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StumblePublished Thursday, March 5, 2009 | 4:46 p.m.
Updated Thursday, March 5, 2009 | 5:35 p.m.
Sun Topics
WASHINGTON -- Republican Sen. John McCain drew a swift response from Nevada on Thursday after he criticized the Obama administration’s intention to substantially scale back funding for the proposed Yucca Mountain waste dump.
The former Republican presidential candidate's comments were a reminder of the starkly different views he and his one-time rival for the White House, President Barack Obama, hold on the Yucca Mountain issue.
Rep. Shelley Berkley said, “Senator McCain has been shameless in pushing to turn Nevada into a toxic radioactive garbage dump.”
McCain's comments came during a spirited exchange as he questioned Stephen Chu, Obama’s energy secretary, at a Senate hearing on the Hill, according to the Associated Press.
"What's wrong with Yucca Mountain, Mr. Chu?" McCain asked, according to the AP.
"I think we can do a better job," replied the Nobel Prize-wining physicist.
Chu said Yucca Mountain was not an option for storing spent nuclear fuel.
Earlier this week, the Sun reported that several prominent pro-Yucca Republicans are planning to fight the administration’s plans to back off Yucca Mountain.
Without mentioning McCain, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid welcomed Chu’s commitment to do away with Yucca.
“I am pleased that President Obama and Secretary Chu are holding firm on their commitment to kill the dump,” Reid said.
Reid and the Obama administration are working with the nuclear industry to develop alternatives to Yucca. Some want a blue ribbon committee to devise a new plan.
“Along with the Obama administration and leaders in industry, I will be working in the coming months to determine the best way to deal with the nation's nuclear waste," Reid said.
Hmmm....what do you know, something I actually agree with Senator Reid on. Truly amazing!
I wish the non-thinking sheep that listen to the lies coming from Harry "We lost the War" Reid would WAKE UP!!!!
What Reid, and apparently now his puppets in Obama and Chu, are doing will simply result in massive lawsuits against the government and cause delay in the next fleet of nuclear power reactors -- And all of the energy independence from foreign oil and jobs that come with them!!!
What better place for the repository than on government land, protected by Nellis Airforce Base, near the unuseable lands of the nuclear test site???
NIMBY issues may delay the selection of a new repository for another 20 years... What will it take to force the issue??? Maybe when one of the many temporary storage pads at a nuclear plant leaks into the ground waters near a major city, or God forbid, dispersed by a terrorist attack near that big city -- Then I'm sure people will wish the material was sent to Yucca Mountain!!!
We need to campaign against Reid's fear mongering insanity that has this state completely hoodwinked. We need the Yucca Mountain for so many good reasons -- a primary one now is to help the Nevada economy and save jobs!!! Besides, IT IS THE LAW!!!
Dirty Harry has done NOTHING to help the Nevada economy and now he's trying to kill a $100 Billion income stream from the Yucca Mountain Project; some thousands of jobs now and in the future; the only job in Nevada for highly educated, highly trained workers; and put enough homes on the market in Summerlin to quickly turn it into Slummerlin...
If the public was properly informed about the Yucca Mountain Project, I'm sure more and more people would be for it. Let's put it on a Ballot for a vote!
Reid should have worked with the Government to make Yucca an advanced center for Nuclear Power, Nuclear Waste, Nuclear Fuel Reprocessing, and even solar and wind farms.
But no, the monster ego of this truly little man is single handedly destroying Nevada while he lines his pockets from his shady dealings...
And then there are his infuriating recent commercials... Every word of them is a lie as he tries to gain our votes once again....
Just say "NO" to Harry in 2010 !!!!!
Ty Cobb is the ONLY Nevada politician with his head NOT firmed planted in Harry's butt! I hope he will challenge Harry in 2010!!!
All,
For information on how to fight Harry on his farcical "Don Quixote"-like quest to kill Yucca Mountain, please see: www.yuccamatters.com
I would like to thank the nuclear industry for its fine post above. Please tell them that nuclear power actually could be a good thing, and if they would research how to dispose of waste they could help us all a lot, but instead they have spent a quarter of a century lying about Yucca Mountain and buying lies about Yucca Mountain, and for that reason, they--you--have sacrificed all right to credibility on this issue.
By the way, one of the more amusing aspects of this is Sherm Frederick throwing praise around on his blog to everyone who helped kill this, including Jim Gibbons, who was about as useful as the 16th Cadillac in an unemployment office's fleet. He neglected to mention the great desire of John McCain, whom his alleged newspaper endorsed and who it still thinks may be president, to send us nuclear waste, and the lies he was spewing in the last couple of days about the dump and Nevada. But, we should be grateful for small favors, I guess.
Who is this Michael Green idiot?
