From: owner-abolition-usa-digest@lists.xmission.com (abolition-usa-digest) To: abolition-usa-digest@lists.xmission.com Subject: abolition-usa-digest V1 #30 Reply-To: abolition-usa-digest Sender: owner-abolition-usa-digest@lists.xmission.com Errors-To: owner-abolition-usa-digest@lists.xmission.com Precedence: bulk abolition-usa-digest Thursday, October 15 1998 Volume 01 : Number 030 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1998 16:35:52 -0400 From: Peace through Reason Subject: (abolition-usa) NucNews: Shattuck Radioactive Cleanup - golf course-inspired? Good that somebody's paying attention in Denver. Note the interests behind this concern: it's getting publicity now, due to what? Property values, golf course? Bearing in mind that what motivates people is devluation in their own back yard, we should ponder how we can get through to the comfortable people. Check out HR-827, the "Nuclear Disarmament AND ECONOMIC CONVERSION Act" (environmental restoration, anyone?). http://prop1.org/prop1/hr827ab.htm Ellen Thomas - prop1@prop1.org - ---------------- http://www.denverpost.com/news/shat1010.htm Suit claims Shattuck costing Denver By Mark Eddy Denver Post Environment Writer Oct. 10 - Denver has lost property tax revenue as a result of the Shattuck radioactive waste dump, a lawsuit filed Friday alleges. "What I've alleged in the complaint is that Denver is in fact damaged by the existence of that waste,'' said David Rees, a lawyer who filed the lawsuit in Denver District Court on behalf of city taxpayers. The 50,000 cubic yards of radioactive waste at 1805 S. Bannock St., site of the former Shattuck Chemical Co. processing plant, has held down value of surrounding property, including that of the Overland Golf Course. "The property values in the Overland area are not rising at the same rate as in other parts of the city, where property values are skyrocketing, and that's because people can't sell houses near a dump site,'' Rees said. In his complaint, Rees claims that Shattuck - owned by Salomon Inc., which is in turned owned by Citigroup Inc. - - violated terms of the Rocky Mountain Low-Level Radioactive Waste Compact. That law was passed to ensure that no state is unfairly saddled with radioactive waste. Members of the compact board met several weeks ago to decide if the Shattuck site was subject to its jurisdiction, but no decision has been made. Rees, who as an assistant attorney general for Colorado helped draft the compact, contends that the board has jurisdiction and that its rules were violated. But an attorney for Shattuck, John Fraught, disagreed. Fraught said the compact's authority was usurped by the federal Environmental Protection Agency, which ordered the radioactive soil entombed on the site. "Congress has made it very clear that if EPA makes a decision under (federal law), that, in fact, preempts any decision of the compact,'' Fraught said. The lawsuit asks the court to order the dirt - contaminated with radium, uranium and heavy metals - moved to a licensed facility. "We are sick and tired of hearing the experts, bureaucrats and politicians debate about whether having a radioactive waste disposal site in Overland Park is a threat to public health,'' Rees said. "This case isn't about health; this case, like so many environmental cases, is about money, power and political influence.'' Gov. Roy Romer could order the waste removed with one phone call, Rees said, because the compact is designed to honor the wishes of the state where a problem exists. Romer, who hadn't seen the lawsuit, couldn't comment on the case, his staff said. The EPA and Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment made the decision in 1992 to mix the radioactive dirt with cement and fly ash and create a monolith on the site. The city of Denver, as well as residents of the neighborhood, have fought that decision. EPA last week ordered an independent panel, which is in the process of being formed, to investigate the cleanup. PROPOSITION ONE COMMITTEE P.O. Box 27217, Washington, DC 20038 USA 202-462-0757 (phone) | 202-265-5389 (fax) http://prop1.org | prop1@prop1.org - - To unsubscribe to abolition-usa, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" with "unsubscribe abolition-usa" in the body of the message. For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1998 16:34:50 -0400 From: Peace through Reason Subject: (abolition-usa) NucNews: George Bush and nuclear weapons, Oct. 11, 1998 Washington Post Outlook So, now Walter Pincus is making an nuclear arms reduction plea, using George Bush as the standard. I wonder whose idea that was? Again it's talk