Antinuclear

Australian news, and some related international items

Lies and censorship rule discussions on Fukushima and nuclear issues

Lies and censorship have from the very beginning been entwined with all manner of nuclear issues.

The global mass media have remained almost entirely true to their despicable selves and avoided like the plague integrity and quality journalism regarding Fukushima.

The government of Japan has in effect made it a criminal offense to tell the truth about the Fukushima disaster.

nuclear-village-

Our Nuclear Heritage: The Fukushima Catastrophe, Too Clever By A Half-Life By Robert Snefjella 14 July, 2015 Countercurrents.org

“The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save our mode of thinking and we thus drift towards unparalleled catastrophe.”- Albert Einstein

Has the Fukushima nuclear disaster, beginning in March 2011, been extremely harmful and is it extremely ominous? Or will the Fukushima ‘problem’ have negligible health impact, as offered by various ‘experts’ and ‘prominent’ institutions and commentators.

On the one hand, massive numbers and large varieties of lifeforms in the North Pacific Ocean, in the post-Fukushima period, are already extensively destroyed, dead or dying, or deformed. [1] Several large nuclear reactors blew up with, among many other nasty elements, plutonium [2] on board, and have now for four years been melting down and emitting massive amounts of radiation into the global environment. [3] This ensures more mutations, more deformities, more cancers, more health problems. In 2015 the situation at Fukushima is described by Japanese engineers as still out of control. “The chief of the Fukushima nuclear power plant has admitted that the technology needed to decommission three melted down reactors does not exists….” [4]

On the other hand, in support of the contention contained in the second question, we select first a “spokesperson for the Nuclear Energy Institute, who declared three months after the accident ‘no health effects are expected among the Japanese people as a result of the events at Fukushima.’”5] And Gerry Thomas, head of the Chernobyl Tissue Bank at Imperial College. London, in 2013, offered this: “Fukushima is nothing compared to Chernobyl.” [6] And here is George Monbiot at the Guardian in 2011 explaining how the accident has converted him to be pro nuclear: “Atomic energy has just been subjected to one of the harshest of possible tests, and the impact on people and the planet has been small.” [7]

So what’s going on here? It’s not easy to find out. Let’s take a stroll down explanation lane:

We now live in a geopolitical and cultural environment of global reach where the art and science of ‘public perception management’ has achieved impressive capabilities. Duplicitous and diversionary ‘news’ and ‘information’ via mass media, and censorship of critical information, are now indispensable bulwarks of the dominant global system. [8]

The layman’s definition of insanity is ‘being out of touch with reality’: The crazy person fears a monster that doesn’t exist, or embraces or ignores the monster that does.

‘Public perception management‘ via censorship and lies, when ‘successful’, achieves the embedding of a highly influential multifaceted false reality in the public, and is thus in effect control via manufactured public insanity.

In the nuclear age, this is a fatal step, beyond the mere sovereignty of tyranny, and even beyond the sovereignty of the irrational, which reason has at least the potential to dethrone. Again, given the context of nuclear weapons and nuclear power plants, a system based on dishonesty, dependent on make believe and public ignorance, is about as dysfunctional as it gets: that is, terminally dysfunctional.

In enveloping environment of control via duplicity means that humanity’s unlimited potential for creative, sensible, beneficent and ethical personal and public interest policy is at least greatly hindered. The potential for evil acts and disastrous consequence is greatly enhanced. Which is where we are at.

In this environment it is difficult to to gain widespread solid understanding of just about any larger political or public issue. This is especially so when it comes to nuclear issues.

Lies and censorship have from the very beginning been entwined with all manner of nuclear issues. These rather tepid quotes from the prologue of the book The Nuclear Barons are suggestive of the obstructions to public understanding of nuclear issues since WW2: “…nuclear decision making has been a closed one, often hiding under the cover of national security.” “…experts differ widely on what precautions are necessary.” “Many of these decisions were taken without public debate…” “…the nuclear system showed an extraordinary capacity to create or manipulate its own needs”. [9]

That is, expert disagreements and self-interest and narrow specialist perspectives conjoin with endemic and ordained secrecy and censorship. Nuclear electricity was at birth intertwined with nuclear weapons, and provides material for and cover for nuclear weapons production: thus, nuclear energy became subject to the hallowed deceptions ‘mandated’ by ‘military considerations’, ‘national insecurity’ and so on.

