Duty to Warn

As the US attempts to dig out from economic collapse, a little-known nuclear industry liability could seriously derail Obama's attempt to revive our finances.

It is the federal disaster insurance on 104 rickety atomic reactors. Because the industry cannot get its own insurance, we taxpayers are on the hook.

There is no "rainy day" fund to finance the clean-up after a reactor disaster. No one in government or industry can reasonably explain how we would pay for such a catastrophe.

Chernobyl's lethal cloud began pouring into the atmosphere 23 years ago this week. Dr. Alexey Yablokov, former environmental advisor to the late President Boris Yeltsin, and president of the Center for Russian Environmental Policy, estimates the death toll at 300,000.

It also gutted the regional economy, and accelerated the Soviet collapse. By conservative accounts Chernobyl's explosion has so far cost a half-trillion dollars, with its financial toll continuing to accrue.

A disaster at a US reactor could dwarf that number.

As President Obama enters his fourth month in office, two tendencies among progressive-minded Americans seem most hazardous to the political health of the country. The gist of one approach is that Obama can’t do anything seriously wrong; the other is that he can’t do anything seriously right.

Among the tendencies, the first is more widespread and more dangerous. All kinds of atrocious policies -- from Lyndon Johnson’s war on Vietnam to Jimmy Carter’s midterm swerve rightward to Bill Clinton’s neoliberal measures such as NAFTA, “welfare reform” and Wall Street deregulation -- were calamities facilitated by acquiescence or mild dissent from many left-leaning Democrats.

There are no headlines or pontificating pundits, but the real news that has become crystal clear to any but the most delusional and distracted Americans is that President Obama has no commitment to applying the rule of law where it counts. Certainly, not applying it to the large number of rich and powerful people that have violated our Constitution and plunged the nation into economic disaster.

Again and again we hear the flimsy argument from Obama and his top advisors that he wants to look forward and not backward. This is tortured logic when it comes to delivering justice in a nation supposedly cherishing the rule of law.

The fundamental logic of honoring and applying the rule of law fairly to absolutely everyone is that people who have broken the law in the past must be held accountable and placed into the justice system after they have misbehaved. In other words, there is no actionable rule of law other than by looking backward into past misdeeds. So how can rational and intelligent people follow the logic of Obama and still believe that he truly understands and honors the rule of law?

The prosecution of torturers has nothing to do with retribution or the politicization of policy differences and everything to do with honoring the sacrifice, in altogether too many cases the ultimate sacrifice, of our parents and relatives who defeated Nazi Germany in World War II. Our parents did not serve and sacrifice so Nazi tactics would be implemented, defended, admired, paid for, and rewarded by the United States Government.

As confirmed by a recent official unanimous bipartisan Senate report, the torture tactics of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan were brought to America by George W. Bush whose grandfather helped finance Hitler. George W. Bush is the fifth in a line of politicians who have betrayed our country.

First, Nelson Rockefeller, as Assistant Secretary of State for Latin American Affairs during World War II, arranged for the Standard Oil Company, in which he and his family held substantial amounts of stock, to sell oil to the Nazis through South America. This oil fueled the Nazi war machine which killed uniformed American soldiers, sailors, and aviators.

A catastrophe like Chernobyl could happen here. It's the radioactive core of the second biggest lie in US industrial history.

The atomic pushers say such a disaster is “impossible” at a US reactor. But Chernobyl's explosion spewed radiation all over the world. And Sunday’s tragic 23rd anniversary reminds us that any reactor on this planet can kill innumerable people anywhere, at any time, by terror, error and more.

It further clarifies why yet another grab at billions of taxpayer dollars for new reactor construction must be stopped NOW!

The BIGGEST lie in US industrial history is that “nobody died at Three Mile Island.” Just before last month’s thirtieth anniversary of the central Pennsylvania melt down, critical new evidence was completely ignored by the corporate media.

Nuclear engineer Arnie Gundersen, a former industry executive, reported in Harrisburg that new findings show far more radiation may have been released than previously estimated. Epidemiologist Stephen Wing of the University of North Carolina joined in a study indicating human health was indeed compromised downwind.

Sponsored by the Campus Republicans and a group called Young Life (America?), Karl Rove spoke to a subdued, mixed crowd numbering 200-300 at Denison University's Swasey Chapel.

I did see a vanity plate in the parking garage from New Jersey with that on it, as in YGLFAM or the like.

In a liberal arts college, the house was very civilized. The only outbreak was when a young fellow who had several male family military members involved in several wars asked Karl why we fight for human rights and then deny them for prisoners of war.

Karl spoke on the economy, and about his mistakes in the White House (should have gone for immigration stuff first then the Social Security), with the smirk of Cheney across his lips and nukular (sic) on the tongue. It was apparent he spent a lot of time with these guys. As to the specific content of his speech, it was main stream right, though not very condescending as one might presume. There were applauses from the right on their catch phrases.

Although many Americans have been hit hard by the continuing – and alarming – growth of unemployment, none have come close to being hit as devastatingly hard as the country’s African-American workers.

The unemployment rate among African-Americans is above 15 percent, more than twice the rate for white workers and almost 7 percent higher than the rate for African-American rate a year ago. The jobless include more than one-third of the African-Americans aged 16 to 19 who want and need jobs.

The figures come from a new report by the Center for American Progress, a think tank headed by John Podesta, the Georgetown University law professor who served as President Clinton’s chief of staff.

As bad as the situation is, the report says it “will likely only increase as the economic crisis deepens.”

Let me start by saying that I am as patriotic as the next guy and I stand respectfully during the playing of the National Anthem before sporting events.

I also like the policy embraced by all the Major League Baseball teams following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks of playing God Bless America at the start of the 7th inning stretch.

But patriotism, like faith, is a personal issue. And while fans should be encouraged to stand during the playing of both, it is beyond the authority of the ball clubs and the police to force anyone to participate.

A federal lawsuit filed by the New York Civil Liberties Union alleges that a fan was forcefully ejected from Yankee Stadium by uniformed cops when he decided to go to the restroom rather than remain in his seat for the playing of God Bless America.

Apparently the Yankees force this new tradition on their fans. And they use uniformed cops to enforce the rule.

What the Yankees, and the police, are doing, is actually unpatriotic. And runs contrary to what this nation is about.