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From Celebrities To Tsunamis: "If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about the answers."
by Phil Rockstroh
Even before the floodwaters of the tsunami that inundated western Japan receded (and a threat of a global-wide disaster, engendered by the core breach of multiple nuclear reactors, loomed) in the US, Godzilla jokes began trending on Twitter.
A number of years back, Pauline Kael took Steven Spielberg to task for his depiction of rural Georgia circa 1909 in his movie, The Color Purple...averring that Spielberg's only field of reference seemed to be images culled from cinematic history, rendering his movie tone deaf regarding the rhythms and cadences of life during the era.
On a cultural level, a great many people in the US evince a similar, media-wrought shallowness of apprehension, and therefore are prone to a contemptible callowness, when faced with tragedy and human suffering. This trait, coupled with a toxic ignorance about the larger world, is an ugly thing to behold, and does not bode well for our collective destiny as a people.
Japan's Tragedy Provides Us All an Opportunity to Show that We Have a Heart
by Brian McAfee
The severe blow from nature with which the Japanese people were struck with on Friday, March eleventh purportedly took the lives of over ten thousand people while forever altering the lives and emotional well-being of hundreds of thousands more. The need to address the multifaceted nature and ongoing complexity of Japan's disaster is evident with each day's news updates. Within minutes after the 9.0 earthquake, northeastern Japan was engulfed by a tsunami that has done more damage then the initial earthquake.
This event was quickly followed by news of possible meltdowns from at least one damaged nuclear power plant and resultant contamination. Today's reports speak of over half a million now homeless in addition to shortages (and need for) water, food and blankets in the still harsh winter conditions. Emotional needs, too, will be an important issue for many as new discoveries of deceased are being made.
From Hiroshima to Fukushima to US!
Eileen Fleming
[The World]---"It's like the third atomic bomb attack on Japan. But this time, we made it ourselves."- Keijiro Matsushima, an 82-year-old survivor of America’s atomic bombing of Hiroshima. [1]
Japan's quake-damaged northeast has helped recall the fact that sixty-six years ago Hiroshima and Nagasaki’s razed villages and burning shells of buildings were MADE IN THE USA!
Japan has 54 nuclear power plants and about one-third of its nationwide electricity comes from nuclear energy.
There are 104 nuclear power plants in the United States!
Japanese journalist JoAkira Tashiro, has been actively advocating for the elimination of nuclear weapons and regarding the damaged nuclear plants in Japan said, "This might be a good turning point. I hope Hiroshima will take a lead on this because of our own experience with the atomic bomb.” [Ibid]
Coverup and Denial in Japan
by Stephen Lendman
Discount all official government statements and major media reports repeating them instead of demanding expert, unbiased views.
Officially, Japan's nuclear emergency is under control and contained. In fact, lies substitute for truths, denial for reality, and managed news for honest reporting.
Point of fact: Besides its catastrophic quake, tsunami, destructive aftershocks, and resulting humanitarian crisis, Japan is experiencing a developing nuclear catastrophe, the full extent not known until independent sources reveal it.
Libyan Options Running Out
By Brian Downing
The Libyan uprising once seemed sure to follow the pattern in Tunisia and Egypt where longstanding autocrats stepped down after large popular demonstrations. Colonel Kadafi, however, has rallied his forces and is quashing the opposition. This has put policymakers in the region and around the world in a dilemma between their preference for democracy and their reluctance to intervene. There are a few actions that can be embarked upon, but which is optimal and who if anyone will take the lead? (Image)
Winds chase evacuees in Japan; Hawaii threatened by Fukushima fallout
By Rady Ananda
In a deepening tragedy, after an earthquake and tsunami caused four explosions at nuclear reactor plants in Japan, most of those who evacuated the area headed south, since winds normally would have pushed the radioactive clouds to the north and east. Instead, winds pushed the r-clouds south, according to The Australian. The shift in winds now threatens Hawaii with fallout from the Fukushima nuclear facilities.
