Japan State Secerts Law Passes Lower House | Will This Finally Be The Breaking Point?
Published on 27 Nov 2013
Will this finally be enough to anger Japanese people enough to take on the ruling powers directly?
Ryan from Tokyo
References:
Japan secrecy law stirs fear of limits on freedoms
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/japan-…
Japan crime: Why do innocent people confess?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20…
Unforgettable photography of the world’s most radioactive places
For years, there have been allegations that the ‘Ndrangheta syndicate of the Italian mafia has been using the seas as a convenient location in which to dump hazardous waste — including radioactive waste — charging for the service and pocketing the profits. An Italian NGO, Legambiente, suspects that about 40 ships loaded with toxic and radioactive waste have disappeared in Mediterranean waters since 1994. If true, these allegations paint a worrying picture of an unknown amount of nuclear waste in the Mediterranean whose true danger will only become clear when the hundreds of barrels degrade or somehow otherwise break open. The beauty of the Mediterranean Sea may well be concealing an environmental catastrophe in the making.
Mafia sinks toxic waste ships in the Mediterranean
8. The Somalian Coast
Nuclear Waste Dumping at Sea “paid” – Somalia
7. Mayak Chemical Combine, Russia
6. Sellafield, UK Continue reading
Useless but “Fun” Christmas gifts are trashing the planet
So you need that smart cuckoo clock for Christmas, do you?, George Monbiot, Guardian, 26 Nov 13
A global bullshit industry recruits the values with which we’d like the festival to be invested – to sell things no one wants Guilt is good. It’s the feature that distinguishes the rest of the population from psychopaths. It’s the sensation you are able to feel when you possess a capacity for empathy. But guilt inhibits consumption. So a global industry has developed to smother it with a 13-tog duvet of celebrities and cartoon characters and elevator music. It seeks to persuade us not to see and not to feel. It seems to work.
The 2012 Greendex survey found that people in poorer countries feel, on average, much guiltier about their impacts on the natural world than people in rich countries. The places in which people feel least guilt are, in this order, Germany, the United States, Australia and Britain, while the people of India, China, Mexico and Brazil have the greatest concerns. Our guilt, the survey reported, exists in inverse proportion to the amount of damage our consumption does. This is the opposite of what a thousand editorials in the corporate press tell us: that people cannot afford to care until they become rich. The evidence suggests we cease to care only when we become rich.
“Consumers in countries such as Mexico, Brazil, China and India,” the survey tells us, “tend to be most concerned about issues like climate change, air and water pollution, species loss and shortages of fresh water … In contrast, the economy and the cost of energy and fuel elicit the most concern among American, French and British consumers.” The more you have, the more important money becomes. My guess is that in poorer countries empathy has not been so dulled by decades of mindless consumption.
Watch the latest advertisement for Toys R Us in the US. A man dressed up as a ranger herds children on to a green bus belonging to “the Meet the Trees Foundation”. “Today we’re taking the kids on the best field trip they could wish for,” he confides to us. “And they don’t even know it.”
Did Toys R Us Just Make an Anti Science Education Ad?
On the bus he starts teaching them, badly, about leaves. The children yawn and shift in their seats. Suddenly, he announces: “But we’re not going to the forest today …” He strips off his ranger shirt. “We’re going to Toys R Us, guys!” The children go berserk. “We’re going to get to play with all the toys, and you’re going to get to choose any toy that you want!” The children run, in slow motion, down the aisles of the shop, then almost swoon as they caress their chosen toys.
Nature is tedious, plastic is thrilling. The inner-city children I took to the woods a few weeks ago would tell a different story, but hammer home the message often enough and it becomes true.
Christmas permits the global bullshit industry to recruit the values with which so many of us would like the festival to be invested – love, warmth, a community of spirit – to the sole end of selling things that no one needs or even wants…….
Are we so bored, so affectless, that we need to receive this junk to ignite one last spark of hedonic satisfaction? Have people become so immune to fellow feeling that they are prepared to spend £46 on a jar for dog treats or £6.50 a bang on personalised crackers, rather than give the money to a better cause? Or is this the western world’s potlatch, spending ridiculous sums on conspicuously useless gifts to enhance our social status? If so, we must have forgotten that those who are impressed by money are not worth impressing.
To service this peculiar form of mental illness, we must wear down the knap of the Earth, ream the surface of the planet with great holes, fleetingly handle the products of that destruction then dump the materials into another hole. A report by the Gaia Foundation reveals an explosive growth in the pace of mining: cobalt production up 165% in 10 years, iron ore by 180%, a 50% increase in nonferrous metals exploration between 2010 and 2011.
