Yucca Mountain News Clips - Tuesday, November 25, 2003

Yucca Mountain News Clips
Tuesday, November 25, 2003
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Las Vegas SUN
November 25, 2003

Democrats rip Bush stance on Yucca

By Jace Radke
<jace@lasvegassun.com>
Las Vegas SUN

Yucca Mountain isn't likely to be a big part of President Bush's agenda during his 3 1/2-hour fund-raising stop in Las Vegas, but Democratic leaders are making the president's strong support for storing nuclear waste in Nevada an issue.

Rep. Shelley Berkley, former Gov. Bob Miller, state Sen. Dina Titus and other Democratic leaders say that while campaigning in 2000 Bush said he would rely on "sound science" in deciding whether to store 77,000 tons of nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain. He has since signed legislation to clear the way for the project, they said.

"I hope while they're having lunch with the president, (Secretary of State) Dean Heller and (Attorney General) Brian Sandoval ask him why he broke his promise," Titus said Monday. Both are Republicans, and Sandoval is the state chairman of Bush's 2004 re-election campaign.

"I hope they ask the president why he ignored science and went with politics and money," Titus said. "I hope voters remember this and send him packing in the next election. I'd like to send him to his own repository."

Titus and others railed against the Bush administration and the storage of nuclear waste 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas during a news conference at the top of a downtown parking garage overlooking the Spaghetti Bowl.

"We're talking about 110,000 shipments of nuclear waste passing through 43 states over the next 38 years," Berkley said. "It will be traveling within one mile of 50 million Americans."

Bush arrived in Las Vegas about 9:30 a.m. and was expected to be back on Air Force One headed for Phoenix by 1 p.m. Bush was scheduled to give a speech focusing on Medicare to a group of seniors at Spring Valley Hospital and attend a fund-raising lunch for his re-election campaign at The Venetian.

The visit will be Bush's first to Nevada as president, although he visited Lake Tahoe in June 2000 as a presidential candidate. Today's lunch is expected to cost between $1,000 and $2,000 a plate and be attended by as many as 500 people, while protests regarding Yucca Mountain take place outside the resort.

In July Vice President Dick Cheney's Las Vegas visit was met with Yucca protests as he raised $300,000 in campaign funds at the Spanish Trail Country Club.

Assembly Speaker Richard Perkins, D-Henderson, said he doesn't believe the argument that transporting all of the nation's nuclear waste to one repository would be safer than storing it in place at the 131 nuclear reactors around the country.

"All he has to do is ask his own Secret Service contingent if he is easier to guard in place or while he is moving around," Perkins said.

Miller said Democratic presidential candidates have been honest on the issue.

"They have not lied to Nevadans, and many voted against Yucca Mountain," Miller said. "There is no way on God's green earth that they can be worse than what we have now."

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Las Vegas SUN
November 25, 2003

Bush Traveling to Nevada for Fund-Raiser

By David Pace
Associated Press

WACO, Texas (AP)

President Bush on Tuesday was interrupting his Thanksgiving vacation at his Texas ranch to travel to Las Vegas, his first visit to Nevada since signing the legislation that ended a decade-long drive to locate the nuclear repository at Yucca Mountain.

Bush planned to sandwich fund-raising stops in Las Vegas and Phoenix with appearances at senior citizen centers in each city to tout the legislation overhauling Medicare. The double duo of official and campaign events allows him to charge part of the trip's cost to the taxpayers.

Republicans maintain that Yucca Mountain won't hurt Bush because Nevada residents understand that Congress also approved the dump and there are many other issues on which to support the president.

"As Ronald Reagan used to say, if people agree with you 80 percent of the time they're you're friend, not your enemy," GOP Gov. Kenny Guinn said.

Nevada has voted increasingly Democratic in recent presidential elections. Former President Clinton carried the state twice in three-way contests, and former Vice President Al Gore won 46 percent of the vote in 2000, the highest percentage for a Democratic presidential nominee since Harry Truman in 1948.

Redistricting has made Nevada an even more attractive prize for Democrats, since it now has five electoral votes.

Democrats in Nevada are trying to make a 2004 campaign issue out of President Bush's decision to support Yucca Mountain, located about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, as the site for the nation's only nuclear waste repository.

Bush narrowly won Nevada's four electoral votes in 2000 after promising that, if elected, he would use sound science to base any decision on locating the repository. That was interpreted in Nevada as a chance to stop the dump from going in at Yucca Mountain.

Monday, on the eve of a Bush visit to Las Vegas, Democrats contended he broke his promise, and they urged Nevada voters to hold the president accountable next year.

"Our memories are not so short that we can't recall that four years ago, this candidate promised us one thing and delivered us the exact opposite," former Nevada Gov. Bob Miller, a Democrat, said.

"I encourage all Nevadans ... to remember what you got. And what you got was a nuclear dump," Miller said.

