Infinite Unknown

- Bechtel Incompetent To Complete Hanford Nuclear Waste Cleanup: DOE Memo (Forbes, Aug 29, 2012):

More than 10 years into the job, Bechtel National Inc. has been described as incompetent to complete the $12.2 billion nuclear waste treatment plant at Hanford, Wa., the nation’s largest radioactive waste site, according to an internal Department of Energy memo.In the Aug. 23 memo, the DOE official responsible for supervising engineering at the facility, Gary Brunson, calls for Bechtel to be immediately removed as the design agent for the novel Waste Treatment Plant (WTP), which was supposed to begin operation last year.

Brunson lists 34 “brief examples” of issues in which Bechtel’s design advice was factually incorrect, technically flawed, unsafe, or more costly than alternatives.

“The number and significance of these issues indicate that Bechtel National Inc. is not competent to complete their role as the Design Authority for the WTP, and it is questionable that BNI can provide a contract-compliant design as Design Agent,” Brunson writes in the memo.

Continue reading »

Tags: Bechtel, Economy, Environment, Government, Hanford, Health, Politics, U.S.

- Ron Paul Recants The GOP, Just Says No To Keynesians (ZeroHedge, Aug 31, 2012):

As we anticipate more demand-rigging, pump-priming, can-kicking experiments from Bernanke today, Ron Paul just came out with his latest stream of truthiness (via Bloomberg):

• *REP. PAUL SAYS BOTH PARTIES KEYNESIANS, GOP ‘NOT HIS
  PARTY’
• *REP. PAUL SAYS FED PRICE FIXING
• *REP. PAUL SAYS FED FLOODING MARKET WITH MONEY

Indeed, what is the opposite of ‘between a rock and a hard place’ when deciding on just who will provide ‘change’ in November.

Tags: Barack Obama, Democrats, Economy, Fed, Federal Reserve, Global News, Government, Obama administration, Politics, Republicans, Ron Paul, U.S.

A CounterPunch Special Report on NRC Collusion With Utilities to Conceal Grave Safety Problems at Davis Besse and Palisades Reactors

- Nuclear Cover-Up Threatens Great Lakes Region (CounterPunch, Aug 20, 2012):

According to recent reports from the nuclear watchdog Beyond Nuclear and several Great Lakes environmental organizations, the NRC is up to its usual practices as an industry captured agency.  Collusion and flagrant cover-ups at the Davis Besse nuclear power plant on the shores of Lake Erie and at the Palisades nuclear plant on the shores of Lake Michigan have drawn the ire of Congressmen Dennis Kucinich of Ohio and Ed Markey of Massachusetts who have called on the NRC’s investigator general to investigate NRC region 3 practices and motivations of the NRC in allowing these plants to operate with grave safety concerns.

With respect to Davis Besse it seems like a flashback to the 2002 hole in the reactor head incident documented here, as part of the history of this Nuclear Nightmare between Toledo and Cleveland on the western Lake Erie basin. In 2003 the NRC’s commissioner resigned after the General Accounting Office found the agency guilty of collusion with plant operator First Energy in their attempts to cover-up the seriousness of corrosion issues that brought Davis Besse within 3/16ths of an inch of a core containment breach and catastrophic release of radioactivity.  Then congressman Dennis Kucinich led the call of the Inspector General’s office as he is once again after First Energy and the NRC have colluded to downplay the seriousness of widespread cracking that has been discovered over the past year throughout the concrete shield building that houses the Davis Besse reactor. Continue reading »

Tags: Environment, Global News, Government, NRC, Nuclear, Nuclear reactors, Politics, Technology, U.S.