The products of this destruction are in everything: electronics, plastics, ceramics, paints, dyes, the packaging in which our fatuities arrive. As the richest deposits are mined out, ever more land must be attacked to maintain production. Even the most precious and destructive materials are junked when a new dopamine hit is required: the UK government reports that a tonne of gold embedded in electronics is landfilled in this country every year…… A fully referenced version of this article can be found at Monbiot.com http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/25/christmas-selling-things-nobody-wants
Japan: Deeply enmeshed in the global nuclear industrial complex
The key is that the nuclear village retains veto power over national energy policy and citizens will not get to decide the outcome even if an overwhelming majority support phasing out nuclear energy. In addition, Washington is leaning on the Japanese government to not pull the plug on nuclear energy.
Japan: Deeply enmeshed in the global nuclear industrial complex Abe’s Nuclear Energy Policy and Japan’s Future 安倍首相の原子力政策と日本の未来 Jeff Kingston : http://www.japanfocus.org/-Jeff-Kingston/3986#sthash.CV9q1CUY.dpufhttp://www.japanfocus.org/-Jeff-Kingston/3986“……..Why has Fukushima not been a game changing event? The institutions of Japan’s nuclear village (principally the utilities, bureaucracy and Diet) enjoy considerable advantages in terms of energy policymaking and have enormous investments at stake. The nuclear village has openly lobbied the government and actively promoted its case in the media while also working the corridors of power and backrooms where energy policy is decided. Here the nuclear village enjoys tremendous advantages that explain why it has prevailed over public opinion concerning national energy policy.
Shhh the nuclear lobby doesn’t want us to know – Thorium nuclear energy is a dud!
There’s One Big Obstacle To US Development Of Thorium BUSINESS INSIDER LUCAS KAWA DEC 20 2012, SOME OF THORIUM’S DISADVANTAGES, WHICH INCLUDE:
- High capital costs ($4000-$10,000/kW)
- Little existing infrastructure, no commercially operating plants
- Long lead times (estimated at over 10 years) and licensing issues
- The bad reputation of nuclear energy, due to meltdowns at Chernobyl and Fukushima……
His conclusion:
Thorium power technology cannot economically compete with electricity generated by gas
Impaired visibility due to particles in spent fuel pond at Fukushima no 4 reactor
NHK: ‘Particles’ impairing visibility in Fukushima pool — Will try to remove spent fuel Tuesday, said to be “one of most dangerous operations ever attempted in nuclear history” — Tepco concerned about sabotage, warns media about filming http://enenews.com/nhk-particles-impairing-visibility-in-unit-4-pool-attempted-removal-of-spent-fuel-starts-tuesday-described-as-one-of-most-dangerous-operations-ever-attempted-in-nuclear-history-tepco-c
NHK, , Nov. 25, 2013: [TEPCO] says it will begin removing highly radioactive spent nuclear fuel from one of its reactor buildings on Tuesday. […] TEPCO says […] sand and fine particles in the storage pool impaired visibility. The utility says it will use a pump to clear the pool of particles for the next round of transfers. […] The spent fuel assemblies are highly radioactive so the operation will require extra caution. This will be the first removal of spent nuclear fuel […]
Bangkok Post, Nov. 24, 2013: World community needed at Fukushima […] Last week workers at Fukushima successfully removed the [unused] nuclear fuel rod assemblies from a cooling pool suspended high above ground at Reactor No 4 in what has been described as one of the most dangerous operations ever attempted in nuclear history. […] Experts say that if the fuel rods come too close to each other during the operation there is a chance of a nuclear chain reaction that could spread to all the fissile material. […]
TEPCO, Nov. 21, 2013: […] we have noticed that some news media released videos, taken from the air, of the on-premise transportation from the Unit 4 Reactor Building to the Common Pool Building […] Some of those videos contain information (such as the transportation schedule, a route of the transportation, and activities of security guards) the disclosure of which conflicts with “Measures To Be Taken for Physical Protection of Specific Nuclear Fuel Material” stipulated in the Nuclear Reactor Regulation Law. The regulatory agency is also aware of this matter, and instructed us to request the media to act with attention to physical protection. As we have already requested the media members on many occasions, in view of physical protection, please refrain from taking pictures and videos of the physical protection facilities such as the building entrances and exits, fences, sensors, and cameras as well as the cask transportation currently conducted. [*Physical protection: To protect nuclear materials and facilities against the theft or unauthorized diversion of nuclear materials and against the sabotage of nuclear facilities]
More: CNN: Tepco only wanted to show us Unit 4, strict rules about what we could film (VIDEO)
Global media avoids covering the real global problems of Fukushima
The Global Threat of Fukushima, counterpunch A Global Response is Needed WEEKEND EDITION OCTOBER 25-27, 2013 by KEVIN ZEESE AND MARGARET FLOWERS The story of Fukushima should be on the front pages of every newspaper. Instead, it is rarely mentioned. The problems at Fukushima are unprecedented in human experience and involve a high risk of radiation events larger than any that the global community has ever experienced. It is going to take the best engineering minds in the world to solve these problems and to diminish their global impact.
