September 4, 2008

"That Dr Robert Oppenheimer's optimism fell/ At the first hurdle"
--Billy Bragg

If we would have went nuclear back in the 50s in the way that Oppenheimer wanted us to after the Atom Bomb, we wouldn't be dependent on any kind of oil, foreign, domestic or vegetable. Or coal, clean or not.

Detractors point at bad nuclear events, but I counter that if we (USA, scientific community, every country that wd benefit from nuclear power) had wrapped our collective noggins together and not focused on fossil fuel from the mid-50s onward, the things that make nuclear energy frightening (beyond the politics) would have been collectively worked out by now. 50 years of hyper-advanced, focused science. I'm fairly sure they would have worked a fair amount of the kinks out.

The Republican, near Francoesque cries of "drill baby drill" would have sounded even more stupid than they are, but only because they would have been obsolete.

Oil in this age is outmoded: it's the whale blubber of the 21st century. The sooner we junk it entirely, the better off we are.