- Confirmed: India’s Polio Eradication Campaign in 2011 Caused 47,500 Cases of Vaccine-Induced Polio Paralysis (Dr. Mercola, Aug 28, 2012):

If you listen to mainstream media news, you’ll be told that polio has now been eradicated in India – an accomplishment the Polio Global Eradication Initiative (PGEI), founded in 1988 by the World Health Organization (WHO), Rotary International, UNICEF, and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), are attributing to the intense polio vaccination campaign. The Indian government reportedly had 2.3 million vaccine administrators visit over 200 million households, with oral polio vaccinations given to nearly 170 million children 5 years of age and younger;¹ health officials are now doubling their efforts to conquer polio in Pakistan as well. What you’re NOT learning from the mainstream media, however, is that there’s a growing public movement fighting the profound misinformation about the vaccine, mainly because VACCINE-CAUSED polio is maiming and even killing a growing number of children every day, far outstripping the damage done by the wild-type polio that has been supplanted by the manmade form found within the vaccine. Continue reading »

Tags: Children, Global News, Health, India, Polio, Science, Vaccination, Vaccine

- PROOF: Chinese industrial fluoride suppliers openly list sodium fluoride as ‘insecticide’ and ‘adhesive preservative’ in addition to water treatment chemical (Natural News, Aug 31, 2012):

Fluoride-pushing doctors and dentists who try to contaminate your water supply with fluoride are promoting their deadly agenda with a clever lie… a lie you will see obediently repeated in every fluoride push. Here’s how it sounds:

Fluoride is a naturally occurring mineral in the water. Our city’s water is unfortunate enough to have a low level, so we are simply adjusting the fluoride in the water to its optimum levels to improve public health.

This lie is repeated almost verbatim, across every city that seeks to poison its citizens with fluoride. Why is it a lie? Here are the five false deceptions found embedded in the statement:

Deception #1) The fluoride ADDED to the water is not “naturally occurring fluoride.” It’s a chemical byproduct often purchased from chemical plants in China (see below).

Deception #2) The false idea that ingesting fluoride is somehow good for your teeth. At best, fluoride is a topical treatment which should be swished around your mouth and then spat out. And that’s only if it’s truly natural (mineral) fluoride, not the fluosilicic acid toxins being pushed as fluoride.

Deception #3) What cities call “fluoride” is actually a toxic cocktail of over 100 deadly industrial chemicals and heavy metals, many of which are purchased in bulk from China, where industrial processing plants are trying to get rid of their excess toxic waste by labeling it “sodium fluoride.”

Deception #4) There is no such thing as a “low” level of fluoride or an “optimum” level of fluoride in drinking water. Pure drinking water should contain NO fluoride whatsoever.

Deception #5) Fluoride is “safe” for human consumption. Oh really? Then why is sodium fluoride labeled by its industrial manufacturers with stern safety warnings about causing severe harm to humans?

Chinese fluoride manufacturers openly admit to the toxicity of the chemical

Continue reading »

Tags: Chemicals, China, Fluor, Fluoridation, Fluoride, Food, Global News, Health, Pesticides, U.S.

Flashback:

- Famous Investor Jim Rogers: Riots Are Coming To America – ‘Mr. Bernanke Has Zero Credibility As Far As I’m Concerned. The Federal Reserve Has Zero Credibility’

“Mr. Bernanke has zero credibility as far as I’m concerned.  The Federal Reserve has zero credibility,” Rogers said forcefully.  “Simon, go back at everything Mr. Bernanke has said in the last seven or eight years he’s been in Washington.  He’s never been right about anything.  The man has zero credibility for anyone who would take the time to look at his history.”

YouTube

Description:

Bernanke telling us not to worry about housing, mortgages, or car companies in the years before the recession, like denying a train wreck that is coming down the tracks. Bernanke was chairman of President Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers, and now as chairman of the Federal Reserve, he’s the fourth most powerful person in the world according to Newsweek.

Tags: Ben Bernanke, Economy, Fed, Federal Reserve, Global News, Government, Politics, U.S.

- Russia announces enormous finds of radioactive waste and nuclear reactors in Arctic seas (Bellona, Aug 28, 2012):

Enormous quantities of decommissioned Russian nuclear reactors and radioactive waste were dumped into the Kara Sea in the Arctic Ocean north of Siberia over a course of decades, according to documents given to Norwegian officials by Russian authorities and published in Norwegian media. Charles Digges, 28/08-2012Bellona had received in 2011 a draft of a similar report prepared for Russia’s Gossoviet, the State Council, for presentation at a meeting presided over by then-president Dmitry Medvedev on Russian environmental security.