Democrats say they're also encouraged about their prospects in Arizona, the second stop on Bush's fund-raising tour Tuesday. Bush won the state with just 51 percent of the vote in 2000, and Arizona last year elected its first Democratic governor in 20 years.

Arizona holds the first presidential primary in the West early next year, and Democratic presidential contenders have been flocking to the state. Bush had made four previous trips to Arizona since becoming president, but Tuesday's event marked the first of his re-election campaign.

"He wants to make sure people will be able to hear his message directly," Arizona Republican Party Chairman Bob Fannin said.

Enactment of the Medicare prescription drug benefit could help Bush in both states because of their sizable senior populations. Democrats have used spiraling prescription drugs prices as a major campaign issues in recent elections.

Bush's appearances at the senior citizens centers in Las Vegas and Phoenix were scheduled last week when Congress was locked in a heated battle over the Medicare bill. Administration officials hoped a public push from the president would seal the deal.

But when the House approved the final bill in an all-night session Friday and the Senate voted Monday to end a filibuster of the legislation, Bush aides had to scramble to redefine the events.

Bush sought out reporters late Monday to praise the Senate vote to end the filibuster. "Modernizing Medicare will make the system better and will enable us to say to millions of seniors, we've kept our promise," he said.

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Las Vegas Review-Journal
November 25, 2003

Letters: 'Miracle metal' an embarrassment for Yucca backers

By Victor Gilinsky
Special To The Review-Journal

Recently, the federal Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board sent the U.S. Department of Energy a message that is devastating to DOE's case for Yucca Mountain. The independent scientific board said the "miracle metal" the department has been counting on to protect waste packages will likely corrode, and may do so rapidly.

Once the radioactive contents are exposed, it would not take long for radioactivity to show up in waters used in Nevada's inhabited areas. It has become apparent that water flows much faster through the mountain and along the water table below than the DOE expected years ago.

Instead of rejecting the site on these grounds, the department rejected its own geologic guidelines in 2001. With a wave of the hand a few weeks later, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham recommended Yucca Mountain to the president.

The Energy Department thereby also rejected the traditional safety philosophy that called for separate safety standards for the man-made package and for the surrounding natural barriers. DOE relies on a huge computer model that lumps everything together to predict radiation measurements some distance away from the Mountain.

The department argues it doesn't matter how it gets to the answer so long as its projections meet the NRC standard on public irradiation. Unfortunately, the NRC has gone along with this all-in-one approach for Yucca Mountain licensing.

As a former NRC commissioner, I can tell you this method is completely at odds with the "defense-in-depth" doctrine the agency applies to nuclear power reactors (or even to other waste sites). The NRC has separate requirements for the various barriers between radioactive fuel and people -- on reactor fuel "cladding," the reactor vessel, the containment building and on outside emergency measures.

The reason for this is that if you rely on only one component and you are wrong, you can wipe out all safety protection. In the case of a permanent repository, such a mistake will be irretrievable.

In its letter, the Technical Review Board told DOE that it didn't want the waste package corrosion problem to be just mixed into the computer model stew. The board wanted the problem dealt with separately and convincingly.

This is a backhanded acknowledgement that DOE's computer model approach -- with the impressive name of Total System Performance Assessment -- has in practice served more to obscure problems than to get on top of them. The board is also impatient with DOE because it has been telling the agency to validate its assumptions that the waste package would withstand the hot and humid Yucca Mountain repository environment with little effect. As we know, DOE is not very good at listening.

Last year I testified before the Congress that the Yucca Mountain program was not ready for a green light. It doesn't make sense from the point of view of public safety, or security, or its cost. Nor is it needed, as some of its adherents think, for a continuation or even expansion of nuclear power use.

As often happens with gargantuan projects that are not driven by a real need, the Yucca Mountain program has taken on a life of its own that is unrelated to any useful purpose; it is a dream for the contractors but, at a cost heading toward $100 billion, definitely not one for the taxpayers.

The federal government should face up scientific and economic reality and take a fresh look at how best to manage used nuclear reactor fuel, which is what most of the stuff is. For many decades we can protect it at reactor sites by putting it in "dry" casks, as is already being done with NRC approval. The casks are hardened air-cooled storage containers licensed by NRC.

We should be making plans for collecting the casks in regional storage centers, and doing so in a way that minimizes transportation. By keeping the waste casks accessible we can monitor potential problems and fix them before they can cause harm.

In my view, a comprehensive waste management plan should also include getting DOE out of the business -- for reasons that are all to obvious -- and putting an entity in charge that is independent of nuclear power promotion. That is what the French have done, and it works well.

