To: Pdbsongs1@cs.com, rhoffman@animatedsoftware.com, mollypj@yahoo.com
From: "Russell D. Hoffman" <rhoffman@animatedsoftware.com>
Subject: Politics 101: Is this a democracy?
Cc: Elizabeth Chesnut <field@wand.org>, karensperos@aol.com, rcberkel@UCI.edu, Pdbsongs1@cs.com, eaton727@earthlink.net, Rwfassett33@aol.com, Elizabeth.lambe@sierraclub.org, BlakeTalulah@aol.com, Oharashar@aol.com, hmpaige722@juno.com, alice@paratec.com, joel@joelbrucedesign.com, webhead@nuclearwitness.org, SNetherby@aol.com, NCForum@aol.com, CBGHirsch@aol.com, psrsm@psr.org, mfield1@san.rr.com, laurah@environmentalhealth.org, beckers@thegrid.net, prcsandiego@igc.org
Hi Patricia,

Regarding your comments (shown below), I assure you: We can talk politely until the cows come home with irradiated milk.  Is that how a democracy works?  Or how it dies?

You can attack me for not excusing the creation of another 10 tons of spent fuel nuclear waste today.  New targets for Osama.

Yesterday, before this latest peace of spin doctoring by the Nuclear Mafia came up which you and Molly Johnson complain about my response to, we had 10 tons LESS of spent fuel nuclear waste.

Talk, talk, talk.

Did anyone reading this exchange catch Dr. Caldicott and David Crosby on Bill Maher last night?  Crosby said something to the effect of "we're not for shutting the plants down" and Dr. Caldicott nearly blew a gasket (in her polite Australian, Harvard-educated way) because they were supposed to be representing the same side!  "Yes we are!" she said.

There are a lot of activists who need to get up to speed on the current issues, and STOP saying that there are safe ways to handle spent fuel.  There aren't, and we need to stop making more.

I'm against Yucca Mountain, and have said so many times, and stood up in front of scores of cops and Feddies, and hundreds of citizens in Nevada, and warned of terrorist attacks against our nuke waste, and against our nuke plants, and against our nuke transport vehicles.  And I was doing this before 9-11, and after, and no one listened then, and they're not listening now.

So I say that NO, there's not much left to be polite about and there's NOTHING left to debate that hasn't been debated and closed.  The plants are not safe.  They are not safely designed or run.  They are not protected.  They are not properly regulated.  The spent fuel is extremely vulnerable.  Any claims to the contrary is hookey.  Oh and did I mention Osama has already threatened to attack our nuclear facilities?

I will not die quietly.  Nor should you, but unless we move away from San Onofre and San Diego Bay, the chances are pretty good that are we, personally (and millions around us, too) are doomed. Why?  Because of Osama?  No: Because our leaders won't listen.  And it doesn't help that the ranks of our fellow activists are speckled with frauds. 

Who is who?  Who knows -- PETA is suing for having been infiltrated right now.  Does anyone reading this really think the anti-nuclear activists haven't been infiltrated, too?  Shall I name names (again)?

Keep the debate going, and they win.  The Nuclear Mafia wins.  Osama wins.  It's as simple as that.  Shut the plants down, and America wins -- or at least, has a fighting chance.  Old fuel is easier to protect than new fuel.  That 10 tons of NEW spent fuel is the hardest to protect of all.  Nuclear energy is not even cost-effective (has everyone forgotten Price-Anderson, one of the most despicable pieces of legislation in history?).

So why does it keep going?  Because, Patricia, this is no longer a Democracy, and hasn't been since World War II when the Manhattan Project was started, which grew into the Atomic Energy Commission, which grew into the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Department of Energy.  If that's not enough proof, a stolen election and a misnamed "Patriot Act" should clue you in to where our "democratic principles" have gone.  On October 12th, 2001 the Freedom of Information Act was gutted.  What's left to debate, now that all the information has been taken away?  Nothing.  It's time for action.  Not internecine bickering.

I do not consider any claim that the current system is safe to be a polite statement, Patricia, and neither should you.  I don't think any well informed activists say such things.

Our lives are in grave danger, and the price of keeping the debate going will be death for all of us and for millions of others, and suffering such as America has never seen.

Attached below your letter to me is another interesting letter I received this morning, which I am about to try to answer.  How shall I apologize for what our Country has done?  Any suggestions, anyone?

Sincerely,

Russell Hoffman
Carlsbad, CA
(Within 30 miles of 30 or more nuclear reactors (including military) which are ALL targets for bin Laden and which are all UPWIND of all of the rest of YOU!)

At 09:08 AM 6/4/02 , Pdbsongs1@cs.com wrote:
Russell -

WHY does it always become a necessity to insult?  In a democracy, there are always different viewpoints and perspectives (and that's what free speech is all about).  When other citizens have views which may be different than yours, I'm almost always offended when your response contains insults, regardless of whether they're directed at me or not.  We all need to learn how to work together.  We can't afford to be pretending, I agree.  I can appreciate your interest in being direct, and calling a spade a spade as you see it.   But we need to develop a better way to engage in a dialogue w/the whole community in a way that doesn't alienate, or immediately cause other people in our community to 'tune out'.  Yes we need public education, we all need to upgrade our learning curve, on these very complex issues.  That's what the dialogue is all about.  Can't we do that in a way that's not so hostile?

That's only my perception.  

Hope it's not way out of line.

Patricia Borchmann

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From: "anupama ananthakrishnan" <anupama125@hotmail.com>
To: rhoffman@animatedsoftware.com
Subject: your article regarding effects of a nuclear bomb
Date: Tue, 04 Jun 2002 15:36:42 +0000

Dear Mr. Hoffman,

I am an Indian National, studying here in the United States.

I read your article "effects of nuclear weapons" dated more than 2 years ago .(http://www.animatedsoftware.com/environm/no_nukes/tenw/nuke_war.htm).

Today, my country and its neighbor Pakistan stand at the brink of a war that may involve the use of nuclear weapons. And the city of my home for 23 years, Bombay, will be the first city to be bombed in the eventuality. Such a possibility fills me with dread. When I read your article, I thought about my parents and sister who live there and will never leave even if this is sure to happen as they don't see how anything will be different in any other place. Away from the people I love, I only hope and pray that such a thing will never happen.

I wanted to clear your misconceptions about what the educated people of India think about this issue. We think that neither India nor Pakistan, China, Russia, France, England or even the USA need any nuclear bombs. We think that the use of nuclear bombs is not even a possibility for anyone. We think that no one is as mature to assume the responsibility of owning nuclear bombs or policing the world to keep it a nuclear free zone. We believe that nuclear disarmament is the only way of eliminating the possibility of such a horrific event.

Most of all, USA , China, Russia, France and England believe that they have the power and authority to dictate and assume the role of Kings of the earths who can tell their subjects how the world needs to treat them.

If they were such responsible and good kings, we would have disarmed nuclear weapons in  the world after Hiroshima and Nagasaki. That has not happened. Instead these countries try to justify why they can have nuclear arms and others cannot.

In the eventuality of a nuclear war in my country, I will hold my country and Pakistan responsible for such a hasty act to come to a quick solution.

However, the world and especially the 5 super powers will be responsible for making available the possibility of a super weapon and the blood of another tens of millions people in addition to victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki will be on their hands.

Its time America and its people face the eventuality of a nuclear war and along with the privileges of being a world leader, assume the responsibility of ridding this world of nukes.

Only time will tell if America has the makings of a responsible country that will exercise its powers to make way for a better future or a power hungry rich and rogue nation that can only think of furthering its own power. You too will have to decide which way your nation will go.

Anupama.

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