Blog Smith is inspired by the myth of Hephaestus in the creation of blacksmith-like, forged materials: ideas. This blog analyzes topics that interest me: IT, politics, technology, history, education, music, and the history of religions.
While exposed spent fuel rods at the failing nuclear reactors in Japan pose new threats, the worst-case scenario would still be unlikely to expose the public to catastrophic amounts of radiation, says a University of Michigan nuclear engineering professor who is an expert on this particular kind of reactor.
"For the public, I don't believe it would be much higher than two additional chest x-rays," said John Lee, a professor in the Department of Nuclear Engineering and Radiological Sciences, citing the results of the Three Mile Island accident.
While the event appears to have progressed beyond Three Mile Island, Lee said that during that 1979 incident in Harrisburg, Penn., two chest X-rays were the worst radiation exposure experienced by plant workers. The public was exposed to much less.
Lee worked at General Electric during the time the company was making the type of boiling water reactor at the Fukushima plant. His book, "Risk and Safety Analysis of Nuclear Systems," will be published in May.
Spent fuel, which is fuel that has already been used but still retains a level of radioactivity, is a new concern, says Thomas Downar, a professor in the Department of Nuclear Engineering and Radiological Sciences.
"The worst thing that could happen now is the fuel rods could be exposed to the air and that could be, then, down to our last barrier," Downar said. "We could not have a recriticality, or a nuclear explosion. It's physically impossible in this kind of system."
Lee and Downar are among the professors in the No. 1-ranked University of Michigan Department of Nuclear Engineering and Radiological Sciences who are studying the technical issues involved in the emergency situation in Japan.
While the researchers understand that the situation is serious, they stress that a "meltdown" does not necessarily mean a major release of harmful radiation, and that the situation, while dire, is still more a kin to Three Mile Island than Chernobyl. A Chernobyl type of explosion is impossible in these plants, Lee said.
The new generation of nuclear reactors in the United States, the researchers say, are equipped with "passive" technologies that allow them to be cooled even during power blackouts. Water does not need to be pumped in, which has been a challenge in Japan.
Experts from the department of Nuclear Engineering and Radiological Sciences at Michigan Engineering discuss some of the critical issues surrounding the nuclear emergency in Japan.
Joseph Mason, author of “The Economic Cost of a Moratorium on Offshore Oil and Gas Exploration to the Gulf Region,” estimated that the new regional job losses due to the moratorium on offshore oil production in the Gulf region is now 13,000 – up from his original estimate of 8,000.
Mason also estimated the national job losses to have increased from 12,000 to 19,000; regional wage losses to be $800 million, up from $500 million; national wage losses to be $1.1 billion, up from $700 million; lost tax revenues on the state and local level to be $155 million, up from $100 million; and lost tax revenues on the national level to be $350 million, up from $200 million.
US: B-2 stealth bombers; EA-18G Growler and AV-8B Harrier aircraft; destroyers USS Barry and USS Stout firing Tomahawk cruise missiles; amphibious assault ship USS Kearsage; command and control vessel USS Mount Whitney; submarines
The former SEIU official, Stephen Lerner, spoke in a closed session at a Pace University forum last weekend.
[...]
Lerner said that unions and community organizations are, for all intents and purposes, dead. The only way to achieve their goals, therefore--the redistribution of wealth and the return of "$17 trillion" stolen from the middle class by Wall Street--is to "destabilize the country."
Lerner's plan is to organize a mass, coordinated "strike" on mortgage, student loan, and local government debt payments--thus bringing the banks to the edge of insolvency and forcing them to renegotiate the terms of the loans. This destabilization and turmoil, Lerner hopes, will also crash the stock market, isolating the banking class and allowing for a transfer of power.
Lerner's plan starts by attacking JP Morgan Chase in early May, with demonstrations on Wall Street, protests at the annual shareholder meeting, and then calls for a coordinated mortgage strike.
Lerner also says explicitly that, although the attack will benefit labor unions, it cannot be seen as being organized by them. It must therefore be run by community organizations.
Lerner was ousted from SEIU last November, reportedly for spending millions of the union's dollars trying to pursue a plan like the one he details here. It is not clear what, if any, power and influence he currently wields. His main message--that Wall Street won the financial crisis, that inequality in this country is hitting record levels, and that there appears to be no other way to stop the trend--will almost certainly resonate.
U.S. Congressman Bill Flores (R-TX) serves as a Member on the House Budget and Natural Resources Committees. Before retiring to pursue public service, Flores served as CFO for a number of successful energy companies and ultimately became the CEO and president of Phoenix Exploration Company. He has 30 years of experience in the energy industry, including oil field services, as well as exploration and production.
"If this was so grave, Congress is still in session. The President could have said 'don't go home, I've got to talk to you about what's happening here. I may need your approval.' This is about the Constitution and if we don't abide by our Constitution, everything falls apart here. This is about the Constitution, not about whether you like President Obama or not. I like President Obama, but I love the Constitution," Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) said on FOX News this morning.
