Greg Jaczko, the former Chair of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, has published an explosive new book: Confessions of a Rogue Nuclear Regulator. In it, he gets honest with the American people about the dangers of nuclear technology, which he labels “failed,” “dangerous,” “not reliable.” He particularly comes down against nuclear as having any part in mitigating the problems of climate change/global warming. In this extended Nuclear Hotseat interview, Jaczko brings us inside the NRC’s response to Fukushima, the “precipice” on which nuclear safety balances, his own growing doubts about how safe nuclear reactors are in the United States, and how, ultimately, it was that concern with safety that probably brought him dow
Americans Deserve Better than the USDA’s GMO Labeling Law | Living Non-GMO : The Non-GMO Project
After a lengthy delay, the USDA published the final National Bioengineered Food Disclosure Standard (NBFDS) in the Federal Register on December 21. This law, which you may have heard called the DARK Act, is the start of mandatory GMO labeling in the United States. It means that some—but not all—products containing GMOs will have to be labeled by 2022.
While the Non-GMO Project supports mandatory labeling, we are disappointed by the content of the final rule. It does not do enough to protect consumers and it does not offer American families the transparency they have been calling for.
As you know, consumers have been demanding meaningful GMO labeling for more than 20 years. Fifty-four GMO labeling bills landed on ballots in 26 states, and consumers in Connecticut, Maine, and Vermont successfully passed statewide labeling legislation. Unfortunately, the NBFDS took those hard-earned wins away from consumers by rolling back existing state laws and preventing any future state-level GMO labeling.
The Lincoln Memorial During the Government Shutdown – The Atlantic
During the Civil War, the government never shut down—not even when the capital was threatened by Confederate troops. A shutdown would have undermined the foundation of Lincoln’s cause, which was the ability of free people to rule themselves. The paralysis and dysfunction would have told the world that the government he led was no longer fully devoted to the cause for which other Americans had given the last full measure of devotion. A shutdown would have looked like the beginning of the end that Lincoln always knew was possible.
Hillary Clinton: American democracy is in crisis
It makes sense that Donald Trump is indifferent to the paralysis of the government he leads, and that he welcomes a shutdown of months or even years. If shutdowns become routine, if politicians view the government in which they serve as a disposable tool, if we’re no longer capable of governing ourselves, this only reflects Trump’s contemptuous attitude toward democracy itself. Shuttered museums, federal workers who can’t pay their bills, national parks with stinking toilets: This is what Trump thinks of American republicanism. This is what the suicide of a great democracy looks like.
So we stayed for a while at the Lincoln Memorial and read the words carved into its walls, to recall what makes America great if anything does.
Conservative floored by Rudy Giuliani basically admitting Trump’s campaign colluded with Russia to win the presidency
Boot said, “This is just stunning because when Giuliani makes these kinds of concessions — and you’ve got to play that clip over and over again because the president’s lawyer is basically admitting that the president’s campaign colluded with Russia to [impact] the outcome of the American election.”
He added, “Rudy Giuliani is saying, ‘I’m not denying there’s collusion. I’m just saying it didn’t involve the president personally. I’m saying the president didn’t personally break the law.’ This is establishing a new defensive perimeter.”
“He’s basically signaling that he knows there is very strong evidence of collusion, and he is trying to get out ahead of that evidence,” Boot said. “This has really never happened before in American history.“
How Putin’s oligarchs funneled millions into GOP campaigns | Commentary | Dallas News
In 2015-16, everything changed. Blavatnik’s political contributions soared and made a hard right turn as he pumped $6.35 million into GOP political action committees, with millions of dollars going to top Republican leaders including Sens. Mitch McConnell, Marco Rubio and Lindsey Graham.
There is a huge push right now to delete and deny the Constitution which separates church and state with a bright line. Why was the Constitution written to SEPARATE state and religion?
What would happen if a small evangelical, fundamentalist religious sect were made into the ‘official’ religion of America, and the line between religion and state was eliminated? In other words, churches could get government grants, disaster relief funding, and public education funding? That one ‘official’ religion would then mandate teaching their fundamentalist brand of ‘dogma’ in all schools, public, private and non profit. No other religion would be allowed, and quite possibly, other religions would be made illegal, discriminated against or even have those other belief systems jailed, fined or made into death penalty offences.
Cohen says he paid to rig online polls at Trump’s direction | MSNBC
To execute the plan, Cohen reportedly hired John Gauger, the chief information officer at Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University, and the owner of a small tech company called RedFinch Solutions LLC. The goal was simple: deliver online poll results intended to make Trump happy.
In January 2014, Mr. Cohen asked Mr. Gauger to help Mr. Trump score well in a CNBC online poll to identify the country’s top business leaders by writing a computer script to repeatedly vote for him. Mr. Gauger was unable to get Mr. Trump into the top 100 candidates. In February 2015, as Mr. Trump prepared to enter the presidential race, Mr. Cohen asked him to do the same for a Drudge Report poll of potential Republican candidates, Mr. Gauger said. Mr. Trump ranked fifth, with about 24,000 votes, or 5% of the total.
As is often the case with people who do work for Team Trump, Gauger said he never received the $50,000 he was promised, though he claims Cohen did give him a Walmart bag containing between $12,000 and $13,000 in cash.
