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One Word: Thorium.

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It has just a couple of protons less than uranium, and it's common as dirt.

Thorium-fueled reactors are supposed to be much safer than uranium-powered ones, use far less material (1 metric ton of thorium gets as much bang as 200 metric tons of uranium, or 3.5 million metric tons of coal), produce waste that is toxic for a shorter period of time (300 years vs. uranium's tens of thousands of years), and is hard to weaponize. In fact, thorium can even feed off of toxic plutonium waste to produce energy. And because the biggest cost in nuclear power is safety, and thorium reactors can't melt down, argues Michael Anissimov in Accelerating Future, they will eventually be much cheaper, too.

How cheap would it be?
If a town of 1,000 bought a 1-megawatt thorium reactor for $250,000, using 20 kilograms of thorium a year with almost no oversight, every family could pay as little as $0.40 a year for all their electricity, Anissimov predicts. And small reactors like that aren't just potentially cost-effective, he says; they're much safer, too.

So why haven't we been using it instead? History. We needed to make bombs, and Thorium just didn't get us there.

 

Related articles

• Could thorium make nuclear power safe? (theweek.com)

Portland City Council Follies

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Randy wants more toys, and he's hopping mad that a couple of other city councilors have had the unmitigated temerity to point out that "Uh, hey Randy - we got no money to staff these things".

Fritz started her line of questioning by saying the city currently has two emergency vehicles similar to the four the city wants to buy.

One of those vehicles is not in service because of staffing issues, she said.

 "If we purchase them right now, we don't have the bodies to go in them," Fire Chief John Klum acknowledged.

Randy Leonard appeared irritated by Fritz and Saltzman's questions. 

What a surprise. His way is the only way.

 

Cobra On The Loose

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By now, you've heard about the Bronx Zoo losing a cobra. Turns out that he tweets even more often than Portland's little "mayor", Sammy Adams does.

"Give me your tired, your poor/Your coiled masses yearning to breathe free" Powerful words at the Statue of Liberty.

Does anyone know if the Whole Foods in Columbus Circle sells organic mice?

Light Rail "Crime Train"

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When even The Oregonian notices, Tri-Met's light rail system has big problems. The Zero routinely cheers on light rail and condos, while steadfastly ignoring the fact that Oregon's business climate essentially ensures a declining job market. That's why the high-end condos in SoWa are suddenly transmogrifying into "affordable apartments". Nobody's buying the condos, because the jobs aren't here. So they're suddenly becoming apartments, in the misplaced hope of luring baristas in to rent them.

The Crime Trains and condos are all part of the grand Plan to make the Portland metro area a "walkable" community. It's kind of hard to walk with a knife in your gut, but nevermind - the "Planners" will figure something out.

Feeling uneasy about last week's broad-daylight stabbings on MAX? This news probably won't help: After two straight years of double-digit declines, crime on TriMet's light-rail system is on the rise again.

Tri-Met and Metro are on the bleeding edge of "Planning", and they're "creating" new jobs as a result of their efforts: there's an emerging field of transit criminology. How cool is that?

Take This Aid And Shove It

Eritrea has finally figured it out - the tiny African nation sent a letter to the U.N., stating that it wants out of its long-term development agreement because the U.N. makes the problem worse, not better.

Their missive notes that “aid only postpones the basic solutions to crucial development problems by tentatively ameliorating their manifestations without tackling their root causes. The structural, political, economic, etc. damage that it inflicts upon recipient countries is also enormous.”

In other words, it masks - rather than addresses - the problems.

This would make the U.N. look really bad, if not for the fact that the U.N. is already well-known for its corruption and its general lack of efficacy. And while that country properly tells them to take a hike, the U.S. President bows down.

The Kids Are All Right

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They love Obama, and think he's doing a great job. Gas prices have doubled since he took office, and he's sent us into another war without authorization. Oh, wait - he takes his marching orders from the U.N. - the U.S. Congress is irrelevant.

So the kids are all right with him; they think he's super.

And they'll re-elect him.

This is why you shouldn't let people who don't pay taxes a vote.

Pre-Loaded With Malware For Your Convenience

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Samsung is there to help, with new laptops pre-loaded with keystroke loggers. The logger starts up as soon as you power up the machine.

Eventually, a supervisor got on the phone and confirmed that Samsung put the software on the laptop to monitor machine performance "and to find out how it is being used."

"In other words, Samsung wanted to gather usage data without obtaining consent from laptop owners," Hassan wrote.

Related articles

• Some laptops may have spyware pre-installed (msnbc.msn.com)
• Samsung Accused of Installing Keyloggers on Laptops (techland.time.com)
• Samsung Intentionally Shipping Laptops with Keylogger/Spy Software (thesecuritypub.com)
• How to detect and remove StarLogger (download.cnet.com)

Lest We "Offend"

Image by aussiegall via Flickr

MUNSON, Ohio --

A Northeast Ohio community is taking the "Easter" out of the egg hunt...Still, township trustees are opting to call this year's Easter weekend event "The Spring Egg Hunt."

And high time! Everybody knows that the "Spring Bunny" hides eggs and other treats for the kiddies to find. There's no escape from Progressivism.

 

Related articles

• Spring egg hunts for all ages at your nearest West Seattle community center (westseattleblog.com)
• Easter PC Madness (fellowshipofminds.wordpress.com)

Radiation Slows Recovery Of Dead

Apparently, you can recover from death, but radiation slows the process of zombification. Who knew?

You Should Become An Oregon Politician

The opportunities for upward mobility are amazing. In Democrat Maggie Carter's case, you vote to create a new, highly-paid job - and then you take the job. No interviews, no worries. Suddenly, you're taking home (note that I did not say "earning") a hundred grand a year more and feathering your Public Employee Retirement System nest. What a deal!

HT:/ Coyote