For the present, the tough comments of the federal Technical Review Board in its letter to DOE should be helpful to Nevada's arguments against Yucca. But it will take more than being right on the technical arguments for Nevada to prevail. The powerful hands of Sen. Harry Reid and his colleagues in the Nevada congressional delegation have been indispensable. Gov. Kenny Guinn's steadfastness has kept the Department of Energy from bullying the state.

Nevada is fortunate to have these leaders in the fight over Yucca Mountain.

Victor Gilinsky, a former commissioner of the Nuclear Regular Regulatory Commission, writes from Santa Monica, Calif.

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Reno Gazette-Journal
November 25, 2003

Bush to campaign in Nevada as Democrats pledge tough challenge

President Bush makes his first presidential trip to Nevada on Tuesday, visiting a state he won narrowly in 2000 but that Democrats are claiming as a 2004 battleground where they'll press accusations the president broke a campaign promise on where to place a nuclear waste dump.

Bush was set to deliver a morning speech on Medicare at Spring Valley Hospital in Las Vegas, then speak at a lunchtime fund-raiser at The Venetian hotel-casino, which is expected to raise more than $1 million for his re-election campaign.

It's the president's first trip to Nevada since the 2000 campaign, when he made a fund-raising swing through Lake Tahoe. That was about a month after issuing a statement declaring"sound science"should determine where the nation's nuclear waste should be stored for the next 10,000 years.

When Bush approved Yucca Mountain 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas as the nation's nuclear dumpsite last year, Democrats said he was breaking his promise and giving them an issue for 2004.

"I think Bush may have signed away his chances to win this state with his signature on the Yucca Mountain bill,"said Jenny Backus, a Democratic strategist."I think with a swish of a pen he turned a red state that had tinges of pink into a top battleground state and prime pickup opportunity for the Democrats."

Several prominent state Democrats criticized Bush over the issue at a Las Vegas news conference Monday, and protesters were expected to greet him at The Venetian on Tuesday.

"Our memories are not so short that we can't recall that four years ago, this candidate promised us one thing and delivered us the exact opposite,"former Gov. Bob Miller said as Democrats gathered on the eve of the president's visit.

"I encourage all Nevadans ... to remember what you got. And what you got was a nuclear dump,"he said.

Republicans downplayed Yucca Mountain as a campaign issue, saying Nevada residents understand that Congress _ not just Bush _ approved the dump, and that it's just one issue among many in a state in which Republicans edge Democrats 41 percent to 40 percent among registered voters.

"As Ronald Reagan used to say, if people agree with you 80 percent of the time they're you're friend, not your enemy,"GOP Gov. Kenny Guinn said.

"Some things just have to be settled in court and that's where we are,"he said. State Republicans and the president have agreed to disagree on Yucca Mountain.

"I may not agree with the president on this single issue, but I agree with him on every other issue,"said Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev. Gibbons credited Bush with strengthening the military and the economy, sending more money to veterans and working to deliver prescription drug coverage under Medicare.

"We're going to do everything we can as Republicans to ensure that President Bush is re-elected, with Nevada casting the vote that puts him over the top to victory just as we did last time,"Gibbons said.

Like other states, Nevada can claim a decisive role in delivering the White House to Bush in the 2000 election which he won with 271 electoral votes, compared with 267 for Democrat Al Gore. Bush scooped up Nevada's four electoral votes by beating Gore 49.5 percent to 45.9 percent. This time around, because of redistricting, the prize is larger with the state offering five electoral votes.

Some Democrats have complained Gore didn't try hard enough in a state that had voted Democratic in the previous two presidential elections. With the Democratic Party struggling in southern states, political analysts said Nevada will be a key building block in the party's strategy for victory in 2004. Many of the Democratic presidential candidates have visited already.

Ted Jelen, a political scientist at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, cited three factors he said make Nevada a challenge for Republicans in 2004: Yucca Mountain; divisiveness among the state's Republicans after this year's record tax increase; and the strong re-election campaign likely to be mounted by Democratic Sen. Harry Reid, who so far has not drawn a challenger likely to match him in voter turnout efforts.

"If Bush really feels he needs it, it's going to take some work,"Jelen said."The way the Bush administration has been operating, they've been acting as if they don't need it."

Bush supporters denied that and said they would work hard to repeat Bush's victory in the state.

"We anticipate that yes, indeed, Nevada will be a battleground state, but we feel we're doing a great job of organizing,"said Nevada Attorney General Brian Sandoval, chairman of Bush's re-election effort in Nevada."Our grass-roots effort is going very, very, well, and the number of volunteers has been tremendous."

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Las Vegas newswoman Christina Almeida contributed to this story.

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Las Vegas SUN
November 24, 2003

Perkins calls for president to address 'broken promises'

By Suzanne Struglinski
<suzanne@lasvegassun.com>
Las Vegas SUN

WASHINGTON -- In preparation for President Bush's arrival in Las Vegas Tuesday, the Democratic National Committee tapped State Assembly Speaker Richard Perkins, a Democrat from Henderson, to make the party's weekly radio address.

