David Safier

Fukushima: enough radioactive wastewater to fill 112 Olympic-sized swimming pools — and counting

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by David Safier

By now, the danger from the disaster at the Fukushima nuclear power plant that was hit by a tsunami two years ago should be contained, or at least the cleanup should be heading in the right direction. Instead, it's a frightening, cautionary tale about how difficult it is to deal with a nuclear-related problem like this, and how politics and business interests make the situation even worse.

The latest problem. Groundwater that flows from nearby mountains to the sea flows through the contaminated area, something that didn't worry the plant's operators who are in charge of the cleanup (bad idea) or the oversight committee made up of nuclear industry insiders and government apologists (worse idea). Their solution? Store the water, decontaminate it as well as they can and dump it in the ocean. Right now, with 75 gallons of groundwater flowing in every minute,

A small army of workers has struggled to contain the continuous flow of radioactive wastewater, relying on hulking gray and silver storage tanks sprawling over 42 acres of parking lots and lawns. The tanks hold the equivalent of 112 Olympic-size pools.

They're running out of storage space, so they plan to chop down a small forest to make room for more tanks. Meanwhile, the plant is in such a precarious state, an earthquake could create another disaster.

Some hair-raising passages from the article:

Fitz on the School Voucher (Vulture) Plan

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by David Safier

Fitz regularly awes me with the quality of his satire and just-for-the-hell-of-it wit, but when he can write about the area I know best, education, and nail it — my hat's off to you, sir.

Today's Fitz Blog entry, in its entirety:

Fitz Blog: Arizona moves ahead with plan to destroy public education

State Superintendent Huppenthal today said he was pleased the State is moving ahead on schedule with its plan to destroy public education with a school voucher plan known affectionately as the "School Vulture Plan" .

"Anything that takes hundreds of millions of dollars a year out of the public school system is great with me," said Huppenthal."Half of the politicians up here up to their necks in private school donors and investments and lobbyists–just like private prisons. This is going to be fun. Why? Because we hate unions and public school teachers.Do any of us look like we've cracked open a book since freshmen English class in '62?"

State education officials are taking applications through Wednesday for the newly expanded "destroy public education scholarship accounts," which provide parents with a $3, 500 bank card and a compass.

“You can use taxpayer’s money to ship your twit to any one of our fine unregulated Elite Academies for Precious Darlings, or maybe the Holy Hell Fundamentalist Traditional Compound is more to your liking! Or even better —home-school your nose picker in your own bomb shelter completely off the grid–Anything! Do whatever you want just as long as your youngster is not enrolled in a public school. Anything put public school! I've been there. There's nothing there but sad looking disabled kids, foreigners, the spawn of welfare queens, gang bangers and mexican-american racists. This is the American dream. Death to public education!  I hated public school. All I got was D’s!”

The one thing I left out is the picture of Hupp and the caption. Check it out. It's great.

Is it possible for a politician to be too “pro gun”?

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by David Safier Maybe, just maybe, politicians will soon come to realize there are political dangers in supporting the NRA, not just in voting against the NRA position. Case in point: the plummeting poll numbers of Jeff Flake, who said he supported an increase in background checks, then voted no. The backlash appears to be … Read more

Another charter school cautionary tale

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by David Safier I'm an [almost] equal opportunity skeptic about the economic and political corruption related to charter schools. Case in point: Chicago's United Neighborhood Organization charter schools, their crony-laden construction contracts and all-too-close connection to Mayor Rahm Emanuel. United Neighborhood Organization (UNO) got a $98 million state grant to start up charter schools. That … Read more

A not-as-bad-as-it-could-be news story

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by David Safier It's no feel-good story that a man at an Albuquerque church vaulted over pews and stabbed members of the choir before he was held stopped and held down by parishioners. But the good news is, the four people who were stabbed are alive and stable. If the man attacked a group of … Read more