about reduction, rather than abolition. Anyone want to reply? Washington Post reply page: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/edit/letters/letterform.htm - -------------------------------------- http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1998-10/11/131l-101198-idx.html Re-Read His Lips: Reduce Arms Now By Walter Pincus Sunday, October 11, 1998; Page C01 Washington Post Seven years ago, President George Bush announced what many experts consider the single most profound reduction of nuclear weapons in arms control history and one that some believe has yet to earn him the credit he deserves. With the Soviet Union collapsing, the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START I) then bogged down in the Soviet parliament and President Mikhail Gorbachev struggling to hold on to power, Bush ordered elimination of thousands of U.S. tactical nuclear weapons, deactivation of 450 land-based ICBMs and a halt to Pentagon development of mobile single and multiwarhead strategic missiles as well as an air-launched, short-range ballistic missile. In Sept. 27, 1991, Bush made his move without prior notification to Congress and with only a last-minute request to Gorbachev to match it. In Cold-War vernacular, he undertook unilateral arms reductions. Comparable arms reduction pledges from Gorbachev followed nine days later, in what some described as an "arms race in reverse" that unquestionably reduced the potential for accidental nuclear confrontation and helped Gorbachev withdraw tactical nuclear weapons from parts of the Soviet Union, which was beginning to break apart. His action also laid the groundwork for the next arms treaty, START II. The situation today cries out for a Bush-like action. Russia is in turmoil. Boris Yeltsin's hold on the government is unsteady. Moscow's control over what remains of that country's nuclear weapons and stockpile of fissionable material has to be bolstered by, of all people, the United States, but its overall security remains questionable. While START I is in force, START II is stalled in the Duma even as the Russian strategic air and naval forces scrounge for funds to maintain their land-based silo and mobile ICBMs or their strategic nuclear submarines. At a time when the Clinton administration is trying to convince the Indian and Pakistani governments--as well as other countries--that they should not build nuclear weapons, the United States still maintains thousands of warheads and strategic delivery systems, many of which remain at a 15-minute-or-less alert with almost no targets for them to aim at. Like Bush, Clinton as commander-in-chief could order deactivation of the 50 MX ICBMs now on alert, each with 10 warheads; begin retiring half the 18 Trident ballistic missile submarines that each have 28 sea-launched ICBMs; and open the safety switches of the 500 Minuteman III missiles, with three warheads each, so that they would be temporarily immobilized. It would be a stunning move that would greatly strengthen our arguments against nuclear proliferation and encourage the signing of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty by nuclear nations, such as India and Pakistan, which last month expressed receptiveness toward the agreement. What's to stop President Clinton from doing what Bush did? Political realists would argue the obvious: that with impeachment hanging in the air, the president was taking a dramatic step to divert attention. But Clinton's opponents and many in the media will say that about everything the president does, whether it's air strikes in Kosovo, a new step toward Middle East peace, even taking a long-planned overseas trip. Then there are the Republicans who not only dislike Clinton but also firmly oppose taking any further arms control steps with the Russians until they ratify START II. They have pushed Congress to put language in the past few Pentagon authorization bills, and the fiscal 1999 measure that would prohibit the spending of any funds to dismantle U.S. strategic weapons under the treaty until the Duma acts on it. In the new bill, those Republicans also want a report on whether Gorbachev's promises to Bush have in fact been carried out. Several experts, including former senator Sam Nunn and Brookings Institution arms control specialist Bruce G. Blair, have suggested publicly that Clinton unilaterally reduce the number of U.S. strategic land- and sea-based ICBMs and remove hair-trigger alerts from the remaining U.S. strategic missiles. There is other support for unilateral action. Former Defense secretary Robert S. McNamara, just back from a non-governmental