On Saturday, during a five-minute speech, Perkins addressed the Yucca Mountain Project and the Bush administration's push to get the federal nuclear waste storage site, planned for 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, approved.

Perkins addressed the "host of safety questions" on the transportation and storage of 77,000 ton of nuclear the waste at Yucca Mountain.

President Bush gave the final approval to the site last year, allowing Congress to give permission to the Energy Department to move forward to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's license processing. DOE anticipated sending an application to the commission in December 2004.

"What is so disturbing about President Bush's conduct is the distrust that he has personally brought to the process," Perkins said. "President Bush, seeking the votes of Nevada citizens during the close 2000 election, promised us here in Nevada that he would not rush to judgment on nuclear waste, that he would let science guide the administration's decision making."

Perkins said the president will be met by people in the state hoping that he will reverse his decision.

"President Bush broke his promise to us here in Nevada with speed and arrogance that is astounding."

Perkins touched on the familiar arguments from the state against the site, from inadequate science surrounding the site's selection, hundreds of remaining unanswered questions on the site, risk of terrorist attacks and accidents during shipment and even Bush's approval of the site despite a veto by Gov. Kenny Guinn's --- a strong Bush supporter.

"You can't build trust based on breaking promises and misleading people," Perkins said. "So as Air Force One lands in Las Vegas in a few days, I would hope President Bush will attempt to address his broken promises and begin to rebuild his credibility with my friends and neighbors here in Nevada."

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Las Vegas SUN
November 24, 2003

Protest at Bush visit prompts ominous call

By Mary Manning
<manning@lasvegassun.com>
Las Vegas SUN

A federal law enforcement official may have tried to gather information on who is planning to attend a protest during President Bush's visit to Las Vegas on Tuesday.

The rally is expected to attract demonstrators to The Venetian, where Bush is scheduled to attend a fund-raising luncheon.

Peggy Maize Johnson, executive director of Citizen Alert, said she was surprised when she received a call from a woman who identified herself as Christine Payson last Wednesday.

When asked, the woman told Johnson she represented the Office of Homeland Security, Johnson said.

The woman wanted to know how many demonstrators were expected and their affiliated organizations, Johnson said.

"It bothered me," Johnson said Sunday. Johnson has been leading Citizen Alert, a group raising awareness of potential dangers from burying nuclear waste at the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear repository. The Yucca issue is expected to be a focus of Tuesday's protest.

"That has a chilling effect," Johnson said of the phone call.

Gary Peck of the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada said he had advised Johnson to call Metro Police and "give them a heads-up" on the demonstration. Johnson said she had called Metro, telling them that a hundred or so demonstrators were expected.

Both Peck and Johnson said the Homeland Security agent said that federal authorities were concerned because "radical" demonstrators connected with the environmental movement sometimes engage in practices such as torching sport utility vehicles.

When asked why Homeland Security was calling Citizen Alert, the woman told Johnson, "We are just trying to keep on top of this."

"I hardly consider myself a terrorist," Johnson said. "I may be a pain in the (expletive)."

The FBI has been collecting detailed information on tactics and training of antiwar demonstrators and has advised local law enforcement officials to report any suspicious activities at protests to its counterterrorism squads, Peck said.

FBI officials told The New York Times in an article published Sunday that the intelligence was aimed at identifying anarchists and those plotting violence, not monitoring political speeches of law-abiding protesters, Peck said.

"The FBI and the federal government are in a gray area here," Peck said.

The federal government appears to be blurring the line between terrorism and legitimate protest, Johnson said.

"I think these people are very afraid of us," she said. "I think these people are afraid of what we are going to say about them."

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Las Vegas Review-Journal
November 25, 2003

Democrats: Bush lied about Yucca

Former governor, U.S. representative, state legislators describe safety problems

By Erin Neff
Review-Journal

On the eve of President Bush's trip to Nevada, Democratic leaders used the backdrop of busy downtown highways to denounce his support for a nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain.

Democrats on Monday said candidate George Bush lied in 2000 during a trip to Northern Nevada by saying he would not recommend construction of the repository 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas until science proved it safe.

"He immediately railroaded Nevada and broke the promises he made to Nevadans," former Gov. Bob Miller said from atop the parking garage of Main Street Station.

Bush was expected to arrive in Las Vegas at about 9:30 this morning and is scheduled to attend a town hall meeting on Medicare at Spring Valley Hospital before heading to a noon fund-raiser at The Venetian, which is expected to generate close to $1 million for Bush's re-election effort.

Democrats also asked voters the seminal presidential question: "Are you better off now than you were four years ago?" and suggested the answer is no.

