Pitt and other DU'ers why have you not "championed Elena?" Why?

This is the most incredible website I've seen out there. Why was this posted in "The Lounge?"

This site should be blaring "Come here, Do Me! ...I have something to say and "Give ME, ELENA, MY FORUM!"

Am I being naive that "Elena" is an internet whore and she has been "shopped around" and "proven to be false in her posts of her independent bike rides, and that "SNOPES" would have a heydey with "Elena's" work....is this correct?

I was totally mesmerized from "Duckies" post in the "lounge" of DU about this...and sent this on to everyone I knew...but if they were AOL subscribers it got "bounced back" as trash from their subscribers "who don't want that internet "URL" to be posted on AOL...

This is a fantastic site. It will take a long time to download and digest but if you do it you will wonder why we Dems/Pitt aren't into the "ELENA CAUSE."

My word on this for what it's worth. And, thanks to DU'er TRUMAD who is mirrowing this and therefor bypasses AOL's "shut down" about passing this site with pix and commentary by Elena to everyone we know.

http://elenaschernobyl.com

What are you talking about?

:shrug:

understand...If you're on "dial up" as I am...it takes some time..but oh....it's worth it!

http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/031104A.shtml

http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/031504A.shtml

http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/032304A.shtml

http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/030804A.shtml

http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/031704A.shtml

http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/030204A.shtml

http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/032504A.shtml

http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/printer_022404A.shtml

http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/printer_022704A.shtml

I've also been a little busy.

gotta take the Good with the Bad..:-)'s

these links you posted. I hope I find much about "Elena." I know that you are a champion of the "female underdog." I hope I find what I'm seeking in these posts.

And, you know...I never give up :D...and a :toast:

...to worry about here in the U. S., what is it we're supposed to do about Elena's site?

I understand the nature of the tragedy at Chernobyl, and I also know that we came very close to having our own nuclear nightmare at Three Mile Island, but again, what is it you want DUers to do with Elena's website? Is it going to help us get the NeoCons booted from the centers of U. S. power? Is it going to help us understand what really happened on 911, and who was really responsible?

Please tell me what you're trying to get across.

would be those who lived near TMI at the time of the accident in '79.
I was one of them and remember that time very well. There was talk of evacuating Harrisburg, PA and I only lived about 40 miles from there and got my milk 15 miles from the plant.

I think how this links to BushCo and it probably would have been better having this site up when Cheney talked about increasing the use of nuclear power and not conserving energy. That site shows the horrible effects of radiation. It can happen here too.

And KoKo, thanks for showing me this. It brought back some memories.

there. It was a "wake up call" that got smothered...But yeah.. I was there... I think that's why I got sort of "obsessed" with "Elena's Post." Because anyone who lived near "Three Mile Island" in that time in history got a "wake up call."

Hey...we need to think about this stuff.. :shrug:
w

We were buying our milk at a farm near Hanover, PA at the time where you could fill your own jug up right from the tank for about $1 a gallon. We had to stop going there because of the risk of radioactive contamination. A low risk maybe but we didn't want to chance it.

I think we do need to think about this especially since our nuclear plants are still vulnerable to attack.

used to buy alot from the Pennsylvania farmer (Amish/Mennonites) who must have been worried about this also... It made a Huge impression on me which I've never gotten over, even though I now live in NC, I was up there for that..it could happen here, but they would "cover it over" just like with Chernobyl, I fear...:-(

But, Hey..it's okay...I have a friend that owns a Mountain Bike Store in the Upscale part of Philly...so his mom says. :D

I think what got it buried was when Carter went to the site. Yeah, I also think they will cover any accident up and quietly evacuate people. Maybe the things we should be talking about are going to better technology such as wind and solar powered electricity and fuel cells.

It's part of the reason I got so bummed out when Bush I stopped funding for the atom smasher in TX. Superconductivity woud have saved us alot of energy. Seems like all the money goes for guns and none for butter.

is bad.. He said everyone knew back in the 1920's that "combustion engine" was bad and there was technology to replace it. But, he said everyone went with Henry Ford and sold it...and he and his engineering compatriots at Georgia Tech in 1929-31 (just before the Depression) were over-ruled when they brought it up for discussion.

He got out with his "Engineering Degree from GA Tech" just when the "Depression" was in full swing. He said "NO One" wanted to listen to their "student theories" that "combustion engine" used too much gas and that it should be made obsolete.

He is still alive...very old...in his late 90's and says..."We could have done better and not relied on "oil from foreign places" to run our automobiles. ..technology was there, but no one wanted to go with it.

And this "very old guy" is a die hard Southern Repug...who says this..not a "liberal Dem." :shrug: What to think about this????

With the Hybrids. It seems the big boys wanted oil so they got oil. Another example of money ruining things. Seems they don't look for better cheaper ways to do things but only things that get them more money. Environment be damned.

and think about Cheney's "Energy Push" where he includes an "Emphasis" on giving "Tax Credits" for Nuclear Power...and tell me this doesn't fit into the upcoming election!

