Matheson on Downwinders

Dear Bob,
Since I was first elected to Congress, I have been fighting to hold the federal government accountable for the harm done to Utahns from exposure to radioactive fallout from nuclear testing.
From 1951 until 1992, the U.S. government conducted over 900 nuclear weapons tests at the Nevada Test Site, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Of the 100 above ground tests, nearly one fourth were bigger than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan. At one time we thought only rural populations in the West were at risk. Recent information proves otherwise. The lone comprehensive study we have completed, of one radioactive isotope (Iodine 131), showed concentrations in every county across America. Evidence compiled over the last 13 years points to the likelihood that there are even more victims in Utah and other states than are already acknowledged under current law.
Now is the time for Congress to take a serious look at expanding the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA) - first passed in 1990 and amended in 2000. Along with New Mexico Senator Tom Udall and Congressman Ben Lujan, I have sponsored the bipartisan RECA Amendments Act of 2010, HR 5119.
Under the current law, residents of only 10 Utah counties (who suffer from 18 types of radiation-associated cancer) are eligible to apply for payments. I hear many stories similar to one I heard recently from a man whose wife spent a lengthy period of time as a child just four miles beyond the Sevier County line--one of the "designated affected areas" and whose compensation claim was denied. Also, it adds renal cancer or any other chronic renal disease to the list of compensable diseases for employees of mines and mills.
I am pushing for a Congressional hearing on this issue to draw attention to new information and to raise awareness. If government deception has endangered people's health, we must shine a light on what really happened and expose the truth.

Sincerely,

U.S. Representative
2nd District of Utah

Obama's Nevada Ad Re: Yucca Mountain

Divine Strake

Next month, the U.S. government plans on exploding this giant bomb in Nevada.

It's the same type of explosives used in the Oklahoma City terrorist attack in 1995. Minus the rental truck. And the fact that it's 700 tons (or, if you like, 1.4 million pounds.)

The government claims that it is to test to see if it will blow up a bunker where a terrorist might be hiding.

Like the terrorists won't figure something's up when you are putting 1.4 million pounds of fertilizer on top of the cave. Because I doubt there's a plane that can carry that much.

In addition, they are blowing it up in the same place that they tested the nuclear bombs in the 50's. They tell us the ground is safe, but they told us that 50 years ago. Ask the thousands of people in Utah affected by the cancer caused by those bombs how safe they were.

For more information, visit the other blogs in today's blogswarm.

Chlorophyll
Dee's 'Dotes
Green Commons
Green News and Opinion
Green Party Action Center
MikeyPod on the Bayou
Obiter Dicta By Steve
One Utah
SLCSpin
Utah Amicus
Utah Democrats

No Way Day

It's an issue that people from every walk of life agree on. It doesn't matter if you are a Republican, Democrat, Green, Libertarian, a Constitutionalist, or Apolitical.

Pete Ashdown and Orrin Hatch agree. Heck, even Rocky and the LDS Church agree (surely, hell must have frozen over!)

We do not want Utah to become the dumping ground for nuclear waste, even temporarily. Accidents and terrorism can and do happen.

I know that this probably isn't the only local blog you read. But I am asking you again to contact the BLM. Do it today. Do it now.

Pam Schuller
U.S. Bureau of Land Management
Salt Lake Field Office
2370 South 2300 West
Salt Lake City, Utah 84119

Email: pam_schuller@blm.gov

It is time to stand up. If this thing goes through, we are all doomed.

Again, it's amazing to me how this thing has spread. Utah Policy organized a Blogswarm, and it has been widely successful, from accross the spectrum:

My Diary on this at DailyKos
The Senate Site
SLCSpin
Part of the Plan
Utahania
Jen's Green Journal
Utah Amicus
JuniperWest
Reach Upward
Dee's 'Dotes
Media Relations
Obiter Dicta by Steve
Eric Hamilton's Reality Check
Political Spyglass
Josh Ewing's Running, but not out of Breath
Utah Planners' Corner
Rural Blogging
Utah Conservative
This Divided State
State of the Beehive
Hot Blava
One Utah
Utah Democrats
Part of the Plan

[Update 5:12 PM]

Gary Thornock
Annother from Utah Amicus
State of the Beehive and here also
Pete Ashdown

[Update 7:03 PM]

Steve Urquhart

I will bump and update the list as I have time and other posts throughout the day today.

-Bob