Editorial: GOP’s credibility gap

Friday, Feb. 13, 2004 | 5:31 a.m.

WEEKEND EDITION

Feb. 14 - 15, 2004

During the 2000 campaign, George W. Bush said that if he was elected president, "sound science" would determine whether the federal government would move ahead with plans to bury 77,000 tons of nuclear waste in Southern Nevada. But residents of Nevada, a hotly contested state that Bush won, ruefully found out otherwise when in 2002 Congress approved Bush's plan to seek a license to open the dump at Yucca Mountain. Last week Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie, during a visit to Nevada, defended President Bush's decision, saying the president "has been true" to Nevadans regarding his 2000 campaign pledge. Come again?

"What the president said is if we are going to do this, let's do it right -- do it the proper way and do it in a way that makes sure all the proper measures are taken for a permanent site," Gillespie said. Bush did it right, all right -- for the nuclear power industry, a big contributor to his campaign. If the president had truly weighed all the evidence, he would have stopped the dump because of all the dangers created by shipping the waste cross-country and burying it in a geologically unfit site. In contrast to Bush, Sen. John Kerry, who very likely will be the Democrats' presidential nominee, voted against the dump.

We understand that Gillespie is trying to put the best face on a decision that Nevadans hate, but insulting our intelligence will only further hurt the president's credibility in Nevada.