"Jobs have been lost, children have been left behind, and more people are without insurance," said Senate Minority Leader Dina Titus, D-Las Vegas. "And now we are closer than ever to having nuclear waste in our back yards."

Democrats said local Republicans should not reward Bush with assistance.

Titus said she hoped some Republicans, such as Gov. Kenny Guinn and Attorney General Brian Sandoval, who oppose the repository, will question Bush about his Yucca decision.

"Ask the president why he broke the promise," Titus said.

Bush in February 2002 selected the flattop ridge to become the nation's burial ground for nuclear waste and directed his administration to continue working toward developing the site. The Energy Department is preparing an application, which must be approved by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission before construction can begin.

During Monday's news conference, traffic zipped along U.S. Highway 95 near signs announcing exits to Tonopah/Reno, Salt Lake City, Los Angeles and the Strip.

U.S. Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., and Assembly Speaker Richard Perkins, D-Henderson, both focused on how the shipments of 77,000 tons of waste could be susceptible to terrorist attack.

"Does anybody really believe the federal government can do anything 100,000 times without an accident?" Perkins asked.

Berkley said Bush is also jeopardizing the safety of anti-terrorism training at the Nevada Test Site, on which Yucca Mountain lies.

"The most important training facility is going to be compromised by Yucca Mountain," Berkley said.

But she noted that shipments from 43 states will affect citizens nationwide.

"Millions of Americans will rue the day Congress approved this bill," Berkley said. "We in Nevada rue the day already."

The leaders said Democratic presidential candidates who have made statements against Yucca Mountain despite past actions in support of the project are still a better choice than Bush.

"First of all, they have not lied to Nevadans," Miller said. "Second of all, they have not lied to Nevadans. Third of all, they have not lied to Nevadans."

During a visit to Las Vegas on Monday morning U.S. Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., said Nevada voters do not blame one party or one person over another.

"This issue goes back through Democratic and Republican administrations," Gibbons said.

He also questioned why Democratic filibusters employed in the U.S. Senate this week were not used during debate on the Yucca bill.

Filibusters were prohibited by procedures related to the repository selection under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act.

Miller said that when he was governor he met with then-President Bill Clinton and presented the state's position on Yucca Mountain.

Clinton vetoed a bill to authorize interim storage of nuclear waste at Yucca, and Miller suggests a new Democratic president would turn to Assistant Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., for guidance.

"There's no way on God's green Earth that (Democratic presidential candidates) can be worse," Miller said.

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Las Vegas Review-Journal
November 24, 2003

Jane Ann Morrison: Bush in Las Vegas, like his predecessor, probably will take money, run

What is it with the Presidents Bush and Las Vegas hospitals? Don't they know these places are germ factories?

Papa President Bush visited University Medical Center in 1992 during his only campaign stop in Las Vegas.

During his four hours in the city that February, he stopped at Opportunity Village and jogged at UNLV for 20 minutes before touring UMC, where fresh paint had been applied wherever he was going to be walking.

Print reporters know that, sadly, it's all about THE PHOTO. And the Review-Journal's Jeff Scheid got a good one of President Bush, who had a slight cold, holding a premature baby weighing less than 2 pounds.

THE MEDIA MESSAGE OF THE DAY: The president is caring and fit. He likes babies and the disabled and is in good shape against that whippersnapper governor from Arkansas.

It was his first and only presidential campaign stop in Las Vegas. When the election occurred in November 1992, the majority of Nevadans voted for Bill Clinton and did so again in 1996.

Now it's the elder Bush's son's turn, and he too is gravitating toward a hospital, Spring Valley Hospital, where tomorrow he's going to talk to about 200 invited guests about Medicare and medical liability.

Afterward, in his first presidential visit to Nevada, Bush is expected to raise a record-breaking $1 million at a luncheon at The Venetian.

About 500 people paying between $1,000 and $2,000 will be inside the hotel listening to the president, while protesters objecting to the Yucca Mountain Project march outside.

In the 11-year interval between Papa Bush's visit and Son Bush's visit, Nevada has become a more Republican state, voting for the current president in 2000 despite Nevada Democrats' best efforts to make the Yucca Mountain Project a wedge issue for voters.

While local event organizers encourage White House organizers to answer local reporters' questions, it's unlikely that will happen.

Bush is not going to want to take questions about his administration's decision to recommend Yucca Mountain for nuclear waste storage despite unanswered scientific questions about the safety of the project. He's not going to want to address why the Patriot Act is being used to search for records in a political corruption case that has nothing to do with terrorism. And he may not want to be quizzed by local reporters about the war in Iraq.

Instead, in the finest presidential tradition, Bush will take the $1 million and run after snarling up Las Vegas traffic with his motorcade.

President Clinton did pretty much the same thing. During his eight presidential visits, he raised a total of $2 million at Nevada events, although the single biggest payday was $525,000, about half what Bush will haul in. And with one memorable exception, where he sought to clarify something he had said earlier, most of those visits didn't include chatting it up with the local media.

