Could America withstand its own Fukushima, Japan Disaster?

While the Japan disaster is no doubt one of the most troubling occurrences of our lifetime, just behind Chernobyl, it has raised questions here in the United States of our own nuclear energy sites and if we could with stand a similar disaster.

The truth is this, we know that there is really no way of getting around nuclear energy, if we want to sustain our current living habits and needs, until something else gets perfected enough to be able to use. The only problem with that is we continue to see our government sit back and watch as the amount of people with cancer in this country grow because our government refuses to push back at corporations and start to actually regulate them and enforce the regulations.

Corporations continue to dump waste into our water supply because paying the fines, once they finally get caught, of breaking this law is cheaper than actually keeping up with regulations. The BP oil rig disaster last year proved that the companies are not afraid of our government. They were told to stop spraying the chemical used to HIDE the oil, by breaking it up into smaller pieces so that it could not be seen in the water as it sank to the bottom or floated around just under the surface, but continued to spray because it was easier than cleaning it up. Out of site, out of mind. Now that it's not rushing up onto the shore in droves anymore, people don't even talk about it. IT'S NOT CLEANED UP YET. They hid it and walked away. The natural gas companies are using fracking to drill for natural gas under the ground. Doesn't sound so bad just yet, but when you realize that fracking is a bunch of cancer causing chemicals that poison the land, your livestock (food), and water supplies, as shown in the documentary GasLand, you realize that your water could eventually become flammable and most certainly make you sick or even kill you. The government (under Bush jr) opened up the availability for these companies to be able to inject anything the wanted underneath the ground. The closer they get to the watersheds that supply our daily needs, the more screwed we'll be. Best case scenario, it eventually costs you thousands of dollars and much pain.

What does all this have to do with the Fukushima, Japan disaster you're probably asking. Well, we have bridges collapsing in Minnesota, levees in Louisiana failing, and our entire infrastructure rotting away piece by piece. If we can't rely on our government to spend some money to build our country back up, in it's greatest time of need, because the corporations need more tax breaks to "create jobs". That worked, oh so well, over the last decade of Bush tax cuts. If they can't protect us from polluting and poisoning of our land and people by corporations, because either they are or will be the CEO of "that company" or because they are being bought off by the company, in order to be able to maximize their profits, by just letting "a few little things" go. Then how the heck can we have any faith in the fact that our existing facilities would be able to hold up to any sort of disaster, such as that in Fukushima? How can we feel comfortable moving forward with any future plans of nuclear energy with a government that has proven again and again that they don't give a shit about the people, so long as it makes the gov't officials a few bucks for retirement or opens up a future job prospect after they get elected out for some other idiot.

Don't get us wrong, we are not against nuclear energy of even utilizing it even more in the future. We prefer to spend money on R & D for solar, bio-fuel (such as hemp, easily renewable), wind or anything else that can help reduce our dependence on non-renewable, foreign or dangerous alternatives as well as continue with what we have. There's no way anyone can say we could continue on as normal without continuing to need oil, natural gas and other current systems. We can, however, try to move away from them as quickly as possible. We are against trusting that our government can regulate anybody that makes over 250,000 dollars a year though. That is what makes us afraid to have confidence in the fact that we could handle a disaster such as that seen in Fukushima, Japan.

Could we handle a disaster similar to that of the one in Japan? They will tell us it's alright, and everything will be fine, because they believe we are like children who can't handle the truth. The truth is, many of us probably can't, but that's another story. Our answer to the question: not under the current system of government. Please help us change that.

AFSOCS