Kucinich quoted President Obama from 2007, where he said the President "does not have the power," according to the Constitution, to attack without Congressional approval:
"The President does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation," Obama said in 2007.
"Well, we're in Libya because of oil. And I think both Japan and the nuclear technology and Libya and this dependence that we have upon imported oil have both once again highlighted the need for the United States to have a renewable energy agenda going forward," Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA) said on MSNBC.
John Bolton believes the only acceptable outcome in Libya is Qaddafi's removal from power.
“It’s a slippery slope that does set a precedent.”
So says Fox News contributor and foreign policy expert KT McFarland about Obama’s decision to intervene in Libya and not other countries experiencing unrest.
According to McFarland, the action could mark the start of “a new kind of war,” in which the U.S. inserts itself into a “civil war” aimed at changing not a government in general but rather its policies.
MARCH 19, 2003
BUSH: 'American and coalition forces are in the early stages of military operations to disarm Iraq, to free its people and to defend the world from grave danger.'
MARCH 19, 2011
OBAMA: 'Today we are part of a broad coalition. We are answering the calls of a threatened people. And we are acting in the interests of the United States and the world.'
Once and future Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Iraqi President Saddam Hussein shake hands December 20, 1983 in Baghdad, Iraq. Rumsfeld met with Hussein during the war between Iran and Iraq as an envoy for former US President Ronald Reagan. (Photo by Getty Images)
Obama and Muammar Gaddafi in 2009.
“The President does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation.”
— Senator Barack Hussein Obama, December 20, 2007, Boston.com
James Madison was very clear on why the founders vested the Legislature and not the Executive with the power to declare war:
"The Constitution expressly and exclusively vests in the Legislature the power of declaring a state of war [and] the power of raising armies. A delegation of such powers [to the president] would have struck, not only at the fabric of our Constitution, but at the foundation of all well organized and well checked governments. The separation of the power of declaring war from that of conducting it, is wisely contrived to exclude the danger of its being declared for the sake of its being conducted.”
Author, Samantha Power, and her husband, Cass Sunstein, wrote a book which may provide insight into Obama's war escalation. Power currently sits on the National Security Council, and she was counseling Obama this week when he decided to take action in Libya. But nine years ago she wrote the Pulitzer Prize-winning book “A Problem From Hell: American and the Age of Genocide.”
Power describes America’s (and then President Bill Clinton’s) early approach to the mid-90s conflict in Bosnia:
But American resolve soon wilted. Saving Bosnian lives was not deemed worth risking U.S. soldiers or challenging America’s European allies who wanted to remain neutral. Clinton and his team shifted from the language of genocide to that of “tragedy” and “civil war,” downplaying public expectations that there was anything the United States could do. Secretary of State Warren Christopher had never been enthusiastic about U.S. involvement in the Balkans.
As hinted in that passage, and as is made clear later in the book, Power scoffs at the idea that committing U.S. forces, and risking U.S. soldiers, may not be in the best interest of the United States.
In her conclusion, she writes:
The United States should stop genocide for two reasons. The first and most compelling reason is moral. When innocent life is being taken on such a scale and the United States has the power to stop the killing at reasonable risk, it has a duty to act. It is this belief that motivates most of those who seek intervention. But history has shown that the suffering of victims has rarely been sufficient to get the United States to intervene.
The second reason, Power continues, is a round-about form of “self interest.” Channeling the advice of others before her she says, “They warned that allowing genocide undermined regional and international stability, created militarized refugees, and signaled dictators that hate and murder were permissible tools of statecraft.”
From the sound of Obama’s speech on Friday, it is evident Power has his ear. His reasoning for Libyan intervention was a paraphrase of Power’s conclusion:
Now, here’s why this matters to us. Left unchecked, we have every reason to believe that Qaddafi would commit atrocities against his people [Power's first point]. Many thousands could die. A humanitarian crisis would ensue. The entire region could be destabilized, endangering many of our allies and partners [Power's second point]. The calls of the Libyan people for help would go unanswered. The democratic values that we stand for would be overrun. Moreover, the words of the international community would be rendered hollow. [Emphasis added]
There are those who disagree with Power and her interventionist doctrine. There is a balance between protecting U.S interests and going “in search of monsters to destroy,” as John Quincy Adams once put it.
Daniel Ellsberg's anti-war speech
Anti-war activist Daniel Ellsberg, author of the Pentagon Papers, arrested.
Navy Releases First Video of Tomahawk Missiles Launched at Libya
Democrat Woodrow Wilson sent American forces to Europe in 1917 not for concrete American interests but for the hazy notion of making the world "safe for democracy." 100,000 were killed.
Democrat Franklin Roosevelt wanted involvement, but public opinion would not allow him to send troops when the British were being bombarded by the Luftwaffe in 1940. When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, Congress rightly declared war on them; but commander-in-chief Roosevelt committed American forces first to North Africa, then to Italy, then to Germany. Japan, the only Axis power to actually attack the U.S., was defeated last. 400,000 Americans were killed.