This puts alot into perspective. I can foresee our DU Biker "Big Jawn" doing his biking in America down "bike paths" of future Chernobyls.

That's what I'm trying to say.

And, I was upset with Pitt who should have been "onto this" because he is always defending "the good out there." Or, at least he says he is with his "poetry and style of writing."

...from certain posters on DU? Couldn't you have taken care of this with a simple personal email instead of the course of action you decided to take?

Maybe you ought to take a deep breath next time and count to ten.

She sees a story...doesn't see a lot of reporting on it...says "This is Pitt's fault"...posts a thread.

I abase myself before the seamless logic.

this. Because..there is...a "heart within."

a woman's website whom I've never heard of? Um...

Whatever, Koko. You feel the need to swat me online here, you go ahead and do it.

:eyes:

that's it...and all of it. :shrug:

<good movie>

(OK, it's "Helena")

Seriously, my focus currently resides in the USA. Elena's site is equally wonderful and disturbing, but I have to have priorities right now. My heart goes out to her and all the other victims of the Chernobyl tragedy, but I'm afraid that's all I have to give her right now.

I still haven't figured it out.

care to clue me in??

:D

I may have misunderstood it, but I can't stand movies that end with a version of the "I've been dreaming" scenario. It's been years since I saw that, but I remember being frustrated that the writers felt they were so boxed in by the plot that they had nowhere to go but the 'story within a story' line.

(My $0.02)

It was about the fine line between love and ownership, told from the viewpoint of a psychotic. Even more disturbing emotionally than American Psycho.

"Elean's Website" and the Chimp and his Squirrel are really not what this whole election is about? Yes? No? Hello?

http://triggur.org/silo/

The one above I found as an undergraduate years ago, and I am still creeped out when I revisit the site.

What was it that Oppenheimer said after Trinity? "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds." (I think it is from the Bhagavad-Gita)

you dealing with here. Are we on the "same page" here?

Here's the link, and I wish it WAS a Documentary Movie!


http://elenaschernobyl.com

The movie we were discussing was "Boxing Helena."

Here is the imdb link:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0106471/

Somebody was playing fast and loose with their puns! :)

BTW- thanks for the link.

A Pox on you for this... :D Please when you finish your puns go to the link in my post... Then I will forgive you for "puns."

:-)'s ..guess we gotta' get our humor where we get it these days...???

I can't think of an appropriate adjective to describe the site/photos.

Regarding the tangent above between you and camero re. TMI, I think that the greatest dangers to us (humans, all- not just US) come from within, not from the threat of a terrorist strike. As we come down from "Peak Oil", we will be pressured to rely on energy sources like 'nukular' power, and the danger of Cherynobyl-like accidents will increase.

I read a good book related to all this, called "Normal Accident Theory" or something like that. Basically, the author said that with complicated systems, things go wrong. And sometimes they go very wrong. The one thing you can expect, is that it will happen.

Depressing, but enlightening.

all of us. How do we know when it goes wrong that "we" aren't the victims. We hope it will be "someone else," but what if it isn't?

What If? :shrug:

There are other forms of electrical generation out there. I think I even heard where Germany is trying to reduce it's dependence on nuclear power. Good point on peak oil.

Same reason anything gets done in this country, I suppose.

Someone with connections makes a large contribution to key lawmaker's reelection campaigns, and presto! A new addition to an energy bill that subsidizes construction of nuclear power plants appears.

It has nothing to do with efficiency or long-term utility or even the good of the people.

I just thought that site brought out the dangers of nuclear power beautifully. The towns near Chernobyl had around 50,000 at the most in each town. Here we are talking about hundreds of thousands and millions because most of the plants are near population centers.

think about why we can't do better than "nuke." It's here..but so many of us see pitfalls that we've managed to stop building new plants but Cheney loves it and thinks we need "tax breaks" and more to sustain it.

This post doesn't even address what's happening to "Nuclear Waste" being buried right now in SC because they need jobs but also being trucked back and forth between our US Coasts. And many here in the "old days" were really upset about "Yukka Mt." being used as a Nuke Waste depository just as all that possible leakege in NW SC will eventually seep it's way down to the coast and ruing the fishing/coastal areas of SC off Charleston...But no one cares. That's a long time away...in the meantime the big worry is about Mercury in Seafood hurting the SC fisherman...

Mercury may soon be the "least of our worries." :-(

where they found plutonium that had leaked into the groundwater in that area. Alot of dangers.

but..perhaps I'm being OTT, here. It's still a warning/wake up call though. No matter how many of us want to put "fingers in ears and go yah, yah, yah...about it. :-(

I'm really trying here to get something worthwhile into the din of "campaigns" and I'm getting that folks here are thinking I'm talking about a "movie," and Pitt (our DU "flagship") is giving me links to "TruthOut."

sheesh.......why do I do this..I don't know...:shrug:

you see your own kids incinerated in a "nuclear disaster" where all that's left of them is "gas masks" from rescuers and "pictures on the wall of what their life was before?"