When we researched the realities of Fukushima in preparation for this article, words like apocalyptic, cataclysmic and Earth-threatening came to mind. But, when we say such things, people react as if we were the little red hen screaming “the sky is falling” and the reports are ignored. So, we’re going to present what is known in this article and you can decide whether we are facing a potentially cataclysmic event.
Either way, it is clear that the problems at Fukushima demand that the world’s best nuclear engineers and other experts advise and assist in the efforts to solve them. Nuclear engineer Arnie Gundersen of Fairewinds.org and an international team of scientists created a 15-point plan to address the crises at Fukushima.
A subcommittee of the Green Shadow Cabinet (of which we are members), which includes long-time nuclear activist Harvey Wasserman, is circulating a sign-on letter and a petition calling on the United Nations and Japanese government to put in place the Gundersen et al plan and to provide 24-hour media access to information about the crises at Fukushima. ..http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/10/25/the-global-threat-of-fukushima/
Japan opposition parties fail [fulfill?] their duty
Iran nuclear agreement- an intelligent step forward
The agreement struck at the weekend is a first step. In a year’s time, it may be seen as a small step and a brief, naive step at that. But for now it’s a step rife with historic possibilities; it’s a step that should be taken with caution but also with hope and gusto.
Iran nuclear agreement rich with possibilities The Age November 27, 2013 Fred KaplanThe accord struck with Iran may be temporary, perhaps even a naive step, but there’s nothing in it any sceptic The Iranian nuclear deal struck at the weekend is a triumph. It contains nothing that any American, Israeli or Arab skeptic could reasonably object to. Had George W. Bush negotiated this deal, Republicans would be hailing his diplomatic prowess, and rightly so.
It is an interim agreement, not a treaty (which means, among other things, that it doesn’t require Senate ratification). It is meant as a first step towards a comprehensive treaty to be negotiated in the next six months. More than that, it expires in six months. In other words, if Iran and the P5+1 nations (the US, Britain, France, Russia, and China plus Germany) can’t agree on a follow-on accord in six months, nobody is stuck with a deal that was never meant to be permanent. There is no opportunity for traps and trickery. Continue reading
Disturbing photographs of Russia’s nuclear decay in the Barents Sea
PHOTOGRAPHY This Island Holds The Decaying Remains Of The Soviet Nuclear Fleet, Gizmodo, 26 Nov 13 ASHLEY FEINBERG Whereas most ruins of decades past are often strictly off-limits, Russia’s Kildin island is a veritable petting zoo of the creepiest decaying military equipment you will ever get to see up close.
Located in the Barents Sea just 120km from Norway, the island is home to a host of used-up reactors and other parts from Soviet nuclear submarines. High-level radioactive waste is relegated to the island’s tunnels for long-term storage, so everything you’re seeing in these pictures consists of the low to intermediate level waste left scattered above ground. And according to one Soviet coastguard who witnessed the dumping in April of 1991, the level of safety precautions was “scandalous”.
Seeing the slow decay of these once-awesome feats of military prowess is oddly beautiful, if not totally creepy. Below are some of photographer Ralph Mirebs’s photographs of the Soviet ghost island, and you can the rest of his work over at English Russia……………… [English Russia] HTTP://WWW.GIZMODO.COM.AU/2013/11/THIS-ISLAND-HOLDS-THE-DECAYING-REMAINS-OF-THE-SOVIET-NUCLEAR-FLEET/#
6 deaths in explosion near Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project.
Explosion at Idinthakarai claims 6 lives, THE HINDU P. SUDHAKAR 26 NOV 13, Six persons, including two children and a woman, were killed and a few others injured seriously on Tuesday evening when country bombs exploded in a house at Tsunami Colony at Idinthakarai, the epicentre of protests against the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project.
Police fear the toll could rise as people might have been trapped under debris.
One presumption is that that the country bombs exploded when the miscreants were engaged in making a bomb in the house. Police suspect the explosion could be because of rivalry between two groups who hail from Kooththenkuzhi, about 6 km from Idinthakarai…….http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/tamil-nadu/5-killed-in-blast-at-hub-of-antikudankulam-protests/article5394541.ece
Scotland independence: Lizzie Windsor can stay – nukes gotta go
Independent Scotland would keep queen, dump nuclear deterrent
Yahoo 7 News November 27, 2013,Glasgow (AFP) – An independent Scotland would keep the pound and the British monarchy but establish its own defence force, First Minister Alex Salmond said Tuesday as he unveiled detailed proposals ahead of next year’s referendum……In a key commitment, the blueprint says an independent Scotland would no longer host Britain’s Trident nuclear missile deterrent…….http://au.news.yahoo.com/world/a/20030691/independent-scotland-would-keep-queen-dump-nuclear-deterrent/
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