Sunday, February 3rd, 2013
Stephan: Several readers sent me different versions of this story and, at first, I thought this is not possible. These stories are some kind of urban legend. But, to my amazement, it turns out this is true. It is hard to believe anyone, even the greediest, could be this stupid. But there you are.
I urge you to contact your Representative and Senators, and to sign the petition. This DOE plan is stupidity at an almost surreal level.
On a vital radioactive waste battlefront, NIRS has put out an alert against a scheme to ‘recycle’ vast quantities of radioactive metal from across the nuclear weapons complex into the consumer product recycling stream. NIRS asks, ‘Will the next zipper on your pants be radioactive? How about your silverware?’, and explains:
‘The Department of Energy wants to mix radioactive metal from nuclear weapons factories with clean recycled metal and let it enter into general commerce–where it could be used for any purpose.
It’s a foot in the door for revival of a vast–and discredited–radioactive waste deregulation plan defeated in 1992.
You can help stop them here.’
Please take action at the NIRS links above. NIRS’ Diane D’Arrigo has also posted more extensive talking points that you can use to write your own comments to DOE.
In an article entitled ‘Nuclear weapons waste in your hip replacement?’, John LaForge of Nukewatch reports, U.S. Representative Ed Markey (D-MA) — who is now running for the U.S. Senate seat vacated by John Kerry as he becomes Secretary of State — has sent a strongly worded letter to Secretary of Energy Steven Chu, expressing opposition to the so-called ‘recycling’ scheme.
John LaForge has also pointed out, in an article posted […]
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Sunday, February 3rd, 2013
Office of Representative Ed Markey, - United States Congress
Stephan: Here is the press release sent out by Representative Markey's office.
WASHINGTON — A Department of Energy proposal to allow up to 14,000 metric tons of its radioactive scrap metal to be recycled into consumer products was called into question today by Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) due to concerns over public health. In a letter sent to DOE head Steven Chu, Rep. Markey expressed ‘grave concerns
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Sunday, February 3rd, 2013
Stephan: Yesterday I went to a small gathering my friend Rick Ingrasci organized and listened to one of the lead authors of the IPCC climate reports talk about about how The American Geophysical Union, the world's largest professional association of scientists studying climate, is planning to hold a conference in San Francisco to try and figure out how to get the public and politicians to understand how really desperate the situation is. We are, he said, befuddled, by what we see as the willful ignorance of policy makers. We don't understand why our alarms have so little effect.
But what really caught my attention was this: We could make the transition from a carbon based energy system to a non-carbon based system for about two per cent of the American GNP. When I talked with him I pointed out that we now spend each year about 17 per cent of our GNP on the illness profit system. So, if what he was saying was accurate, and I trust both his passion and his proven expertise, then if we could achieve approximately a 12 per cent reduction in healthcare costs we could pay for the whole energy transition.
The reduction plus the cost would mean that the total would be no more than we are paying now. Inasmuch as the French pay 11 per cent of their GNP to have the best healthcare in the world, and we pay 17 per cent to get the 37th worst healthcare, it is clear that the only thing stopping the transition is the corruption of our Congress, and the greed of the uber-rich and the corporations they control. Think about that insight.
Nothing is going to save us but ourselves. If you value your children's and grandchildrens' lives you better start working and organizing your friends to make your voice heard through voting and social activism.
And here is the realpolitik truth as I see it: The Red value states are not going to wake up to the coming disaster in time, so the Blue value states have to overwhelm them, by changing election financing laws, and voting for men and women with fact based world views, and enough integrity and guts to see this change through.
The alternative is the end of world as we now know it.
-- Stephan
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Saturday, February 2nd, 2013
GILLIAN FLACCUS, - U-T San Diego
Stephan: It appears that finally, however tentatively, the firewall that has protected the hierarchy of the Roman church is beginning to crack. As noted in the report, this is not quite what it may seem, but I do think it shows it is no longer going to be possible for the Church to protect its aristocracy.
LOS ANGELES — Retired Cardinal Roger Mahony, the former head of the nation’s largest Roman Catholic diocese, was stripped of his duties Thursday by his successor as the Los Angeles archdiocese released thousands of pages of personnel files of priests accused of child molestation.
‘I find these files to be brutal and painful reading,’ Archbishop Jose Gomez said in a statement, referring to the newly released files made public by the church Thursday night just hours after a judge’s order. ‘The behavior described in these files is terribly sad and evil. There is no excuse, no explaining away what happened to these children.’
Gomez announced that he has ‘informed Cardinal Mahony that he will no longer have any administrative or public duties.’
The archbishop also said Monsignor Thomas Curry, former vicar of the clergy who was Mahony’s point person for dealing with priests accused of molestation, has stepped down from his post as head of the diocese’s Santa Barbara region.
The public denouncement of Mahony and Curry was highly unusual and marks a shift from the days when members of the church hierarchy emerged largely unscathed for the roles they played in covering up clergy sex abuse, said the Rev. Thomas Reese, a Jesuit […]
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Saturday, February 2nd, 2013
JEFFREY M. JONES, - The Gallup Organization
Stephan: It becomes increasingly clear that Southern white men, in everything from guns, to the Theocratic Right, to the suppression of women are the source of the problem. This really is disturbing to me, although not surprising when I look back on the Southern men I have known, because I am a married older White man from Virginia. Yet the data cannot be denied.
PRINCETON, NJ — Men are three times more likely than women to personally own guns, representing one of the largest demographic differences in gun ownership, according to an analysis of Gallup polls from 2007 to 2012. Gun ownership also varies significantly by region, with Southerners more likely to own guns than those living in other regions of the United States. Marriage is also a strong predictor of gun ownership.
These findings are based on aggregated data from six separate Gallup polls that asked about gun ownership — one each year from 2007 through 2012. The analyses presented here are based on interviews with more than 6,000 U.S. adults.
Across those six data sets, an average of 30% of Americans said they personally own a gun. Another 14% did not personally own a gun but live in a household with someone who does. The results presented here focus mainly on personal gun ownership, though the demographic patterns are similar among the larger group of Americans living in gun households.
In addition to gender, Southern residence, and marital status, personal gun ownership also varies significantly by age, race, and political ideology.
Non-Hispanic whites (33%) are significantly more likely than nonwhites (22%) to […]
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