conference on disarmament in Russia with that country's nuclear scientists, said a unilateral U.S. reduction of strategic weapons is "exactly what I think should be done." He said the Russians have turned to a first-use of nuclear weapons strategy because their armed forces have collapsed and they fear a U.S. first strike. "They would respond," McNamara said of the Russians, "because they know nuclear weapons are not the answer to their problems." McNamara said that he and others could put together a package that would be acceptable to the Pentagon and to Congress and which would elicit a favorable response from the Russians. Today, because of their financial troubles, the Russians cannot sustain the 9,000 warheads on their strategic silo-based and mobile ICBMs, nor the 2,000 more in missiles on submarines. Gen. Vladimir Yakovlev, chief of the Russian strategic rocket forces, said recently that 62 percent of Russia's ICBMs are beyond guaranteed service life. Only two of their new mobile ICBMs have been deployed and those were three years behind schedule. Only 25 of 100 planned Blackjack strategic bombers have been completed in the past nine years and the largest number of them are rusting away in Ukraine. When that country offered them for sale to Russia recently, the Russians turned them down because they did not have the funds required. According to Blair, only two of Russia's 26 ballistic missile submarines are on patrol and only one of three planned new subs is actually under construction. Of six Typhoon ICBM-equipped subs built in the last decade, only three are still operational. Blair estimates that usable Russian nuclear warheads could drop below 1,000 in less than 10 years. Congress has recognized Russia's severe nuclear weapons problems. In the new Pentagon authorization bill, the legislators have provided funds to assist the Russians in the dismantling of their missiles and bombers as contemplated by the treaty, but not ours. Bush's action came from a position of strength. It grew out of his determination to do something bold as a followup to the victory in Desert Storm and to keep his momentum heading into the 1992 presidential election. While vacationing at Walker Point, the president's vacation home in Maine, Bush and his national security advisor, Brent Scowcroft, talked about taking "sweeping initiatives" in disarmament in the face of the breakup of the Soviet Union, according to their newly published book, "A World Transformed." In language that President Clinton could employ, Bush announced the reductions by declaring that "If we and the Soviet leaders take the right steps--some on our own, some together--we can dramatically shrink the arsenal of the world's nuclear weapons . . . . America must lead again, as it always has." Senior Clinton national security and foreign policy officials are looking for initiatives that could bring the president to center stage here and abroad on substantive issues. It could be a fitting challenge to Clinton's persuasive powers, first within his administration and then with the Congress. A major, unilateral reduction of strategic warheads by the world's strongest nuclear power, while a big gamble for the president, would set an example worldwide. Walter Pincus is a reporter on The Post's National staff. REFRESHER COURSE INTERMEDIATE-RANGE NUCLEAR FORCE TREATY Eliminated an entire class of nuclear weapons with a range of between 300 and 3,400 miles. Entered into force in June 1988. STRATEGIC ARMS REDUCTION TREATY (START I) Cut of 30 to 40 percent in overall strategic nuclear forces, including ICBMs, sea-launched ballistic missiles and deployed heavy bombers. Entered into force in December 1994. STRATEGIC ARMS REDUCTION TREATY (START II) Further reductions in the most threatening weapons, including multiple independently targetable nuclear warheads. Would cut nuclear arsenals of United States and Russia by two-thirds. Signed by both countries in 1993. Ratified by the U.S. Senate in January 1996. Not yet ratified by Russian Duma. COMPRENHENSIVE TEST BAN TREATY Prohibits nuclear explosions, above ground or underground. Negotiated in 1996. Signed by 150 nations, including the United States, but so far ratified by 21, the United States not among them. _______________________________________________________________________ * Peace Through Reason - http://prop1.org - Convert the War Machines! * _______________________________________________________________________ - - To unsubscribe to abolition-usa, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" with "unsubscribe abolition-usa" in the body of the