Democrats have a trio of events planned to hammer Bush on the Yucca Mountain Project. Today, they'll haul the news media up to the top of the Main Street Casino parking garage to point to the Spaghetti Bowl and talk about the dangers of hauling nuclear waste on highways.

Tomorrow, groups including the Democratic Party, the Sierra Club and Culinary Local 226 will be outside The Venetian to talk about Yucca Mountain.

On Saturday, Assembly Speaker Richard Perkins delivered the Democratic Party's weekly radio address in response to Bush's address. His subject: Bush's broken promise to rely on "sound science" for his decision.

"President Bush broke his promise to us here in Nevada with speed and arrogance that is astounding," Perkins said. "He short-circuited the research going on at Yucca Mountain; he ignored the concerns of independent scientists and rushed to judgment."

Perkins told the nation: "So as Air Force One lands in Las Vegas in a few days, I would hope that President Bush will attempt to address his broken promises and begin to rebuild his credibility with my friends and neighbors here in Nevada."

That's just not going to happen.

It's all about the images in the photos and on TV. And the money.

Jane Ann Morrison's column appears Monday, Thursday and Saturday. E-mail her at jane@reviewjournal.com or call 383-0275.

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Las Vegas Review-Journal
November 24, 2003

Letter: Yucca vote

To the editor:

Should Nevadans seriously question the words of Joseph Lieberman, who says he would not go forward with Yucca Mountain "if I feel it's not safe" (Review-Journal, Nov. 20)? George Bush said that he would base his decision on "sound science" -- yet almost no one buys that in spite of the several billion dollars that the Department of Energy spent to demonstrate that it's safe. After all, who is Mr. Bush to believe, if not the trusty DOE? Should he trust someone who feels that it isn't safe?

What, if anything, would Sen. Lieberman base his feelings on? Is he like many who simply assume a position rather than look at facts? Or would he believe the DOE's multibillion-dollar research?

Furthermore, after a decade or more of studies and billions spent, Sen. Lieberman would "want to examine whether there are alternatives." Already the repository is in trouble time-wise. Wasn't he the one who urged an "accelerated waste acceptance" time frame in 1999? Another decade or so of delay caused by re-examining the project doesn't seem plausible. There are more than feelings at stake here.

And finally, those of us who knew Sen. Lieberman's positions on political issues before he became Al Gore's running mate know that his opinions can change as quickly as the time it takes him to go from voter group to voter group. Maybe Nevadans will be forced to choose between one who bases his Yucca decision on feelings and one who bases it on DOE reports. Does anyone feel good about that?

Dennis Weber
Las Vegas

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Las Vegas Review-Journal
November 25, 2003

Police request surprises activist

Organizer says she was asked to identify groups planning to protest Bush's visit

By Frank Geary
Review-Journal

What a police captain described as standard procedure, a grass-roots political organizer said was aimed at identifying hundreds of demonstrators expected to protest President Bush's policies during a Las Vegas visit today.

Peggy Maze Johnson, executive director of the anti-Yucca Mountain organization Citizen Alert, said she was surprised when a representative of the Metropolitan Police Department's Homeland Security Division asked her last week to identify groups that plan to protest Bush's visit.

The request came amidst national press reports about an Oct. 15 FBI anti-terrorism memo that instructs local law-enforcement officials to monitor possible protests and report any "potentially illegal" activity to the FBI.

Maze Johnson said she typically discloses to police the number of people expected to attend a protest and the activities planned, but police have never before asked her to identify organizations expected at a demonstration.

"I never had any fear that what I was doing was bad or wrong, or that it would put me or my family at risk," she said Monday. "Now, I do feel at risk. It's like all of a sudden they're watching me."

Police Capt. Mike McClary, who oversees Homeland Security, said it's common for police to try to identify groups that may attend a protest and that the practice has gone on for years.

It's necessary so police can determine how many protesters to expect and to devote police resources accordingly, McClary said.

"This is common practice when we know we will have a planned event," he said. "There is no sinister attempt to do whatever."

Maze Johnson was asked to identify other groups so leaders of those organizations could be asked the number of protesters each group expected to attend today's demonstration outside a fund-raiser at The Venetian, McClary said.

However, Maze Johnson said the police representative who contacted her last week explained that the groups' identities were needed because some protesters are known to engage in unlawful activities. For example, Maze Johnson said, she was told that militant environmental groups set trees on fire during protests.

McClary acknowledged a staff member made those comments, but would only say the department always has sought the same type of information.

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Las Vegas SUN
November 24, 2003

Defense bill aids disabled vets

By Suzanne Struglinski
<suzanne@lasvegassun.com>
Las Vegas SUN

WASHINGTON -- President Bush signed the 2004 defense authorization bill at the Pentagon today, solidifying a $22 billion phased-in concurrent receipt program for some disabled and retired veterans benefit and almost $393 million from the Defense Department for the Yucca Mountain Project.

