nuclear-news

TODAY. Right Wing politics – are they getting cold feet about nuclear power?

It is a truth universally acknowledged that the political Right are pretty stupid. (At least, here in Australia, I can vouch for that.)

But, on the subject of nuclear power, there seems to be a glimmer of light emerging. And that is confusing to the onlooker.

Up until now, one could depend on Right-wing media and politicians to be firmly united in praising nuclear power (it’s safe, clean, cheap, solves climate change, solves energy problems, has no connection with weapons etc etc). Meanwhile the political Left are a bit less stupid, (have a few reservations about nuclear power – mainly cost) and on their extreme Left, actually oppose it.

We knew where we all stood. But now – there’s a weakening among the previously sturdy Right.

Dwayne Yancey in his thoughtful article ‘The Complicated Politics of Nuclear Power” points out that in the USA 37% of Republicans oppose nuclear power, and in Virginia, a strongly religious Republican Delegate, Marie March, opposes plans for “a sacrifice zone” of small nuclear reactors there.

In the UK, Sanjoy Sen, writing in Conservative Home, raises serious doubts about nuclear power plans, and raises the possibility that someone might “get cold feet and cancel all that”. He rather ominously warns “what can we learn from our French neighbours, the world’s biggest nuclear enthusiasts?” [nuclear power is failing in France] He does go on to parrot out the widely believed dogma that small nuclear reactors are the answer to everything. But still his article shows a definite chink in Right wing belief in the rightness of nuclear power.

December 7, 2022 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | 2 WORLD, Christina's notes, politics