message. For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1998 16:45:06 -0400 From: Peace through Reason Subject: (abolition-usa) NucNews: Carlsbad NM INVITED WIPP (Forbes, Oct. 19, 1998) Would you like a nuclear waste dump in your backyard? Carlsbad, N.M. lobbied like hell to get one. How Carlsbad got WIPPed By William P. Barrett, Forbes Magazine, Oct. 19, 1998 FOR DECADES isolated Carlsbad, N.M. has basked in the fame of nearby Carlsbad Caverns National Park, with its awesome underground stalactites and stalagmites. Now it's getting another underground claim to fame: a huge nuclear-waste disposal site. Carlsbad's mayor and local businesspeople actually invited the federal government to consider bringing the waste here. Why? They figured they needed it for their economic growth. Located 26 miles east of Carlsbad, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, or WIPP, is a world first: a series of man-made tunnels 2,150 feet underground, designed to accommodate radioactive waste. Delighted to find a place that would accept nuclear waste, the U.S. Department of Energy has poured $2 billion into this hole in the ground. Much of the money has circulated through this town of 25,000. "No one had any earthly idea how big this rascal could be," Don Kidd, Carlsbad state senator and bank president, says approvingly. Today, according to economic models, WIPP generates more than $150 million annually for the Carlsbad economy, or about $6,000 per resident. A small army of miners, contractors, technicians, federal bureaucrats, supervisors, executives and vendors either live in or frequently visit the area. WIPP's 20-person communications team, for example, tops the staff of 11 journalists on the local daily newspaper. Unemployment, a high 8.1%, would be a lot higher without WIPP. New homes costing upwards of $200,000 are going up in a town where older houses can be found for under $30,000. So far WIPP is empty, though it was ready for business by 1988. Lawsuits backed by out-of-town environmentalists have delayed its use. WIPP is now supposed to receive its first waste next year. In the mine, dug through ancient salt deposits, WIPP will ultimately hold a total of 850,000 barrels of lightly contaminated items like tools and clothing-trucked in from ten nuclear weapons facilities around the country. In this rough region, where people have long worked the land, lived by their wits, taken risks, hoped for luck and respected authority, most local people welcome WIPP. It's a poor area where per capita income runs 28% below the national average. Atomic bombs were perfected and first tested in New Mexico, so the word nuclear probably didn't generate the same hysteria here it did elsewhere. Carlsbad has been hooked on Washington handouts for a long time. In the later 1800s U.S. Army troops cleared out Indians for cattle-raising settlers who later founded the town of Eddy. In 1899 Eddy renamed itself after the famous European springs at Karlsbad, hoping to attract more settlers, but the area continued to get federal largesse. Washington-financed projects rebuilt damaged irrigation systems and tamed the Pecos River. Congressional appropriations developed Carlsbad Caverns. Natural resources outfits got cut-rate leases on federal lands. It was Carlsbad that wanted WIPP. In 1972 the old Atomic Energy Commission abandoned plans to build a nuclear dump near Lyons, Kans., amid botched underground surveys and withering media coverage. On an out-of-town trip Carlsbad state senator Joseph Gant Jr. read a wire-service story-by chance-about the Lyons fiasco and got on the telephone to other Carlsbad influentials. Mines harvesting potash, a key ingredient for fertilizer, were closing, and Carlsbad seemed on the road to becoming another Chihuahuan desert ghost town. Within weeks these local movers and shakers were actively lobbying astonished but wary federal officials, and they have never stopped. When, in 1980, Jimmy Carter vowed to scrap the project, city fathers descended upon Washington to lobby Congress and various federal agencies. Ronald Reagan later acceded to their wishes and reversed Carter's decision. Along the way the city fathers made sure Carlsbad would be well rewarded. The feds agreed to move high-paying federal jobs to Carlsbad and to buy lots of supplies locally-sometimes from city officials running side businesses. They won funding to improve the 200-mile-long highway to a New Mexico interstate from two lanes to four. The locals even got $33 million in taxpayer money to build and support an environmental monitoring center where residents can get free body scans for