Officials finally admit radiation has reached lethal levels in the area surrounding the explosions. Tokyo, 200 miles to the south, is also seeing higher levels of radiation. “[A]bnormal radiation and traces of radioactive elements were detected around Greater Tokyo, the world's most populous metropolitan region with 36 million people."
The paper also noted that "Hong Kong, The Philippines, Singapore and South Korea began testing Japanese food imports for radiation yesterday.”
Though initial mainstream news sources downplayed the danger, mocking the following map which has gone viral, it now seems wise for North Americans on the West Coast to consider relocating, at least temporarily. Radioactive winds are expected to hit North America tonight.
"Postponed, but Not Avoided" (OpEdNews 404 – Repost)
By Robert Singer
Click here to read why “this article is not currently available” at OpEdNews.
October 21, 2008
Postponed, but Not Avoided
On both environmental and financial fronts, the end of our consumer society can be postponed, but not avoided.
We live, after all, in a society that is consumed with unrelenting consumption.
Even the most conscientious consumers are leaving us in a world in which the air and water are polluted, the world’s precious rainforests are depleted and the planet continues its downward spiral into the grip of global warming.
Agrarian economies, even economies ruled under the limited excesses of Communism, are consumption oriented. With hungry capitalistic societies thrown into the mix, it’s estimated that the most of the world’s resources will be gone before the year 2023. The outlook isn’t bright.
Post Nuclear Japan, Pre Disaster United States
The Japanese disaster at Fukushima I is a human tragedy of striking proportions. As many as ten thousand citizens may be dead in the general catastrophe, with many more at risk for radiation poisoning at levels yet to be determined. The fact that Japan is a highly organized and wealthy nation in no way diminishes the intensity of the losses and pain experienced by the victims. (Image)
Political and economic implications will emerge rapidly. As the whole world watches, the Japanese experience creates windows of opportunity to learn how to avert future meltdowns at nuclear ticking time bombs placed throughout Europe, the United States, India, and China.
Events have overwhelmed the highly professional Japanese bureaucracy. In a late Saturday night report by CNN, the chief cabinet minister said that he presumed that there was a nuclear meltdown in reactors one and two, with three on the way. A nuclear regulatory official hedged by referring to the "possibility" of a meltdown, which he said could not be confirmed since workers couldn't get close enough to see. The same regulatory official told CNN,
The Tragedy of Fukushima May Be Mankind’s Greatest Hope
Peter Chamberlin
The Tragedy of Fukushima is not yet fully known, at least not in terms of the long-term effects of the radiation released today and tomorrow, perhaps for mankind’s entire “half-lifetime.” We don’t know (meaning our best scientists don’t know) what will grow out of the hole which has been blasted in our collective consciences today. Our knowledge of atomic science, just like our understanding of all earth science, is in its infancy, yet we have chosen to build nuclear reactors in geologically risky locations. Beyond the risky siting problems, lie the earth forces of wind and water, which we only now beginning to see.
The End of Nuclear and its Timing
by Jan Lundberg
Three days before the Fukushima nuclear power explosion, I made this comment on a peace activist's Facebook page: "I believe a successful, final anti-nuke campaign will only take place in one of two ways: (1) collapse puts the entire infrastructure of industry and consumption out of business, forcing the survivors to minimally babysit the nukes forever, or, there's an accident or deliberate blast or meltdown that motivates people all over the world to shut down the mechanical beast once and for all."
I didn't think it would come so soon. But that has been the pattern for our planet in peril in recent years: acceleration of disasters, climate destabilization, peak oil, strife such as wars and revolutions, extremes of elitist wealth and overwhelming poverty, fresh water depletion -- all prelude to complete collapse. However, to use the equivalent of jiu-jitsu or aikido to rapidly channel the onslaught of negative energy toward something positive is our duty and opportunity. It takes not only a mass awakening to the insane futility of nuclear power, but a realization that the present system; a.k.a. Western Civilization, is hitting bottom. As glorifying as our civilization is in some respects, the extinction of species and the sprawling, cancerous waste known as development (for profit of the few) are impossible to ignore and excuse.
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