The Russian state nuclear corporation Rosatom confirmed the figures in February of this year during a seminar it jointly held with Bellona in Moscow.

Bellona is alarmed by the extent of the dumped Soviet waste, which is far greater than was previously known – not only to Bellona, but also to the Russian authorities themselves.

Continue reading »

Tags: Global News, Government, Health, Nuclear, Nuclear reactors, Oceans, Politics, Radiation, Russia

- New Study Reveals Children Are Being Poisoned by Common School Supplies (Activist Post, Aug 28, 2012):

Children are now being exposed to toxic phthalates found in school bags, rain coats, rain boots, three-ring binders and other common school supplies.

A new study published by the Centre for Health, Environment and Justice titled “Hidden Hazards: Toxic Chemicals Inside Children’s Vinyl Back-to-School Supplies” has revealed that common school supplies are laden with toxic chemicals that have been banned in toys.

It was identified that school supplies made out of softened vinyl plastic contained dangerous levels of phthalates.

Phthalates are known to be hazardous even at very low levels of exposure. At high levels of exposure they can disrupt hormones, and have been linked to birth defects, infertility, early puberty, asthma, ADHD, obesity, diabetes, and cancer.

A summary of the results of the study are as follows: Continue reading »

Tags: Chemicals, Children, Global News, Health, phthalates, Science, toxic, toxicity

- The skies open up for large civilian drones (BBC News, Aug 30, 2012):

Unmanned aircraft, known as drones, are the eyes and ears of the US military, providing troops with an “eye in the sky” in situations where manned flight is considered too dangerous or difficult.

A decade ago less than five per cent of US military aircraft were unmanned, now 40 per cent have no pilot on board – from small surveillance craft light enough to be launched by hand, to medium-sized armed drones and large spy planes.

But the role of the drone is now changing. Millions of pounds are being sunk into civilian projects – everything from border security to police surveillance and even transporting goods.

This year the US Congress passed legislation giving US airspace regulator the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) until September 2015 to open up its airspace to drones, and Britain is expected to follow suit.

The UK’s airspace regulator, the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), has told BBC Newsnight that large unmanned drones could be flying in British skies by the end of the decade.

Continue reading »

Tags: Drones, Global News, Technology, U.K., UAVs

- Time for Eurozone to Reach for the Gold Reserves? (Financial Times, Aug 31, 2012):

Is it time for some eurozone governments to start selling that metaphorical family silver? Or, more specifically look at their all-too-real gold reserves, to find a solution to Europe’s crisis?

That is a question which has recently been buzzing around in some policy making and investing circles. For as autumn looms, it is clear that the eurozone remains under profound stress. However, it is also unclear whether the European Central Bank – let alone the eurozone politicians – will really be able to do anything soon to ease market fears and lower those borrowing costs.

Thus, as unease builds, the World Gold Council – or the body that represents the gold industry – has recently lobbed a new idea into the fray: it thinks it is time for eurozone governments to start using gold in a creative manner, particularly in places such as Italy, to cut those interest rates.

The issue at stake revolves around the estimated 10,000 tonnes of gold reserves that are currently held by eurozone governments. According to the Council, “it is well known that some of the countries most affected by the crisis, including Portugal and Italy, are responsible for a significant proportion of these assets.”

Unsurprisingly, this situation has prompted some to suggest that governments should sell some of that gold. The value of gold has soared in the last few years, and if there were ever a time that eurozone countries needed an unexpected windfall – say, to pay interest on bonds – it would be now.

But the Gold Council, for its part, insists this would be a mistake. For quite apart from the fact that a massive dump of gold would dampen the price, eurozone debt woes are now so large that gold sales would only scratch the surface of the problem. Or as it notes: “The gold holdings of the crisis-hit eurozone countries (Portugal, Spain, Greece, Ireland and Italy) represent only 3.3 per cent of the combined outstanding debt of their central governments.”

Continue reading »

Tags: Debt, Economy, EU, Europe, Global News, Gold, Government, Politics