One of the things I didn’t mention in this post (which earned the much-coveted Instalanche), was the sneaking suspicion I had that the shoddy journalism in Japan was headed toward a certain conclusion. With all the panicky stories involving scary, but ultimately useless, words like “meltdown”, “radioactive”, and “elevated”, it was only a matter of time before we saw a story like this.
Some U.S. lawmakers are looking to “put the breaks” on building new nuclear power plants after witnessing the crisis at several Japanese reactors that were rocked by Friday’s massive earthquake and tsunami.
Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) called for a temporary moratorium on the construction of nuclear power plants in the United States following the Japanese quake, which damaged two reactors at a nuclear facility in the country’s northeast.
“The reality is that we’re watching something unfold,” he said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.” “I think it calls on us here in the U.S. naturally – not to stop building nuclear power plants – but to put the brakes on right now until we understand the ramifications of what’s happened in Japan.”
But of course these calls would come from the Democratic Party. It’s not big secret that the left despises nuclear power — it is, after all, the home of the “back to the stone age” environmentalists. It does surprise me that Joe Lieberman, who has always struck me as one of the most thoughtful and sober Democrats, has joined the usual doom-criers Ed “Biz” Markey and Chuck “Rhymes with a Bad Word” Schumer. Then again, Lieberman only seems like a sensible Democrat when the issue is national defense. On everything else, he’s as predictable as a Michael Bay flick.
Let’s be honest here. We may find a serious design flaw in the reactors at Fukushima, though I seriously doubt it. We are far more likely to find that things could have been exponentially worse but weren’t because of superior design, construction, and the diligent execution of plans honed sharp by experience and endless review. We should be pleasantly surprised that the reactors withstood as much energy as would be released by detonating almost 340 megatons of TNT as well as they did. We should be elated that they didn’t crack open like eggs. We should be hearing from actual, factual nuclear technicians who know a fuel meltdown from a core meltdown. Instead, the MSM are bandying about scary words they barely understand and Democrats in Congress are standing by to feed on the unease that “reporting” will surely cause. Fukishima is shaping up to be just another crisis the progressive left won’t waste. That’s a shame, because the real conversation ought to be how durable and, yes, safe nuclear energy truly is.
If I didn’t know better, I’d say this was the plan from the very first report of a tremor. But that’s just crazy-talk, isn’t it?
Tags: Democrats, Energy Policy, Environmentalists, Media Bias