Retired veterans with a 50 percent disability rating will receive both retirement pay and disability checks. Most currently must forfeit a dollar of retirement pay for every dollar of disability pay they receive. Civilian government workers are allowed to receive both payments concurrently.

Those who qualify will see more money each month through 2014.

Starting Jan. 1 the agreement will put $750 per month into the check of a retired veteran with a 100 percent disabled rating, and $100 a month in the check of a 50 percent disabled veteran, with other percentages falling in between.

The law allows all retirees with any level of combat or operations-related disability for full concurrent receipt through the Combat-Related Special Compensation program approved last year.

All retired National Guard members and reservists with any level of combat disability or who are Purple Heart recipients will also qualify.

Supporters of full concurrent receipt for all disabled and retired benefits say the move is a step in the right direction but note that the change will only help 225,000 veterans, leaving 400,000 without both benefits.

The law also includes $392.5 million for the Defense Department's share of the nuclear waste storage site planned for Yucca Mountain 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

That's almost $38 million less than originally planned.

A total of $580 million has been approved for the project for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., had pushed to cut the Energy Department's request of $591 million.

The law will also alter portions of the Endangered Species Act and Marine Mammal Protection Act when it comes to military training, although the changes probably will not have much effect on Nellis Air Force Base.

The desert tortoise, the only endangered species on the 2.9-million-acre Nevada Test and Training Range, occupies only the southern half of the range, according to the base. The northern part is more mountainous and doesn't have desert tortoise habitats.

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Las Vegas SUN
November 24, 2003

Bush to campaign in Nevada as Democrats pledge tough challenge

By Erica Werner
Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush makes his first presidential trip to Nevada on Tuesday, visiting a state he won narrowly in 2000 but that Democrats are claiming as a 2004 battleground where they'll press accusations the president broke a campaign promise on where to place a nuclear waste dump.

It's the president's first trip to Nevada since the 2000 campaign, when he made a fund-raising swing through Lake Tahoe. That was about a month after issuing a statement declaring "sound science" should determine where the nation's nuclear waste should be stored for the next 10,000 years.

When Bush approved Yucca Mountain 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas as the nation's nuclear dumpsite last year, Democrats said he was breaking his promise and giving them an issue for 2004.

"I think Bush may have signed away his chances to win this state with his signature on the Yucca Mountain bill," said Jenny Backus, a Democratic strategist. "I think with a swish of a pen he turned a red state that had tinges of pink into a top battleground state and prime pickup opportunity for the Democrats."

Several prominent state Democrats criticized Bush over the issue at a Las Vegas news conference Monday, and protesters were expected to greet him at The Venetian on Tuesday.

"Our memories are not so short that we can't recall that four years ago, this candidate promised us one thing and delivered us the exact opposite," former Gov. Bob Miller said as Democrats gathered on the eve of the president's visit.

"I encourage all Nevadans ... to remember what you got. And what you got was a nuclear dump," he said.

Republicans downplayed Yucca Mountain as a campaign issue, saying Nevada residents understand that Congress - not just Bush - approved the dump, and that it's just one issue among many in a state in which Republicans edge Democrats 41 percent to 40 percent among registered voters.

"As Ronald Reagan used to say, if people agree with you 80 percent of the time they're you're friend, not your enemy," GOP Gov. Kenny Guinn said.

"Some things just have to be settled in court and that's where we are," he said. State Republicans and the president have agreed to disagree on Yucca Mountain.

"I may not agree with the president on this single issue, but I agree with him on every other issue," said Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev. Gibbons credited Bush with strengthening the military and the economy, sending more money to veterans and working to deliver prescription drug coverage under Medicare.

"If Bush really feels he needs it, it's going to take some work," Jelen said. "The way the Bush administration has been operating, they've been acting as if they don't need it."

Bush supporters denied that and said they would work hard to repeat Bush's victory in the state.

"We anticipate that yes, indeed, Nevada will be a battleground state, but we feel we're doing a great job of organizing," said Nevada Attorney General Brian Sandoval, chairman of Bush's re-election effort in Nevada. "Our grass-roots effort is going very, very, well, and the number of volunteers has been tremendous."

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Las Vegas newswoman Christina Almeida contributed to this story.

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Reno Gazette Journal
November 24, 2003

On eve of Bush visit, Nevada Democrats criticize Yucca decision

By Christina Almeida
Associated Press

LAS VEGAS — Nevada´s Democratic leaders criticized President Bush on Monday for his decision to locate a nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain .

Rep. Shelley Berkley joined former Gov. Bob Miller, Assembly Speaker Richard Perkins and other lawmakers in calling for the state´s Republicans to question Bush, who will make his first presidential visit to the state Tuesday.