radioactivity. City schools get used computers from Westinghouse, which runs WIPP for the feds. The nuclear wastes have an estimated dangerous radioactive life of up to 240,000 years. If anything goes really wrong, Carlsbad could end up abandoned, but these folks are used to taking chances. _______________________________________________________________________ * Peace Through Reason - http://prop1.org - Convert the War Machines! * _______________________________________________________________________ - - To unsubscribe to abolition-usa, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" with "unsubscribe abolition-usa" in the body of the message. For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1998 18:01:27 -0700 (PDT) From: Jackie Cabasso Subject: (abolition-usa) RE CHICAGO: HAS ANYONE SEEN MY NOTEBOOK?? Greetings, friends. I seem to have left my notebook at the Saturday session of the Chicago abolition conference. It is a standard letter-size spiral-bound notebook with a purple cover. On the first page there's a long list of things to do! There was a also shiny purple University of Chicago pen clipped to the cover. If you accidentally ended up in possession of my "portable brain," please let me know!! Many thanks. -- Jackie ******************************************** WESTERN STATES LEGAL FOUNDATION 1440 Broadway, Suite 500 Oakland, CA USA 94612 Tel: (510)839-5877 Fax: (510)839-5397 wslf@igc.apc.org ********** Part of ABOLITION 2000 ********** Global Network to Eliminate Nuclear Weapons - - To unsubscribe to abolition-usa, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" with "unsubscribe abolition-usa" in the body of the message. For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1998 20:59:42 -0700 (PDT) From: Nevada Desert Experience Subject: Re: (abolition-usa) Re military spending Dear David, October 12, 1998 Greetings from Las Vegas. I just returned from the board meeting of the Nevada Desert Experience in the San Francisco Bay Area. Chris Montesano is on our board. Both Chris and I want to invite you to consider coming to our turn of the millennium event at the Nevada Test Site. From December 29, 1999 to Jan. 2, 2000 we plan to host 500-1000 folks for Millennium 2000: Walking the Ways of Peace. Already we have Bishop Gumbleton, Dr. Rosalie Bertell and Dan Berrigan planning on attending. More literature will be coming out in the next months and you will probably be hearing soon from Chris, of the Sheepranch Catholic Worker Farm and our Board. Please seriously consider being a part of our event. In the meantime...keep on keepin on for peace in New York, the Pentagon, etc. Sincerely, David Buer, ofm NDE Interim Director - - To unsubscribe to abolition-usa, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" with "unsubscribe abolition-usa" in the body of the message. For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1998 07:23:34 -0400 From: Peace through Reason Subject: (abolition-usa) EnviroNews: Poplars clean pollution 10/12/98 - USA Today - Science Phytoremediation: Poplars vs. pollution Cleaning up polluted industrial sites may not require billion-dollar government programs. Instead, scientists suggest, plant a poplar tree. Laboratory-designed hybrids of the fast-growing tree have been found to act like 100-foot straws that suck contamination from soil and ground water. This natural cleanup is inexpensive but takes several years to complete. Still unknown, however, is whether the chemical byproducts generated by the poplars really are less harmful, or if diluting them in the atmosphere only creates another hazard. _______________________________________________________________________ * Peace Through Reason - http://prop1.org - Convert the War Machines! * _______________________________________________________________________ - - To unsubscribe to abolition-usa, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" with "unsubscribe abolition-usa" in the body of the message. For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1998 06:09:50 -0700 (PDT) From: Joseph Gerson Subject: Re: (abolition-usa) RE CHICAGO: HAS ANYONE SEEN MY NOTEBOOK?? 