How could any of us live with the Nuclear Disaster that wiped out "Citiies and Towns" and under Asscroft who wouldn't tell us the truth we would have "radiation in our bodies and children's bodies" forever and everything we touched, ate, fished or grew would have mega radiation?

How would we AMERICANS DEAL WITH THIS? Being "outcasts in our own country?" What would we do in the BUSH AMERICA?

Excuse my shouting...hanging head in shame...but wanted "emphasis." :-(

I also saw how the radioactivity ate up everything in sight. And the melted plastic on the doll.

stop posting on this thread and read all of Pitt's posts above in peace and quiet and not feel I have to hype and hawk this post..

Many thanks! :toast:

Beautiful and strange.

3 Mile Island refer to

when I mentioned that to a 50+ man, he sheepishly said he didn't know either

How do we tell folks what can happen. How do we reach those who have no idea? Is it important...Well, I think so, to pass on for an alert...YES!!!

Like Antonio Machado wrote:

The wind, one brilliant day, called
to my soul with an odor of jasmine.

"In return for the odor of my jasmine,
I'd like all the odor of your roses."

"I have no roses; all the flowers
in my garden are dead."

"Well then, I'll take the withered petals
and the yellow leaves and the waters of the fountain."

the wind left. And I wept. And I said to myself:
"What have you done with the garden that was entrusted to you?"


Translated by Robert Bly

Not meaning to stray off topic, after all, to whom was the garden entrusted?

what some of us feel about all this. But, especially our "environment."

Here's soem links to Rachel Carson which I was going to post before I saw your poem, which dug into my heart. Links:

Ecology Hall of Fame: Rachel Carson
... Rachel Carson made environmentalism respectable. Before Silent Spring, nearly all Americans believed that science was a force for good. ...
www.ecotopia.org/ehof/carson/ - 3k - Cached - Similar pages

NRDC: The Story of Silent Spring
... Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe roused Northern antipathy to slavery in the decade leading up to the Civil War; and Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, which in 1962 ...
www.nrdc.org/health/pesticides/hcarson.asp - 26k - Mar 29, 2004 - Cached - Similar pages

Doesn't France get around 75-80% of their energy needs from nuclear power?

"In 2002, nuclear electricity generation remained at the same level as in 2001, with a total output of nearly 2 170 terawatt-hours (TWh), representing 23.8% of total electricity generation in OECD countries. Seventeen OECD countries have nuclear power plants in operation providing between 4% (in the Netherlands) and 78% (in France) of their electricity generation."

http://www.nea.fr/html/general/press/2003/2003-01.html

Yeah, I thought so.

any seeming problems to date. One could say that France is a very small country compared to ours, and therefore they can monitor more closely their nuclear plants, whereas ours are many and spread far and wide with "States" having control and therefore the money spent on regulation might be dispersed much father and wider than in France.

And, former "Soviet Union" (Chernobyl) might be more applicable to us here in America at this time rather than comparing Chernobyl happeneing when the Soviet Union was broken up into various countries which made up the old Soviet State.

But here's a glowing account from the French from your link about what they have done. Shouldn't we be working with them if they are that good..which I think they must be, no matter how tiny their country is compared to ours?

Just published

Nuclear Energy Data to 2020 in OECD Countries


In 2002, nuclear electricity generation remained at the same level as in 2001, with a total output of nearly 2 170 terawatt-hours (TWh), representing 23.8% of total electricity generation in OECD countries. Seventeen OECD countries have nuclear power plants in operation providing between 4% (in the Netherlands) and 78% (in France) of their electricity generation.

This information is contained in the just-published 2003 edition of Nuclear Energy Data, which gives an overview of the status of and trends in nuclear electricity generation and the fuel cycle up to 2020 in OECD member countries. The information, provided by government officials, includes statistical data and projections complemented by short country reports highlighting significant events in the field of nuclear energy.

At the end of 2002, 362 nuclear units were connected to the grid, representing a total installed capacity of 309 gigawatts electrical (GWe). Seven units with a total capacity of 6.5 GWe were in construction in Japan (3 units), the Republic of Korea (2 units) and the Slovak Republic (2 units). Eight units (10 GWe) were firmly committed in Japan. In addition, 19 units (22.5 GWe) were planned in Finland (1 unit), Japan (8 units), the Republic of Korea (8 units) and Turkey (2 units).

Nuclear electricity generation is projected to increase slightly in the coming decade, reaching between 2 340 and 2 360 TWh in 2010, but the share of nuclear energy in total electricity generation is expected to decrease to around 22% in 2010 as total electricity demand will grow faster than nuclear generation.

Do not call out another DU member. Thank you.