia will deliver the same message she has given for over 30 years: Nuclear war is by far the greatest threat to the future of humankind
Today, there are almost 27,000 nuclear weapons left in the world. Over 4,000 of these are on trigger alert – ready to be computer-launched within minutes. The risk of accidental nuclear war is as great as it has ever been. Even a small accidental attack could devastate the entire planet; if dropped in tropical areas, a minuscule percentage of the world’s total nuclear explosive power would affect the climate so greatly that agriculture would collapse in major areas and billions would die from starvation.
Yet, the world faces an even greater nuclear threat. As more countries of the world gain access to nuclear power, more nuclear weapons will be in the hands of unstable regimes. The risk is such that Henry Kissinger and George Schultz warn that the world is now poised “on the precipice of a new and dangerous nuclear era.”
Here in Halifax, we already face a tremendous nuclear threat. At this time, any NATO vessel entering Halifax Harbour is permitted to carry nuclear weapons on board. Our government holds an official “neither confirm nor deny” policy on their existence. This means that our government essentially sanctions the presence of nuclear weapons right outside our front doors. Halifax consequently faces a small but very real risk of a catastrophe far greater than the explosion of 1917…………………………Canada should now play a significant role in leading an international anti-nuclear campaign. We have already taken several important steps, including ratifying the Non-Proliferation Treaty of 1970. But the Canadian public clearly wants the government to do far more: In a recent poll, 73 per cent of Canadians supported eliminating all nuclear weapons through an enforceable agreement.
Nova Scotia News – TheChronicleHerald.ca
Tags: Nuclear, antinuclear, uranium, radioactive
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