Virtually all of the scientific work on Yucca was done during the Clinton Administration. That's a fact. For political reasons the Clinton administration held off making the site suitability announcement, but the information was collected and the site was determined to be suitable while he was President. I know -- I worked there and by the way I'm a Democrat.
I have challenged Green to say something fact based about Yucca and he never does instead he makes general attacks on the credibility of statements made by people who actually know what they are talking about. It is very clear that Green has formed his opinions about Yucca and nuclear technolgy in general based on reading the nonsense generated by Nevada politicians and the popular press in Nevada. There is no indication whatsoever that he has a clue about what is really going on -- no sense of context or history.
The man has listened to the screw Nevada drivel for far too long -- probaly doesn't know that it is nonsense. Nevada actually invited the federal government to NOT look at any other sites. In 1975 the State of Nevada, Clark County and others in no uncertain terms told the federal government that the Nevada Test Site was a well understood, excellent location for a repository with a world class work force to undertake this responsibilty. The State actually discouraged the federal government from looking at other sites. Dick Bryan voted for the resolution. Fast forward to 1986 after years of scientific study the federal government decides to do exactly what Nevada requested 10 year earlier. There has been a great deal of spinning and revising of history, but Yucca has always been about science.
You know what would stimulate our state's economy? I think a $100 billion project would and that is exactly what the repository is at Yucca Mountain. I wonder if Senator Reid is just trying to take advantage of all the impressive reprocessing research being done at the UNLV Center for Environmental Studies that bears his name. Reprocessing is the way to go - nuclear isn't going away - emission free sources provide only 30% of our electricity and three fourths of that comes from our over 100 nuclear power plants but that gets lost in the green translation. Green is good and I think we should turn Yucca Mountain around to diversify our economy and I mean green as in dollars as part of a significant benefits package that includes health and safety assurances. Our state's opposition is based on politics and the rhetoric of fear but is that a responsible approach to a scientific project?
Ok. I just watched the testimony online and witnessed the Secretary of Energy demonstrate that he knows zero about the science of yucca mountain. He refers over and over again to the idea of "solidification" of commercial spent nuclear fuel at each reactor location as the solution to the waste management issue. I listened over and over again to make sure I heard this correctly. I made sure he wasn't talking about defense waste or how one has to deal with waste after it is recycled and sure enough he wasn't. This is truly amazing. Anyone who knows anything about the subject knows that spent fuel is a solid ceramic pellet stacked in a solid steel rod. How is it possible that the Secretary of Energy doesn't understand this basic fact? How can challenge the result of 25 years of amazing scientific work at Yucca and not know this incredibly basic fact? Very scary.
I will tell you what, all you have to do is look at last week to demonstrate that Yucca is not a good site for the nuclear waste. There was an earthquake in the northern part of the valley and we had an idiot driving a truck too fast and dumped his explosive material all over the city's street. Let's think about it, the Yucca Mts. are one of the most ACTIVE areas in the U.S. We cannot think in the time lengths that this material will be dangerous. You Pro-Dump people are probably OLD. You won't have to live with your short-sightedness. The young and the unborn will have to deal with it. Another example of old people putting off the hard decisions onto the youth of this country. You wonder why the young people are doing the things we read about everyday? You don't give them a future that they can believe in. You should move to Arizona and ask McCain to bury the waste near Tombstone, Arizona. There isn't much out there (unless you count people and living things). Kind of like the area near Yucca Mt., huh?
I would provide facts--the way the nuclear power industry bought off assorted scientists, the geologic issues that have been ignored, the fact that it was not until after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, that a longtime proponent of nuclear energy who had been named secretary of energy in conjunction with a president whose record makes Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton look moral chose the site without any additional scientific evidence having come in. But bag appears to have delusions of persecution--I don't remember ever seeing him or her challenge me to say anything about this subject, and if I have posted on this before, it has been so rare that I don't happen to remember it. Which suggests that bag may be, like me, a Democrat, but bag's wheels have come off much in the same way that the Republican party has.
Hey Impeach Reed;
Anyone who reads these comments know that you are really jnance. "A rose by any name".
You cheer Gubbons and the gop. You live in Reno. Move to Vegas next to the UP tracks and then spout your nonsense.
In keeping with Sen Reid's move to keep Nevada jobs for criminal invaders and good paying jobs out, The Yucca mountain project must die.
Most in Las Vegas fail to realize that all water has been filtered thru uranium deposits in the Grand canyon and lake Meade along with the deposits in the Las Vegas valley.
If Yucca mountain was active there would be at least 1000 more good paying jobs in Nevada.
Reid is an embarrassment to Nevada and the nation.
Wouldn't allowing a dump at Yucca be like prostituting our future in health and welfare? I would rather keep my appendages connected to my torso.
If McCain is so bent on saving our nation, why dosen't he bury it in Arizona if the process is so safe. He's got plenty of desert to choose a spot.