Columnist Jeff German: It’s time for GOP to get a backbone

Friday, March 25, 2005 | 10:02 a.m.

Jeff German's column appears Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays in the Sun. Reach him at german@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4067.

It was only a matter of time before fallout from the wounded Yucca Mountain Project reached President Bush.

It came this week from an unlikely source -- Lt. Gov. Lorraine Hunt, a Republican candidate for governor who is known for attracting business to Nevada rather than pointing out the dangers of storing nuclear waste here.

In the wake of revelations that government scientists may have falsified documents to move the much-delayed project along, Hunt sent a letter Wednesday to Bush urging him to re-evaluate the evidence he used in 2002 to recommend sending the deadly waste our way.

Hunt told the president the revelations "put serious doubts on the truth and accuracy of the sound science" the president relied upon.

They were strong words that no other ranking Nevada Republican has managed to put in writing for the president's eyes.

"This is very encouraging," says Bob Loux, the state's chief Yucca Mountain watchdog. "A good case can be made that the president was duped by the Energy Department.

"There's an opening here for him to basically move away from the decision if he wants to."

No one, however, is willing to bet that Bush will listen to Hunt -- who's not even her party's front-runner for governor -- and change his mind about Yucca Mountain in the immediate future.

But imagine the motivation the president would have to take another look at the stalled project if other top Nevada Republicans, from Gov. Kenny Guinn on down, started putting more public pressure on the president when the opportunity arose.

Even as Hunt was composing her letter on Tuesday, her fellow Republicans missed another chance to confront the administration directly about Yucca Mountain.

Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., and other GOP leaders let Vice President Dick Cheney come to Reno without facing a single question about the reported rigging of scientific evidence at the project.

It was a replay of what happened during the 2004 president race, when Bush and Cheney stumped in Nevada many times without having to be held accountable for their decision to make us the nation's nuclear waste dumping ground.

Bush ended up winning our five electoral votes and his re-election over a Democratic challenger who had vowed to kill Yucca Mountain if he got to the White House.

Just as in the campaign, reporters in Reno Tuesday weren't allowed to question Cheney, and the Ensign-led Republicans baby-sitting the vice president didn't lift a finger to put him on the hot seat.

The Republicans showed the lack of backbone we've come to expect from them in this fight since Bush was first elected in 2000.

Once more they made us look like fools.

"They've helped the president carry the state twice, and he's done nothing but screw us ever since," says former Democratic Gov. Bob Miller.

And the president will continue to screw us until Nevada Republicans have the courage to stand up to him when it counts.