Tokyo Nuclear Professor "It's All About Money"

The current chair of the Japan's Nuclear Safety Commission is Haruki Madarame, who's been dubbed 'Detarame' Haruki in Japan, or 'Falsehood, nonsense' Haruki. 'Detarame' nicely rhymes with his last name.

He was a professor at Tokyo University before he became the chair of the NSC in April 2010. He gave an interview to a citizens' group back in 2005 on nuclear energy. Far from being 'falsehood' or 'nonsense', his talk was very frank, and totally made sense.

He quite readily admitted, among other things, that:

• He and his fellow nuclear scientists in Japan didn't quite know what they were doing;
• There is no such thing as safe nuclear technology;
• The nuclear power generation was filthily profitable;
• It's all about money - if someone's unwilling to have a nuclear waste dump in his backyard, tell him you'll pay him twice the amount promised before. If he still says no, tell him you'll pay him 5 times as much, or 10 times as much.

Somewhere down the line, someone will say yes, and that's all that matters. And Madarame saw nothing wrong with that. In fact, he didn't see anything wrong with any of his positions, because that was how it was.

Too bad it had to take the Fukushima nuke accident for the average Japanese to realize not only they'd been served with imperfect and dangerous 'clean energy' technology but also that a nuclear expert like Madarame at the nation's top research institute knew quite well about the danger and the nature of the nuclear technology and industry and was openly telling people about it. Laughing, as if it was a funny joke.

Quite a contrast to another Tokyo University professor, Tatsuhiko Kodama, who seems to have inspired many people beyond Japan's border.

Madarame also said in the interview, 'Trust us.' And trust we did.

Here's the 2005 interview video with English subtitle (EX-SKF/Tokyo Brown Tabby):

Source: Another Tokyo University Professor Haruki "Detarame" Madarame Tells Like It Really Is: "It's All About Money, Isn't It?"

Shell admits liability for huge Nigeria oil spill. 'BP did more in six months for the US communities than Shell has done in 50 years for the Ogoniland,' activist says.

Shell admits liability for huge Nigeria oil spill. 'BP did more in six months for the US communities than Shell has done in 50 years for the Ogoniland,' activist says.

Thanks Corporate America, you're the best!

Shock, awe: British government agrees that copyright has gone too far

Shock, awe: British government agrees that copyright has gone too far: "

The British government today pledged (PDF) to enact significant changes to copyright law, including orphan works reforms and the introduction of new copyright exceptions. And the tone of the comments was surprising: the government agrees that 'copyright currently over-regulates to the detriment of the UK.' CD (and perhaps DVD) ripping for personal use should become legal at last—and the government is even keen to see that the consumer rights granted by law can't simply be taken away by contract (such as a "EULA" sticker on a CD demanding that a disk not be ripped).

Responding to an independent study done earlier this year, the government has also endorsed the creation of a digital copyright exchange to facilitate licensing. Within limits, the government endorses the view that 'the widest possible exceptions to copyright within the existing EU framework are likely to be beneficial to the UK.'

The government's report is also significant for what it pledges not to do. The government says it will not bring forward the 'site blocking' provisions of last year's Digital Economy Act. This is evidently not referring to the power of copyright holders to compel individual ISPs to block infringing sites after a lawsuit, but to a more comprehensive system whereby the government maintains a list of sites that all ISPs in the country would be required to block.

Tortured Contractor Can Sue Rumsfeld

A federal judge has ruled that former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld can be sued personally for damages by a former U.S. military contractor who says he was tortured during a nine-month imprisonment in Iraq. The man, who speaks five languages and worked as a translator for Marines in Iraq, claims he was abducted by the U.S. military and held without justification while his family knew nothing about his whereabouts. Court papers filed on his behalf say he was repeatedly abused while being held at Camp Cropper, then released without explanation in August 2006.

"This is how we treat our allies and civilians."

U.S. Debt Reaches 100 Percent of Country's GDP

The U.S. debt reached 100 percent of gross domestic product after the government's debt ceiling was lifted, Treasury figures showed Wednesday, according to AFP.

Source: U.S. Debt Reaches 100 Percent of Country's GDP

Color video from Hiroshima

The Nation's Greg Mitchell has a new book out about the strange saga of color video, shot in Hiroshima and Nagasaki after the nuclear bomb attacks, which was suppressed for nearly 40 years. You can see a couple of clips from that video in the trailer he's put together for the book.

In the weeks following the atomic attacks on Japan sixty-six years ago this week, and then for decades afterward, the United States engaged in airtight suppression of all film shot in Hiroshima and Nagasaki after the bombings. This included vivid color footage shot by U.S. military crews and black-and-white Japanese newsreel film.

The color US military footage would remain hidden until the early 1980s, and has never been fully aired. It rests today at the National Archives in College Park, Maryland, in the form of 90,000 feet of raw footage labeled #342 USAF.

When that footage finally emerged, I spoke with and corresponded with the man at the center of this drama: Lt. Col. (Ret.) Daniel A. McGovern, who directed the US military film-makers in 1946, managed the Japanese footage, and then kept watch on all of the top-secret material for decades. I also interviewed one of his key assistants, Herbert Sussan, and some of the Japanese survivors they filmed.

Now I’ve written a book and e-book about this, titled Atomic Cover-up: Two US Soldiers, Hiroshima & Nagasaki, and The Greatest Movie Never Made.

What I think is particularly striking about the clips in Mitchell's preview video: They're heart-wrenching, but, at this point, not particularly shocking. The US Military may have successfully covered up video that showed the brutality of atomic warfare, but, in the intervening years, we saw the brutality of war (in general) in Vietnam and we saw what acute radiation poisoning can do the human body in Chernobyl. Secrets don't stay buried even when secrets stay buried.

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