Democrat Harry Truman sent American forces to defend South Korea after communist North Korea invaded in 1950. The communists believed they had a green light to attack when Truman's Secretary of State Dean Acheson failed to include South Korea in America's defense "perimeter." Truman refused to use nuclear weapons to save American lives. End result: 50,000 American dead for a stalemate. Sixty years later, communist North Korea is still there, and now it has nuclear weapons.
Democrat John Kennedy began American involvement in Vietnam, and Democrat Lyndon Johnson escalated the war, sending 500,000 American troops. End result: 58,000 American dead, and a humiliating withdrawal.
Democrat Bill Clinton sent American warplanes to bomb Serbia, which never attacked us; and on Dec. 16, 1998 (which just happened to be the night before he was to be impeached) Clinton ordered four days of bombing missions against Iraq.
Bush continued Clinton's policy against Iraq and Congress approved the Iraq War. The Iraq Resolution or the Iraq War Resolution (formally the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002, Pub.L. 107-243, 116 Stat. 1498, enacted October 16, 2002, H.J.Res. 114) is a joint resolution passed by the United States Congress in October 2002 as Public Law No: 107-243, authorizing the Iraq War.
The BGM-109 Tomahawk is a long-range, all-weather, subsonic cruise missile. Introduced by General Dynamics in the 1970s, it was designed as a medium- to long-range, low-altitude missile that could be launched from a submerged submarine. It has been improved several times and, by way of corporate divestitures and acquisitions, is now made by Raytheon. Some Tomahawks were also manufactured by McDonnell Douglas (now Boeing Defense, Space & Security).
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Info World: Information Technology News, Computer Networking & Security;
Information Week: Business Innovation Powered by Technology:
Infostor: The Leading Source for Enterprise Storage Professionals;
Infrastructure Insite: Bringing IT Together;
Insurance Technology: Business Innovation Powered by Technology;
Integrated Solutions: For Enterprise Content Management;
Intel Premier IT: Sharing Best Practices with the Information Technology Community;
Irwin, Robert, Dangerous Knowledge: Orientalism and Its Discontents;
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McCullough, David, John Adams;
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McNamara, Patrick, Science and the World's Religions Volume 2: Persons and Groups (Brain, Behavior, and Evolution);
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Pitre, Brant, Jesus and the Jewish Roots of the Eucharist: Unlocking the Secrets of the Last Supper;
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Potter, Wendell, Deadly Spin: An Insurance Company Insider Speaks Out on How Corporate PR Is Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans;
Pouesi, Daniel, Akua;
Premier IT Magazine: Sharing Best Practices with the Information Technology Community;
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Profit: The Executive's Guide to Oracle Applications;
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Redmond Channel Partner: Driving Success in the Microsoft Partner Community;
Redmond Magazine: The Independent Voice of the Microsoft IT Community;
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Roberts, Ian, The Energy Glut: Climate Change and the Politics of Fatness in an Overheating World;
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SC Magazine: For IT Security Professionals;
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Scholastic Instructor
Scholastic Parent & Child: The Joy of Family Living and Learning;
Schopenhauer, Arthur, The World As Will And Idea (Sony eReader);
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Schulze, Hagen, Germany: A New History;
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Software Test Performance;
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Strategy + Business;
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Sumner, Graham, Roman Military Clothing (2) AD 200-400;
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Swanston, Malcolm, Mapping History Battles and Campaigns;
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Swiderski, Richard M., Quicksilver: A History of the Use, Lore, and Effects of Mercury;
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Tech Briefs: Engineering Solutions for Design & Manufacturing;
Tech Net: The Microsoft Journal for IT Professionals;
Tech Partner: Gain a Competitive Edge Through Solutions Providers;
Technology & Learning: Ideas and Tools for Ed Tech Leaders;
Tenet, George, At the Center of the Storm: The CIA During America's Time of Crisis;
Thackeray, W. M., Vanity Fair;
Thompson, Derrick & William Martin, Have Guitars ... Will Travel: A Journey Through the Beat Music Scene in Northampton 1957-66;
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Ungar, Craig, House of Bush House of Saud;
Unterberger, Richie, The Unreleased Beatles Music & Film;
VAR Business: Strategic Insight for Technology Integrators:
Virgil, The Aeneid
Virtualization Review: Powering the New IT Generation;
Visual Studio: Enterprise Solutions for .Net Development;
VON Magazine: Voice, Video & Vision;
Wall Street Technology: Business Innovation Powered by Technology;
Wallace, Robert, Spycraft: The Secret History of the CIA's Spytechs, from Communism to al-Qaeda;
Wang, Wallace, Steal This Computer Book 4.0: What They Won’t Tell You About the Internet;
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Wissner-Gross, What High Schools Don't Tell You;
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Xenophon, The Anabasis of Cyrus;
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A tax on toilet paper; I kid you not. According to the sponsor, "the Water Protection and Reinvestment Act will be financed broadly by small fees on such things as . . . products disposed of in waste water." Congress wants to tax what you do in the privacy of your bathroom.