The silence of the Lamb
It will happen this way, now that the news cycle is over. One day, probably on a weekend this month, the Department of Homeland Security will announce that the UC/Bechtel/Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory proposal to place a biodanger level-4 lab near Tracy at Site 300, an LLNL bombing range already laced with depleted uranium and tritium, will make the short list for biowarfare pork. LLNL also recently announced that it will be releasing eight times as much radioactivity in bomb tests this year on Site 300.
But never you mind, public, it’s all perfectly safe under UC and Bechtel management, just like security is perfect at Los Alamos National Laboratory, managed by the same win-win, public-private partnership.
Meanwhile, the congressman for the district, Jerry “The Lamb” McNerney, has been on about a veterans hospital out of his district in Livermore, signing a pledge to make his earmarks public information, and opining that lobbyists shouldn’t be on PACs contributing money, at least to Himself, the Lamb. His ardent supporters out in the blogosphere have been defending him for these radically moral stands, because the Lamb is not Pombo. One assumes he did not do his graduate work in the higher mathematics of political money. Failing to provide any leadership in opposition of the biowarfare lab, which might have energized his core supporters in the 11th CD, the Lamb has probably been terribly impressed by those fine academic minds at the LLNL, just his sort of people, unlike the people in the district he represents.
And, of course, the biowarfare lab security will be perfect and there is no problem, whatsoever, about studying diseases lethal to poultry and cattle upwind from the greatest concentration of poultry and cattle in California. None, whatsoever. The biodanger level-4 designation is for the most deadly pathogens known on the planet. But these will be no problem for the citizens living near the biowarfare lab. None, whatsoever, because the security in these labs is perfect, which was explained so articulately in Michael Carroll’s Lab 257, about Plum Island Animal Disease Laboratory.
Nevertheless, Marylia Kelley, executive director of Livermore-based Tri-Valley Citizens Against a Radioactive Environment, reminded us today that occasionally security breaches occur, even at LLNL, where the new generation of nuclear warheads is being designed. In recent years, employees have lost keys to secure areas and have not informed top management sometimes for months, during which access to these high security areas could have been compromised. The Lab left open a four-lane gate for a weekend. The Department of Energy Inspector General recently reported that a significant number of LLNL former employees still have their security badges and their names still appear on rosters, “which is a huge security risk,” Kelley said.
“The Livermore lab has a history of major security breaches,” she added.
The Department of Homeland Security has repeatedly said that it would take into account local opposition to the biowarfare lab. In Kelley’s view, there is no support for the biowarfare lab or the increase in radioactive explosives at Site 300 among the citizens of Tracy or nearby areas.
“Even where the lab has gotten official organizations for agriculture and elsewhere to support the biolab project,” Kelley said, “polls of the families those organizations represent would show significant opposition.”
“McNerney would do well to campaign against the biolab,” she said.
But Jerry the Lamb says nothing and Rep. Dennis Cardoza, Shrimp Slayer-Merced, says even less. If it is possible to be even less sensitive to the dangers of lethal war pork than the Lamb and the Shrimp Slayer, try the San Joaquin Valley Air Quality Control District, which promises to hold a public hearing on the increase in radioactive explosives at the Tracy City Council chambers on June 26, at 7:30 p.m. This is the air board that approved a plan Thursday to put the San Joaquin Valley air basin in the worst air pollution category the federal government has a name for, in order to extend deadlines for cleaning up pollution so that the flow of federal highway funds will not be halted as a penalty for not attaining its air quality goals. Presumably, by 2026, the nation will have yet another category named to which the Valley can apply for further extensions and more growth-inducing highways. Perhaps it could be called the Radioactive Pathogenic WalMart Distribution Center/NASCAR level of non-attainment. Or simply, the San Joaquin Valley Level.
Dean Andal has announced he’s running against McNerney. It has been discovered that Andal is listed as a principle in Gerry Kamilos’ company, currently proposing to redevelop the former Naval Air Station at Crows Landing, downwind from Site 300, into a business park with a short-haul railroad. Andal, although a ferociously righwing ideologue, might have the brains to oppose the biowarfare lab and the radioactive bombing increases for simple self-preservation as well as self-enrichment. If Andal did oppose the Site 300 projects, he might find constituencies of support unique in his long, reactionary political career.
Yo, Dean, think Reinvention! A coalition awaits, and hey, maybe even Tsakopoulos O Megas would throw a few bucks your way.
Meanwhile, over the hill, the Lamb lives pleasantly in Pleasanton, breaking pencils over PACs full of lobbyists.
Badlands editorial staff
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6-15-07
San Francisco Chronicle
Lab managers accused of security breach...Deborah Baker and Jennifer Talhelm, AP
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2007/06/15/national/a05...
Officials with the contractor that runs Los Alamos National Laboratory sent top-secret data regarding nuclear weapons through open e-mail networks, the latest potentially dangerous security breach to come to light at the birthplace of the atomic bomb, two congressmen said...breach was investigated by the National Nuclear Security Administration, which rounded up laptop computers from Los Alamos National Security LLC's board members and sanitized them. But NNSA and lab officials who subsequently appeared before a congressional committee investigating security problems at the nuclear weapons lab never mentioned it, according to a letter the congressmen sent Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman. Reps. John Dingell, D-Mich., chairman of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, and Bart Stupak, D-Mich., who heads the panel's oversight subcommittee, called that "unacceptable" and demanded an explanation. "This facility's mind-bogglingly poor track record makes me repeat my question: What do we do at Los Alamos that we cannot do elsewhere?" Stupak said Thursday. LANS, which took over the lab's operation, is made up of the lab's former manager, the University of California; Bechtel Corp.; and two other companies. The e-mail case, the latest to come to light, was reported to NNSA by a University of California official on Jan. 19, according to the congressmen. The breach occurred when a consultant to the LANS board, Harold Smith, sent an e-mail containing highly classified, non-encrypted nuclear weapons information to several board members, who forwarded it to other members, according to a Washington aide familiar with the investigation who asked not to be named because the information is sensitive. The notice went out that there had been a breach, an official was pulled out of a White House meeting and told, and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory flew a team across California and recovered the laptops within six hours... Lawmakers were assured no damage was caused, according to the aide.
