USA Today has a regular left-right feature between hard-right pundit Cal Thomas and TV “liberal” Bob Beckel. Today’s topic? Nuclear power. And the verdict? Well, the headline tells you all you need to know.
Knee-Jerks and Nukes
Cal and Bob agree that despite the chorus of hand-wringers, it would be foolish to give up on nuclear power plants in the wake of Japan’s tragedy
To give you a sense of the seriousness of the discussion, here’s Beckel criticizing Joe Lieberman:
Bob: I grew up in his home state near one of the country’s oldest nuclear power plants (the Connecticut Yankee plant), and in all its years of operation–like virtually every other nuclear plant in the world–not a single life-threatening event has occurred.
Cal: And you told me you used to swim in the warm water generated by that plant. No wonder you became a liberal!
I had heard Cal Thomas was funny, but not that funny.
Thank you for reminding me why I seldom if ever read the MSM, especially its idiot offspring like “USA Today” and its ilk. They take a complex issue, touch ONLY on the ‘sensational’ aspects, throw in a lot of ‘personality’ (seemed like Beckel & Thomas should ‘get a room’ rather than pretend to ‘debate’), support the prevailing status-quo conservative view, launch a few facts, and that’s it. And of course you can expect these ‘debaters’ to NEVER mention an anti-capitalist idea like reduced population/reduced consumption/downsizing as PART of the solution to our increasing energy needs. Even a simple reading of Wikipedia will easily give you a way more intelligent discussion — pro and con — than something smarmy like this.
For instance, Wikipedia states that the Chernobyl accident “… killed 56 people directly, and caused an estimated 4,000 additional cases of fatal cancer, as well as damaging approximately $7 billion of property. Radioactive fallout from the accident was concentrated in areas of Belarus, Ukraine and Russia. Approximately 350,000 people were forcibly resettled away from these areas soon after the incident. Recent estimations say that between 400,000 and 500,000 inhabitants (when including unborn children) near Kiev province had been exposed to a comparatively high dose of radiation, and there’s a possibility of developing cancer, leukemia and DNA malformation in the next 10 to 40 years” which is LOT more dire than Beckel (much less Cal Thomas) portrays it. Nor is there any mention of the problem of storage of nuclear waste, the huge costs (even with the favorable insurance rates the plants historically get), or the possibility of sabotage/terrorism (recall that Bhopal was employee sabotage by a disgruntled employee). Yes, much of this hasn’t happened YET, but as our US economic condition continues to deteriorate, it’s not hard to envision ‘cost cutting’ of privatized nuke plants (by some young exec taking the fast-track to ‘the top’?) and cutting corners resulting in more accidents (and you’d only need a major one near NYC, for instance, to affect 5 or 10 MILLION people).
Another “Black Swan” and other styles of BS.
How many failures are tolerable? Zero comes to mind as the appropriate number claimed by the industry itself. All failures beyond zero are unpredicted “Black Swans”.
These “unforeseen” failures occur far more widely and frequently than predicted by experts. They are not limited to nuclear and economic meltdowns. Expert assurances are always subject to both styles of BS.
With all the tax money used to subsidize nukes,oil and coal,we could have had safe wind,solar and geothermal and had money left over.
â┚¬Ã…½”5. Don’t let anyone — in industry, government, or the media — define an “acceptable level of risk” for your own death or disease. They may not have the same vested interest in the right answer as you do.” -Sam Smith, A Poker Player’s Guide To Environmental Risk Assessment
For your consideration:
Let’s put four nuclear reactors in close proximity. This means that when the area around one reactor must be evacuated of critical personnel due to a critical failure, then the remaining three will be left unattended to operate by themselves. That kind of non-planning results from the great faith that no failure is possible. This faith is not a plan but a gamble.
Not being able to see a problem is not evidence of the non-existence of a problem.
There is no acceptable amount of ionized radiation. Beyond the normal back ground radiation we evolved in this is a critical factor.
Also many people are suffering from the Chernobyl disaster as far away as Sweden even today. Many more cancers of all kinds and birth defects. Its cumulative and damages the DNA.
Nuclear Power = Death, Leukemia, and numerous other human defects. Ask survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and Chernobl! And now Fukushima! Lest we forget, Three Mile Island!
Today water in Main had higher than usual readings do to the Japanese accident. There is no acceptable level of radiation exposure as has been stated by bloggers above.None comes to mind.This is a bad play and the end has not been written.Sobering
There are orphanages in Russia made up of kids born of parents exposed to radiation from Chernobyl. Many are bedridden with their brains lying outside of their head. As well as all forms of deformities of their skeletons. Some have barely functioning organs. These orphanages have kids that their parents basically just abandoned to these dire places of a poor environment when they found out about their children’s defects. These kids will never know the love and devotion of their parents nor will they feel the physical affection from their parents to the children. There are some dedicated caregivers to these kids but they are few and far between and many of them suffer from a kind of emotional burnout, or a sense of dealing with a hopeless situation that will never get better. These homes are overwhelmed with these poor children in age ranges from infants on up. It is such a sad reality. And Chernobyl had only a partial meldown. And look at all the damages inflicted on so many. And of course the most vulnerable suffer the most. There have been in the US many somewhat minor accidents at Nuclear power plant sites that the news coverage of has been very sparse.
Obama’s solution is to put more subsidy guarantees for nuclear plants in the future. The Rethugnuts applaud him for this, in spite of the fact that Wall Street investors will not touch the nuclear industry with investments with a ten foot pole. It has been verified that the true cost of these plants will be overshadowed by the amount of energy gotten from these plants, in no way justifies the expense of building them in the first place.
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