According to the news this morning at least four tornadoes touched down in that storm that rolled through here Monday night.  There may be more because investigators have yet to visit some other sites.  On Monday of last week Mom and I started a walking regimen which we reluctantly broke yesterday because of the weather.  We got back on schedule this morning.  We saw some tree damage and a few signs littered the nearby street.  Otherwise our part of town was not affected much.

It looks like today will be the second day of news covering John McCain's trip to the Michigan nuclear power plant to push his plan to encourage the building of up to 45 new ones by 2030.  I almost choked last night when touted his 'experience' with nuclear power while on board an aircraft carrier.  That was no experience at all.  He did not work with the power plant.  He flew a damned plane off the flight deck and landed it again.  I definitely do not want to see new plants built until three crucial, to me at least, questions are answered.  The safe operation of the plants is really the least of the issues.  I have read some accounts of new designs developed in France which have both a longer life than the first generation of reactors which are now at the upper limit of their life expectancy and have an extremely safe operating history.  However the problems for me comes at the beginning and end of the process: how the fuel is mined and processed, and how the spent fuel is disposed of.  I have read too many reports of workers, many Native American, who were lured by the promise of good pay into jobs which destroyed their health and the health of their families.  Many are still fighting for medical benefits.  Worse is the problem of ground water contamination in the southwest from the processing of uranium.  I want to see very strict health and environmental standards in place with very high escrow accounts from the companies to prevent the past practice of declaring bankruptcy and leaving the problems for others to clean up.  On the other end, we have never come up with a good way to handle waste that will be deadly for centuries.  Even if the government finally managed to open Yucca Mountain (now 10 years behind deadline) I doubt that it would handle the waste from 45 new plants plus all of the old ones.  For some of the problems, including allegations of fraudulent geological studies, start with Wikipedia.  Also consider the problems of transporting the spent fuel to the site.  The news has covered several train crashes since 2000 alone where people living nearby had to be evacuated because of toxic chemical spills.  Do we really want the equivelent of 'dirty bomb' rolling through our towns and cities?

By the way, take a look at C.A. Rotwang on TPM Cafe today.  He says the same about the problem of nuclear fuel waste and has a nice link to Paris Hilton's response to McCain anti-Obama ad featuring her.  Love the satire and didn't think she had it in her. 

My now deceased ex-husband had what became a tiresome and trite comment for whenever someone seemed to be indecisive or dawdling or simply wasn't moving fast enough for him: "Do SOMETHING, even if it's wrong!!!"  The news coverage of the candidates' energy policies has brought it back to me.  The candidates seem to be responding to a similar attitude among the American public.  I get the impression that my fellow Americans want someone to do something to fix whatever is wrong and they want it NOW.  They don't care if it won't work at all, or if the fix is only temporary, or if the fix will in fact make things worse.  It is a kind of snatch and grab mentality much like the 'I've got mine; f**k you' mentality I mentioned a couple of posts ago.  McCain reads this mood and proposes everything under the sun without any thought to the hows, whys, or even the oughts of his proposals and the news media cover Obama's alleged shifts on off-shore drilling as though he was a weather cock in a gale.

It appears that I am not the only one who has had cacophonous earful of Senator McCain's whining during Senator Obama's overseas trip.  Here is the latest from tomdispatch.  Entertaining and informative, as always.  Englehardt asks an interesting question: "Will "character," the culture wars, and security fears help elect the most woeful Republican candidate since Bob Dole -- and in a country that not only increasingly doesn't think much of Republicans, but has never cared to vote old?"  A better question is: "Will the tired Republican harping on 'character,' fear mongering on culture issues and security trump the economy, a realistic and balanced foreign policy platform, and environmental concerns?"  The rest of the post (by Ira Chernus) discusses the sticky quagmire of the values and 'values-plus' voters and speculates that the real determining factor may not be the candidates' positions on issues but on the image they present.  Once a good many years ago, I taught a college history class during which we talked about the Tonkin Gulf incident (I think).  Most historians now recognize that the incident as portrayed in the press, and which led to the passage of legislation expanding President Johnson's war powers, did not happen.  One of the students asked how such far reaching action (the war powers legislation) could come out of a mirage, a phantasm.  I told them that often what is important is what people think is true not what is true.  In all of the elections of the 21st century the perceptions of the voters has been more important than the substance of  the candidates.  That is why the most insubstantial candidate in recent history, George W. Bush, has won the past two elections and why an equally insubstantial candidate, John McCain, might win this one. 

A blogger I recently started to follow because I saw her linked on the elderwomanspace I belong to has a similar theme today.  What do Obama, McCain, and China in its pre-Olympic frenzy have in common?  She follows print media because she doesn't have a TV but most of what she reads is superficial, sparkling, and 'well manicured' but which are unremarkable and unrevealing.  I do follow the broadcast media and can say the same thing about what alleged facts I receive by that route.  Same 'facts,' same presentation leaving the same questions and no follow up.  I think she put the case very well.  Drop by and read her comments.  And I totally agree.  We must look at what ever information we receive with a lot of skepticism.  By the way, my blogger's name is June Calender who also posts at Calender Pages.  That is also worth the time to drop in there.  Today she talks about using the selvage edges from fabric to make a quilt block.  I never thought of that.