10/13 Jackie, Sorry to read that you lost your notebook. I hope it turns up. That would drive me nuts! Probably like you, I'm crushed with work, but if time allows (on either of our ends) I'd probably benefit from a phone conversation with you dissecting the politics of what happened in Chicago. (My assumption is that our AFSC phones are not bugged, but we shouldn't do it by phone if there's a chance that yours are: legacy of organizing against the war in Vietnam in Arizona.) Good luck, J. Gerson At 06:01 PM 10/12/98 -0700, Jackie Cabasso wrote: >Greetings, friends. I seem to have left my notebook at the Saturday session >of the Chicago abolition conference. It is a standard letter-size >spiral-bound notebook with a purple cover. On the first page there's a long >list of things to do! There was a also shiny purple University of Chicago >pen clipped to the cover. If you accidentally ended up in possession of my >"portable brain," please let me know!! Many thanks. -- Jackie > ******************************************** > WESTERN STATES LEGAL FOUNDATION > 1440 Broadway, Suite 500 > Oakland, CA USA 94612 > Tel: (510)839-5877 > Fax: (510)839-5397 > wslf@igc.apc.org > ********** Part of ABOLITION 2000 ********** > Global Network to Eliminate Nuclear Weapons > > >- > To unsubscribe to abolition-usa, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" > with "unsubscribe abolition-usa" in the body of the message. > For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send > "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message. > > - - To unsubscribe to abolition-usa, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" with "unsubscribe abolition-usa" in the body of the message. For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1998 09:09:39 -0700 (PDT) From: Joseph Gerson Subject: Re: (abolition-usa) REGIONAL REPORTS FOR CHICAGO MEETING 10/13 Hello Rosalie, The Chicago meeting was interesting. Hopefully I'll be able to get a summary report out to our network in the next few days. In sum, it allowed for quite a lot of communication and some debate about what is needed to move ahead with a national campaign. An interim coordinating committe was established for a six month period, with a mandate to call another more representative and diverse group, and with more comprehensive campaign proposals, so that the national campaign can be launched. I was surprised that word of the Maine town meeting campaign had not reached Gordon Clark, the staff director (not sure of his formal title) at Peace Action in Washington, D.C. I pressed for parent groups of all the organizations working on the Vermont and Maine town meetings to amplify the message that comes out of town meetings. More anon... With best wishes, Joseph Gerson At 08:39 AM 10/5/98 -0400, Rosalie Tyler Paul wrote: >Jackie - Sue Broidy will have the information of Maine's Abolition 2000 >work. Rosalie Paul, Peace Action Maine > > > >- > To unsubscribe to abolition-usa, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" > with "unsubscribe abolition-usa" in the body of the message. > For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send > "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message. > > - - To unsubscribe to abolition-usa, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" with "unsubscribe abolition-usa" in the body of the message. For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1998 14:28:16 -0700 (PDT) From: Sue Broidy Subject: (abolition-usa) Fwd: Update on information please >Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1998 09:16:12 -0400 >From: Lorna Howarth >Subject: Update on information please >Sender: Lorna Howarth >To: "Press/Media Dept." >MIME-Version: 1.0 > >Dear Friends > >I am going to put a small piece in the next issue of Positive News about >the work of Abolition 2000 and the Middle Power Initiative. I need a >little more information: > >Why is there no MPI network in the UK (UK was not listed as a coalition >country)? >Is there a UK Abolition 2000 working group, and if so, what are the contact >details. > >Very much looking forward to hearing from you. > >Yours sincerely > > >Lorna Howarth, Editor, Positive News > - - To unsubscribe to abolition-usa, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" with "unsubscribe abolition-usa" in the body of the message. For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1998 00:38:38 EDT From: DavidMcR@aol.com Subject: (abolition-usa) DWOP News coverage in Colorado Springs Date: 10/13/98 3:10:56 PM Eastern Daylight Time From: bf283@scn.org (Erica Kay) Sender: owner-wrll@scn.org Reply-to: bf283@scn.org Thanks to those in Colorado Springs for making this stop fun and newsworthy and thank to Bill Sulzman for forwarding this report. And thank yous to you at other stops for your hospitality and helping create the tour's success. Erica in Seattle Here is a summary of the news coverage in the Colorado Springs Gazette, October 13. The caption under a picture of a street theater scene reads: "Members of the Nonviolent Action Community of Cascadia-Seattle,Wash., perform