The group wants Nevada Republicans who oppose Yucca Mountain, including Gov. Kenny Guinn, to ask why Bush approved the plan to transport 77,000 tons of high-level nuclear waste across 43 states after saying during the 2000 campaign that he would rely on “sound science’ and would not move forward unless it was deemed scientifically safe.

“George Bush has made it clear he doesn´t care about the truth, he doesn´t care about science, he doesn´t care about keeping promises, he doesn´t care about Nevada,’ state Sen. Dina Titus, D-Las Vegas, told reporters at a downtown news conference.

Bush signed legislation last year tapping Yucca Mountain, about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, as the nation´s sole nuclear waste repository. The underground site is scheduled to open in 2010.

The president and the Energy Department contend nuclear waste can safely be transported and stored at Yucca Mountain.

Opponents of the repository are among those expected to protest outside the Bush fund-raising luncheon at The Venetian hotel-casino, where about 500 people paying up to $2,000 each are expected.

“I would ask those people that are wining and dining our president to ask these hard questions,’ Berkley said. “Find out how we´re going to pay for it, how we´re going to keep the routes safe from terrorist attacks.’

“Waste containers cannot stop a missile attack, much less a 9/11-type attack by plane,’ she said.

In the weekly Democratic radio address, Perkins said the decision to move forward on the Yucca Mountain project has serious consequences not only for Nevada, but for the 38 million Americans who live within a mile of the nation´s highways and rail lines.

“In this presidential election, truth is an issue,’ said Miller, the former governor. “Our memories are not so short that we can´t recall that four years ago, this candidate promised us one thing and delivered us the exact opposite.

“I encourage all Nevadans … to remember what you got. And what you got was a nuclear dump.’

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NewsNet5
November 24, 2003

Study: Davis Besse Spent Fuel Could Create Nuclear Nightmare

Radiation Accident Could Kill 25,000 People

PORT CLINTON, Ohio -- FirstEnergy Corp. said it's close to being ready to restart the Davis Besse Nuclear Power Plant. But in "Special Assignment," NewsChannel5's Ted Hart looked inside some of the government's documents that spell out a potential nuclear disaster.

The plant has been sitting idle since February 2002. For residents who live just a few miles down wind, they like it that way.

"It's a peaceful feeling to look out and not see the steam coming out of the reactor. But at this point it would make me very nervous and it would be a concern to see it every day," said Port Clinton resident Barb Cabral.

After months of investigating and thousands of pages of study, Hart said that it's clear the hole in the reactor head caused by leaking boric acid was far more serious than originally thought.

Consumer advocate Ralph Nader stands with those who say Davis Besse should not be allowed to restart.

"You don't need Davis Besse and certainly don't need a Davis Besse that could end up in a meltdown that could take out a portion of Ohio," Nader said.

A video shows workers using a crow bar to chip away all the corrosive buildup left by the leaking boric acid.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission estimated that had the problem gone undetected, within another year or so, the stainless steel liner already cracking would have given way. Company officials said even if backup systems to backup systems had failed, ultimately the containment vessel would have done its job.

"It would have ruined the plant and cost the company a lot of money, but it would not have endangered the local community," said Richard Wilkins with FirstEnergy.

Over the past 20 months, First Energy has spent more than $400 million on repairs and retraining.

While much of the debate has focused on whether the plant should be allowed to restart, NewsChannel5 has obtained a copy of a study that suggests a potentially bigger risk. It focuses on the stockpiles of spent fuel.

The study, conducted in 2000 at the request of the NRC, concludes in a worst-case scenario that as many as 25,000 people could die from exposure to radiation in an accident involving spent fuel.

"A radioactive cloud from Davis Besse can go right over Cleveland," Nader said.

The federal government hopes to eventually store all the spent fuel inside Yucca Mountain in Nevada. But until that happens, it's stored in pools at more than 100 nuclear power facilities across the country. The study was classified after Sept. 11, 2001. According to Nader, that proof the government knows just how vulnerable the nuclear industry is and that spent fuel is its soft underbelly.

"This is what happens when people looked the other way when nuclear power was rammed down their throats 35 years ago," Nader said.

The study also points out that the risk of a spent fuel incident is very low.

"The likelihood that that can be done is extremely remote. There's a lot more risk in the world, in this area much more likely to, I don't know how that scenario would actually occur," Wilkins said.

But some who live nearby say they have reason to be concerned.

"They say that their safeguards are such that there's no risk, but we were told that about the plant, too," said Port Clinton resident Donna Lueke.

And FirstEnergy hopes to have the plant ready to restart within a month.

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State of Nevada
Agency for Nuclear Projects
www.state.nv.us/nucwaste/
nwpo@nuc.state.nv.us
775-687-3744
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