this appears to be a legitimate article

although, i really am taken aback. i just cannot believe it. how the hell stupid are we?

NRC says it can't ban importation of nuclear waste
By BROCK VERGAKIS

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — The Nuclear Regulatory Commission says it doesn't have the authority to prevent foreign radioactive waste from being imported into the United States.

The NRC wrote in an April 9 letter to Reps. Jim Matheson, D-Utah, and Bart Gordon, D-Tenn., that the Atomic Energy Act doesn't distinguish between domestic and foreign waste. The NRC says that as long as the material can be imported safely and someone is willing to accept it, the commission can't keep the waste out.

Salt Lake City-based EnergySolutions' is seeking a license to import up to 20,000 tons of low-level radioactive waste from Italy's shuttered nuclear power program. After processing in Tennessee, about 1,600 tons would be disposed of in the western Utah desert.

Matheson and Gordon are sponsoring a bill — which has yet to get a hearing — that would ban the importation of low-level radioactive waste unless the nuclear material originated here or the waste was imported for a strategic national purpose.

They contend that the country should restrict space at its dumps to domestic waste. The site in Clive, Utah, is the only low-level radioactive waste facility available to 36 states, although EnergySolutions says capacity there isn't an issue.

The company has agreed to limit the amount of foreign waste accepted in Clive to 5 percent of its remaining capacity.............

are they rushing to do the MOST HARM

they can before being booted out of office? it sure appears that way to me

Bush administration files nuclear dump application

After long delay, Bush administration submits application to build nuclear dump in Nevada

H. JOSEF HEBERT

Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said Tuesday he's confident the government's license application to build a nuclear waste dump in Nevada will "stand up to any challenge anywhere."

Bodman spoke at a news conference hours after the Bush administration submitted the formal application with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a license to build the underground storage facility at Yucca Mountain more than 80 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

Nevada officials, who have fought the waste dump for years, vowed to launch hundreds of specific challenges to the proposed design of the facility, arguing the Energy Department has not proven it will protect public health, safety and the environment from radiation up to a million years.

Responding to the filing, Nevada Gov. Jim Gibbons reiterated his promise to fight the waste dump which he said "threatens the life and safety of the people of Nevada."..............

i just get a warm and fuzzy

don't you?

(hey chertoff, what does your GUT say about THIS? no wonder you have a GUT feeling about a terrorist threat, huh!)

Sting Reveals Security Gap at Nuclear Agency

security GAP? it's more like a F**KING security GRAND CANYON

By Kathleen Day Washington Post Staff Writer

Undercover congressional investigators posing as West Virginia businessmen obtained a license with almost no scrutiny from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that enabled them to buy enough radioactive material from U.S. suppliers to build a "dirty bomb," a new government report says.
The investigators obtained the license within 28 days from officials at the NRC, the federal agency that in addition to regulating nuclear power plants oversees radioactive materials used in health care and industry, the report by the Government Accountability Office says. NRC officials approved the request with a minimal background check that included no face-to-face interview or visit to the purported company to ensure it existed and complied with safety rules, the report says.......

(by the way, charlton heston uttered one of my favorite lines of ALL times in a movie called something like 'the lost treasure of the incas' - i'm too lazy to actually look it up right now - BIT ima sumac was in it and that's ALL you have to know. anyway, big chuck says something like, 'GET AWAY FROM ME YOU BIG TUB O' GUTS'.

Homeland security chair responds to Chertoff's 'gut'

Will Menaker

Following yesterday's statement by Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff that his remarks on the increased risk of terrorism this summer were based "on a gut feeling," the Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie G. Thompson has sent a letter to Chertoff demanding an explanation, "what color code in the Homeland Security Advisory System is associated with a 'gut feeling?' What sectors should be on alert as a result of your “gut feeling?”
The letter states, "Over the past five years, tens of billions of taxpayer dollars have been dedicated to standing up and building capacity at the Department of Homeland Security. The Department of Homeland Security is charged with deterring, preventing and responding to the threat of terrorism. To that end, systems have been erected to identify risks and communicate them to the American public. With all the resources you have at your disposal and all the progress that you assure us that you are making, I cannot understand why you are quoted in the Chicago Tribune as saying you have a 'gut feeling' that we are entering a period of heightened risk this summer."........

picture: mr tub o' guts and the king: whitehouse.gov