Consistent with the above, near total mass media censorship and disinformation about Fukushima, beginning in March 2011, was implemented. This prevented necessary immediate global brainstorming over possible mitigationtactics, and prevented the possibility of mobilizing all-out implementation of conceivable mitigation and salvage operations.

The censorship and disinformation have also prevented people from learning about and taking actions to reduce personal and familial and community exposure to harm.

The longstanding censorship and dishonesty about nuclear issues has been buttressed in recent years by much concern pertaining to the ‘end of oil’, oil related pollution, and global warming. This has led many to conclude that though problematic, nuclear electricity was necessary in order to reduce reliance on fossil fuels: thus let us not speak truth or ill of the monstrosity.

The automatic institutional default position when it comes to the specter of potential liability also doesn’t help matters: Stonewall, deny responsibility, lie, admit no mistakes, avoid honest confession at all costs.

In the case of Fukushima we encounter many additional impediments to understanding the situation.

The government of Japan has in effect made it a criminal offense to tell the truth about the Fukushima disaster. [10]

The Tokyo Electric Power Corporation (TEPCO), the owner of the Fukushima reactors, has egregiously covered up and lied about what has been and is happening. [11]

The political leadership of countries other than Japan have participated in silence, ignorant assurances, or lies, pertaining to Fukushima. [12]

The global mass media have remained almost entirely true to their despicable selves and avoided like the plague integrity and quality journalism regarding Fukushima [13]

The World Health Organization (WHO) once again repudiates their ‘mythological’ role of protecting public health and giving sound health information [14] by shamelessly understating the danger that Fukushima presents. [15] In keeping the public in the dark, they are joined by a global network of prominent agencies that have the resources, should they so choose, to shine a light; yet that mislead or remain silent about Fukushima. [16]

Furthermore, there is no precedent for the events at, or the results of, Fukushima. Never have nuclear specialists encountered anything like the Fukushima explosions or melt downs and extreme levels of radioactivity and lack of knowledge about what is actually happening within and below the destroyed reactors, and ongoing probable fissioning.

Thus ‘experts’ – even if they can overcome the epidemic of cowardice which infects with craven silence so many of them, or the compulsion to regurgitate officially sanctioned falsehoods – can offer nothing more than opinions and guesses, with bits and pieces of ‘specialized’ knowledge injected, mediated in some cases by common sense, about what has happened and is happening and will happen: there is no Fukushima disaster expertise.

The challenge in sensibly assessing the implications of Fukushima is compounded by the dynamic interplay of many elements of the global environment. The radioactive materials released by and after the destruction of the Fukushima reactors not only effect life directly, by attacking life’s wondrous blueprints and accurate-replicating capacity. They ,may also effect critical parts of life’s context: atmosphere, air, water, radiation from the sun and space. An example is the impact that the Fukushima disaster might have on the ozone layer, thus on the amount of harmful radiation striking the earth; which will effect say the viability of ultra-violet sensitive ocean microorganisms thus effecting oxygen production and oxygen levels in the ocean and over land, thus effecting both sea life and terrestrial creatures.

An additional problem is posed by the existence of very high, evacuation level radiation readings in many locations prior to Fukushima. [17] What are the sources; why weren’t we told??……..http://www.countercurrents.org/snefjella140715.htm

July 17, 2015 - Posted by | Uncategorized

1 Comment »

  1. Australia is lagging behind in SAFE Clean Energy because its Leaders are focused on MONEY and Control instead of what is best for all Australians.