6-16-07
Los Alamos National Laboratory. Energy Dept. acknowledges lab's e-mail security lapse...Keay Davidson
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/06/16/BAGG3QGHF01....
The latest security breach was acknowledged Friday by Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman after it was revealed by two congressmen. Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich., who chairs the oversight and investigations subcommittee of the Energy and Commerce Committee, called the latest security lapse a fresh example of Los Alamos' "mind-bogglingly poor track record" on security issues. The scandal comes less than two years after the Energy Department awarded a consortium led by the University of California and Bechtel Corp. a new contract to run Los Alamos partly in order to prevent a repeat of numerous scandals involving the security of weapons information at the lab. The consortium operates under the name Los Alamos National Security LLC. A similar managerial consortium -- one that is also dominated by UC and Bechtel -- was selected May 8 to manage the nation's other nuclear weapons design lab, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore. "The UC-Bechtel consortium at Los Alamos has taken what was a bad managerial situation and made it a lot worse," said Marylia Kelley, head of Tri-Valley Communities Against a Radioactive Environment, which is based in Livermore. "As long as the United States continues to design and develop new nuclear weapons, some of that information can and will leak out. ... Better management cannot solve that deeper problem." After the news leaked out, Dingell and Stupak wrote Bodman demanding to know why the breach wasn't reported to Congress for six months, even though an unidentified UC official informed the National Nuclear Security Administration of the breach on Jan. 19. The timing delay raises the question of whether another scandal is being covered up -- in effect, the possibility that authorities dragged their feet for almost six months investigating the security breach so that UC and Bechtel could win their joint bid for the Livermore contract without suffering any taint of scandal.
Fresno Bee
Critics unimpressed by smog-plan reform...Mark Grossi
http://www.fresnobee.com/263/story/60000.html
State air officials on Thursday approved a much-criticized smog cleanup plan with a 2024 completion target for the San Joaquin Valley -- but they offered a concession to those who want a quicker fix. In the next six months, the California Air Resources Board will intensely study other pollution-cutting ideas for the Valley, such as banning older vehicles during dirty-air days. Based on the findings, the state air governing board may add more rules to speed up the cleanup. The critics...were not impressed. The state will send the plan to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which also is expected to approve it. EPA approval would remove the threat of federal sanctions for the Valley, such as the delay of $2 billion in road-building funds. In addition, the Valley would become the first place in the nation to be classified in a category reserved for the worst smog offenders, based on how long a cleanup would take.
5-14-07
Monterey Herald
Nuke weapons workers denied...Michael Alison Chandler and Joby Warrick...Washington Post
http://www.montereyherald.com/health/ci_5891631
Hidden costs...Since its inception in 2000, the compensation program has cut more than 20,000 checks and given long-delayed recognition to workers whose illnesses were hidden costs of the Cold War's military buildup...of the 72,000 cases processed, more than 60 percent have been denied. Thousands of other applicants have been waiting for years for an answer. Overall, only 21 percent of applicants have received checks. Even as the nation continues to close and dismantle many nuclear weapons sites, a growing number of those who helped build the bombs are turning to lawyers and legislators to argue they are being treated unfairly. Many complain that the compensation process is slow, frustrating, even insulting. "You get exposed to something that's so bad you have to leave your clothes behind," McKenzie said, "then they try to tell you it's not their fault that you got sick." Feds call program a success...Some evidence suggests the government has tried to limit payouts for budget reasons. Internal memos obtained by congressional investigators show the Bush administration chafing over the program's rising costs and fighting to block measures that would increase workers' chances of compensation. Labor Department officials who oversee the program say it has been successful, pointing to the large sums distributed: about $2.6 billion in payments in five years, far more than some early estimates. Missing or unreliable records and the murkiness of cancer science, the officials say, make it difficult to satisfy all the claimants. 'Normal beans'...Still, Labor's management of the program has drawn bipartisan, and often fierce, criticism from members of Congress. Former congressman John Hostettler, an Indiana Republican who chaired a House subcommittee overseeing the program, said at a hearing last December that Labor Department memos reflect a "culture of disdain" toward workers and raise questions about whether the department exceeded its authority by using "legalistic interpretations" to limit eligible workers. Scant records...The estimates are based largely on personnel files and historical radiation measurements at the plants. But the records are often so incomplete and unreliable that it can be impossible to determine a worker's true exposure. "At every site, you hear stories about workers being told to put their badges in their lockers," said Mark Griffon, a radiation-safety expert who advises the government on worker exposure. "If workers wore their badges and ended up exceeding their quarterly radiation limit, they could be laid off or put in a different job." Another obstacle is that records are becoming harder to track as plants are dismantled. The compensation program does provide a path for the government to help workers if records are lost or questionable. But critics say officials are reluctant to pursue it. No special status...So far, groups of workers from 18 sites have been added to the special exposure cohort, and petitions are pending for workers from a dozen other sites. The process can be difficult... Denver site...plant gone, many workers are struggling to re-create what happened. Many applicants who were denied blame missing or inadequate records and petitioned two years ago for special cohort status.