You don’t have to tell me it’s the tenth anniversary of the Al Qaeda attacks on the US. I was there, thank you. There is plenty to be said on the subject, and politicians, pundits and the population at large are saying it. My only comment today on this is to consider the cost. According to one analysis, it’s $3.3 trillion – and counting. Another perspective is asking how much of that massive price tag could have been spent on rebuilding this country and putting people to work. (I’m not forgetting the blood of Americans, Afghans, Iraqis and coalition forces spilled and the wounded, believe me, not to mention the erosion in civil rights here.)
Today marks another anniversary, though: it’s been six months since the tsunami hit Japan and set off the horrific events at the Fukushima Daiichi complex. I’ve written quite a lot about nuclear power, before and since. The bottom line is it’s not safe, it’s not cost-effective, it is counterproductive to seriously reducing greenhouse gases and more and more people, all over the world, don’t want it. The Japanese, in the aftermath of Fukushima, are 70% against nuclear power. The events at Fukushima might not have the media resonance that the September 11th anniversary has, but the waste, the ignorance and the dangers are more than sufficient to equal what we lost ten years ago and what continues to threaten us today.