This little piece from yesterday's Altercation blog, which I read this morning, continues the coverage of Senator McCain's contention that Social Security, funded by taxing the current generation to pay for the payments to the previous generations as it always has been, is a disgrace.  I wouldn't have bothered mentioning this except that guest 'altercator' Siva Vaidhyanthan asks a very good question: where is the prominent coverage in the mainstream media?  It seems to be mysteriously absent.  What is more pathetically amusing is that this morning I wondered why our news cast featured about three minutes on minor league coach behaving badly.  Worse the minor league teams weren't even local teams.  My questions in order were:  'Aren't we lucky the idiot wasn't really insulting and drop his pants?' and 'WHY?'  As in 'why the HELL is this piece of crap on the local early morning news show?'  It isn't amusing.  There is no human interest.  And there is no local relevance.  Blast, there isn't even any national relevance.  But there is almost no coverage of Senator McCain's lack of historical awareness, lack of economic knowledge, and arrogant display of the conservative 'I've got mine and my constituents have got theirs, now F**k you" mind set.

As I went through my usual blog visits I wondered if any of them would pick up on the recent remarks of former Senator and Republican economic guru Phil Gramm.  Finally, the shakers at Shakesville got their nice sharp teeth into the matter.  I guess I have needed an attitude adjustment for all of the last 8 years.  I can't count all of the morning round-the-coffee discussions that noted the news stories of job losses/lay offs juxtaposed with never changing unemployment numbers (unless they were going down) and asked where the hell the newly unemployed were going.  Or asked what new jobs were being created at what compensation with what (if any benefits).  I guess that was really just in my head because all of the pundits, experts and other oh-so-smart people all said the economy was just peachy keen.  I wonder what was in the heads of the airplane pilots who lost their jobs or barely kept them by accepting 30+% pay cuts thought.  Was their pain simply in their heads.  Or the Enron employees who were lied to by their company executives until their pensions disappeared.  That, of course, was simply all in their heads.  But then take note of the links Shakesville notes between Gramm, his wife, and Enron.  They have made theirs, everything is fine.  It's is the rest of us that get f**ked.  After you visit Shakesville pay a call on the guys at AMERICAblog.  they have a few appropriate words for this idiocy.

 Other discussions around here often center on frugality and simplicity.  Leslie Valeska at Journey to Simplicity makes some points that parallel some of our thinking.  Saving money and simplicity can often conflict.  A couple of days ago our local news featured a woman who uses coupons to reduce her grocery bill.  And like Leslie we have found that coupon clipping doesn't really do us any good.  Often we would have to buy much larger quantities than we can easily store or use before the product goes bad.  We live in a small two-bedroom town house and don't have a lot of storage space. Even buying large quantities of non-perishables is out of the question because of the limited storage available to us. The reporter showed the woman's pantry with dozens of boxes of cereal.  However, I noticed that many of the brands were those that included high amounts of sugar, artificial flavorings and colors marketed mostly to children.  I stopped buying these kinds of cereal 20 years ago.  We used to stop buying cold cereal late in the fall when the weather turned cold and we turned to hot cereals instead.  This year we consciously decided not to buy cold cereal again.  The price was simply too high, the cereals we liked were seldom on sale and almost never featured in coupons, and we found we could do without.  We are often caught between the dilemma of trying to get the cheaper price but being unable to figure out where we can put the amount of product we would have to buy. 

I hope I didn't give anyone whiplash with that change of topic.  Sorry about the expletives today.  Unfortunately, softening the expressions would have been tantamount to a lie.  There are times when manners simply get in the way of expressing just how pissed off I am.

Yesterday I wrote that I thought Senator John Warner's attempt to re-establish a national speed limit would not be popular.  Today I found evidence of that on this site.  Generally, people want what they want NOW, they want it CHEAP, and they want NO RESTRICTIONS.  That is especially true with gasoline and vehicles.  

Entitled To Know has more on Senator McCain's notion that Social Security is a disgrace and hits hard on a problem I let go but perhaps shouldn't have.  The good Senator not only doesn't know much about economics (according to his own assessment, though he has lately tried to disown saying that) he doesn't know much about history either.  Interestingly, the second quote used in this article was featured on a news program earlier this week.  The reader noted that Senator McCain was trying to have things both ways; i.e., he claimed he didn't want to 'privatize' Social Security while describing President Bush's plan to privatize to a tee but not mentioning the word.  When I was a kid we called that 'talking out of both sides of your mouth' but I guess it would be rude for me to use that phrase for the 'straight talking' war hero candidate.  He wouldn't do such a silly thing, would he??

Some time ago I wrote that I was dubious, extremely dubious, that any of the candidates would be willing or able to bring about real change in the political system.  The question of whether any candidate, once elected, would be able to make changes should be obvious.  S/he can only propose.  Congress disposes.  The question of willingness is something else.  Shakesville contributors (see Petulant's column) have some comments on the passage of the FISA bill and noted the fact that Senator Obama voted for it.  Once again supposed security issues have trumped civil liberties and Senator Obama promises that he will carefully oversee the provisions of the FISA.  In the mean time, companies who had no legal right or obligation to provide information about their subscribers and customers get a retroactive pass.  All they need is a friendly letter from the government to the judge.  Sorry if I come across as deeply cynical and misanthropic but I think my assessment is spot on.

I wasn't going to post anything today but I found this little piece.  

Poor Senator McCain found himself in an uncomfortable spot on last night's news sound bite.  The ABC news reporter asked him specifically how the experience of being shot down and held prisoner enhanced his qualifications to be President.  That seems to be a good question since he has made it such a central issue in his campaign.  And I thought the reporter was very respectful and polite in asking it.  Unfortunately all we got, at least in the sound bites, was an interjection from Senator McCain to the effect of 'Oh, my God!!' (paraphrased because I can't remember the exact phrase) followed a few minutes later, after the candidate regained his composure, with the oh-so-revealing comment that the experience taught the Senator to 'love' his country.  Did he not love his country before being shot down?  And how would his love of country affect his decision making?  His love of country is just about as  pertinent to his qualifications to be President as his war time experiences.  Not very.