street theater on the Colorado College campus, Monday." The text of the article reads:"Carrying signs and a 15-foot silver model of a rocket, protestors opposed to military spending marched in Colorado Springs on Monday. About 20 people, some dressed in costumes, marched through Colorado College and Acacia Park. They sang songs and performed skits urging disarmament of missiles. The march was inspired by six people from Seattle who stopped here on their way to a protest in Washington, D.C., next Monday called 'A Day without the Pentagon'. More than 100 organizations are expected at that rally. John Reese,a member of the Seattle group, said the United States should stop making bombs and instead invest in education, health care and housing. The country should also stop selling weapons, Reese said. 'We sell to country A, then country A goes to war with country B. Now country A is our enemy, and we have to arm country B,' he said. The group plans to make 14 stops on its way to the Washington rally." - - To unsubscribe to abolition-usa, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" with "unsubscribe abolition-usa" in the body of the message. For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1998 00:53:02 EDT From: DavidMcR@aol.com Subject: (abolition-usa) BUS REPORT Subj:=09 BUS REPORT Date:=0910/13/98 8:27:09 PM Eastern Daylight Time From:=09can@drizzle.com (John Reese) Sender:=09owner-wrll@scn.org To:=09can@drizzle.com Report From the bus Tuesday, October 13, 1998 We started the day in Kansas City, Kansas, with an early morning crowd of about 20. We held banners at a busy intersection and then gave a tour of the bus. We = had channel 4, the local FOX affiliate, filming us but no interview. We were interviewe= d by the local Pacifica station and a weekly newspaper. The Kansas City folk were very supportive and it was great doing a demo with them. In St Louis we drove through McDonnell Douglas. Got a lot of looks and t= hat is about it. We needed a break so we are at Mira=92s with AFSC to shower, eat and= then move on to Chicago. For those in Chicago, South Bend and Kent it would be great if you could = give your local media a call. We will be in Chicago at the Federal Building at noon on Wednesday and then South Bend at 5 PM at Main and Colfax (not main and Washington). Th= en on Thursday we will be in Kent, Ohio - noon at Kent State University Student Center Plaza, 2 PM at the May 4th memorial, and 4 PM in downtown Kent at Main and Water St. We should arrive in Annapolis at 3 PM on Friday for the conference. And = of course we will all be at the Pentagon on the 19th. We=92ll try to send a message from South Bend but may not be able to unti= l we get to Kent on Thursday. For Peace and Justice, the bus crew - - To unsubscribe to abolition-usa, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" with "unsubscribe abolition-usa" in the body of the message. For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1998 10:04:00 -0400 From: Peace through Reason Subject: (abolition-usa) NucNews: DOE Cleanup Program Criticized (NY Times 10/14/98) http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/w/AP-Energy-Cleanup.html October 14, 1998 NY Times - AP Online Energy Dept. Program Criticized By The Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) -- When officials at the Hanford nuclear site in Washington state sought a quicker way to test for soil contamination they turned to an Energy Department program that has spent hundreds of millions developing new technologies to be used at cleanup sites. Two experimental technologies developed by the department's Office of Science and Technology caught the officials' eyes. But they were quickly disappointed. That's because the methods had not been developed to work effectively in Hanford's arid soil. The wasted opportunity is symptomatic of the department's OST program, which has cost $2.5 billion over the last decade but managed to find uses for fewer than one in five technologies it has paid to develop, according to a new congressional audit. The audit, made public Tuesday, criticized the program for underwriting possible cleanup technologies without consulting with the nuclear weapons sites that might benefit. It said many department weapons site project managers shun the OST program because they ``lack confidence in OST's ability to provide technical advice and assistance.'' The General Accounting Office, the auditing arm of Congress, also criticized the program for failing to follow its own rules for deciding when to continue funding for experimental technologies. OST's adherence to its own procedures ``has been spotty in part because a rigorous application of its requirements might indicate that some projects should be terminated for reasons such as the lack of an identified customer'' within the department, GAO reported. Nearly 73 percent of OST's money for developing new cleanup technologies this year went to private industry or the department's private contractors, 20 percent to the department's own labs and 8 percent to universities, officials estimate. The department wrote the GAO that it agrees with the audit findings. An official who oversees the program said Tuesday he believes it is moving toward making the technology development more efficient and tailored to the cleanup sites' needs. ``We're going to see more deployment of these technologies in the future. Some 200 of these projects that GAO studied are still under development,'' said Gerald G. Boyd, Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary for science and technology. But House Commerce Chairman Thomas Bliley, R-Va., whose committee investigated the program, said the audit reveals major faults in a well intentioned initiative that suffers from ``an unfocused and poorly planned effort.'' ``DOE could save billions with innovative technologies if it could just clean up its act,'' Bliley said. The OST program has been under scrutiny for more than a year. The Associated Press reported in May 1997 that a Massachusetts company with ties to Vice President Al Gore got $33 million in development funds -- nearly all without bidding -- for its experimental technology. The department often approved new funds around the time the company, Molten Metal Technology, made donations to the Democratic Party, records showed. The AP reported that the company's lobbyist, former Clinton campaign manager and fund-raiser Peter Knight, arranged for company executives to meet privately with the assistant secretary overseeing the program. Knight also provided that official with complimentary tickets to a black-tie Democratic event. Knight, the company and Energy officials denied wrongdoing. The assistant secretary was investigated by Energy's inspector general and left the department. The department never hired Molten Metal Technology after its technology was developed, and it later filed for bankruptcy protection, officials said. The OST program was created in 1989 to underwrite development of new technologies to clean up the various sites used to create the massive U.S. nuclear weapon arsenal during the Cold War. The Energy Department program has underwritten 713 potential cleanup technologies. The department says 152 of them, or 21 percent, have been used at a department site at least once. The GAO, saying that figure is inflated, estimated the department deployed 88 to 130 technologies it had funded, a success rate of 13 percent to 18 percent. The rate for experimental technologies the department funded into later stages of development was higher, ranging from 28 percent to 45 percent. But GAO noted that still lagged behind the Environmental Protection Agency's 59 percent rate for a similar program. A Defense Department initiative averaged 38 percent. _______________________________________________________________________ * Peace Through Reason - http://prop1.org - Convert the War Machines! * _______________________________________________________________________ - - To unsubscribe to abolition-usa, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" with "unsubscribe abolition-usa" in the body of the message. For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 15 Oct 1998 10:20:09 -0700 (PDT) From: Joseph Gerson Subject: (abolition-usa) "Faustian Bargain" 10/15 Dear Jackie, I picked up a copy of "A Faustian Bargain" at the Chicago meeting and read it on the plane coming back. A fine piece of work, and very helpful. Could you please send me 15 copies, with a bill? If at all possible, I'd like to have them by the 22nd so that I can take them down to New York for a talk and a meeting I have there on the 23rd. My mailing address is 2161 Mass. Ave., Cambridge, Mass. 02140. Thanks, Joseph Gerson - - To unsubscribe to abolition-usa, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" with "unsubscribe abolition-usa" in the body of the message. For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message. ------------------------------ End of abolition-usa-digest V1 #30 ********************************** - To unsubscribe to $LIST, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" with "unsubscribe $LIST" in the body of the message. For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message.