    This is the case in many Countries except for Germany which is in the process of closing its reactors as fast as possible. Japan (which now owns TEPCO and its Trillion Dollar Eco-Disaster) the Nuclear Utility “Gangs” control the entire Country and have enacted freedom of speech restrictions in an attempt to “quiet” their anti-nuclear sentiment. In France, where the Government is now the majority owner of their Nuclear “industry” they trying to extend the lives of their nuclear industry since decommissioning nuclear Fleet will cause even more civil unrest because of the huge costs involved. In the USA, the Nuclear Utilities are now actively trying to stifle the Pro-Solar movement by pushing what they refer to as “Clean Nuclear” a sales pitch that ratepayers are not buying into. In the UK, their attempt to build Hinkley C has met with serious fiscal opposition, since its Energy costs will be far higher than those produced by todays renewables and much higher than future renewables, which will make Hinkley’s Energy so expensive, it will only be a good deal for the Plant owners and its builders. The entire project is now involved in a lawsuit:

    http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-somerset-33529430

    The military program that produced the Atomic weapons used in Japan created “the nuclear power industry that began with Dwight Eisenhower’s Atoms for Peace program”.

    Utilities have used these nuclear power plants to create 50 to 70+ year (design to decommissioning) income streams for themselves and their shareholders with little to no oversight by the ratepayers they keep in Energy Slavery with ever increasing Energy costs. It is no wonder that these Nuclear Utilities are doing everything they can to oppose the adoption of residential Solar, since Solar offers almost all their ratepayers a path toward Energy Independence (once their Solar investment is paid off), since they can then reduce their monthly Energy Utility bills as low as they want. Big Utilities are using their considerable Political influence to reduce, limit and/or eliminate all subsidies for residential Solar (Wind and PV) since those will only make it easier for ratepayers to “escape” Energy Slavery.

    Residential Solar also offers its Owners the option to use their generated Energy for electric vehicles (eVehicles), which then eliminates having to pay for diesel or gasoline at the pump which includes large amounts of taxes. As an example, you can now buy a number of electric motorcycles that have a top speed over 80 mph, only cost about a penny a mile to operate and can be driven on the highway over 150 miles between charges! http://www.zeromotorcycles.com/motorcycles/
    Larger eVehicles will also provide some Energy Storage options that were unheard of just a few years ago, since Energy Storage technology is now just beginning to become commonplace and it will also help revolutionize how ratepayers manage the energy they generate themselves.

    http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/articles/2015/07/tesla-cto-bulk-energy-storage-will-grow-much-faster-than-people-expect.html
    Snip
    Tesla Co-Founder and Chief Technical Officer JB Straubel who offered a vision for the future of energy storage and PV. Straubel believes that the energy storage industry is “right at the precipice” of massive cost declines like PV experienced. “The next decade is going to look very different because all of the demand [for energy storage technology] coming from stationary energy storage and from electric vehicles — from many different companies not just Tesla — will change the demand curve and slope in a huge way,” he said. “It’s kind of like the difference between solar used for pocket calculators and satellites VS solar used for buildings. The demand is orders of magnitude higher and puts it on a different trajectory for cost declines.”

    To put it in numbers, Straubel believes that the demand for batteries coming from just his company will be something like 35GWh of energy storage by 2020. “That is more lithium-ion capacity than existed in the entire world in 2013.”

    For all these reasons and more, Nuclear Utilities fear what is know as the “Utility Death Spiral” and it is no wonder that Energy investors have now shifted so much of their investment money away from Nuclear and toward “Clean and SAFE” Renewables like Solar and/or Wind Generation that no new nuclear reactors would be built without huge Government guarantees, despite what the cost of the Energy produced is or what voters/ratepayers want.

    I predict that we are now seeing the last of the “Nuclear Age” which began about 70 years ago, since Nuclear is pricing itself out of the Energy Marketplace since the cost of Renewable Generation is dropping almost monthly and is predicted to continue to do so far into the future! Of course, like the dinosaurs of past ages, we will see them struggle as current economic conditions make it ever harder for them to compete. Since a major cost for business is Energy, expect to see them relocate to where Energy is the lowest cost (along with their good paying jobs) or simply generate their own Energy, like Google, Apple and others are now starting to in ever increasing numbers.

    Parts of the above comment were posted here:
    http://washingtonspectator.org/nuclear-age-began-70-years-ago/#comment-9860
    and

    Australia losing its great wind power opportunity

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    CaptD's avatar Comment by CaptD | July 18, 2015 | Reply


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