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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 Johnson

There 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

September 30, 2008 Posted by | weapons and war | Leave a comment

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

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September 30, 2008 Posted by | business and costs | Leave a comment

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

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September 30, 2008 Posted by | weapons and war | Leave a comment

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

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September 30, 2008 Posted by | politics | Leave a comment

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)

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September 30, 2008 Posted by | indigenous issues | Leave a comment

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

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September 30, 2008 Posted by | ENERGY | Leave a comment

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

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September 30, 2008 Posted by | weapons and war | Leave a comment