In Search Of Utopia: No New Nukes

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June 27, 2005

No New Nukes

The Bush Administration just doesn't get it.

Last year, TrueMajority members asked Congress to shut down the plan to build a new nuclear weapon, the pleasantly named "bunker buster."[1] So ludicrous was the president's idea that the Republican-led Congress then eliminated all the money for new nukes. [2] Now Bush is back, asking for money to cook up new nuclear weapons - even as polling makes clear that the American people want significant reductions in our 10,000-weapon nuclear arsenal. [3]

This week, the Senate will consider spending taxpayer dollars to design yet another generation of nuclear bombs.

If you'd like to edit the message we'll send to your senator, or if you aren't yet a TrueMajority member, click here: http://action.truemajority.org/campaign/bunkerbuster. And forward this to others so they, too, can help make the world a safer place.

Monitoring Washington for you,

Darcy Scott Martin

P.S. If you haven't checked out Ben's little movie on what America's nuclear weapons arsenal is all about before, click here.

1) For more on the "bunker buster" from our friends at Women's Action for New Directions, click here.

2) "Bush Denied Nuclear Bunker-Buster Funds," ABC News, Nov. 2004. http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200411/s1249981.htm

3) We commissioned a poll in March by the Carnegie Foundation-based PIPA, which showed that Americans want to switch federal investments from nuclear weapons to pressing human needs at home and around the world. Click here to see what the public wants: http://pipa.org/OnlineReports/budget/030705/Press03_07_05.pdf

Crossposted to The Rogue Angel.

Posted by Rogue at June 27, 2005 12:52 PM
Filed Under Guest Bloggers | 246 Words

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Comments

Here's a story for you: when I was a freshman in college, the local College Democrats club brought Eugene McCarthy in as a speaker. Eager to see such a political celebrity (he ran, unsuccessfully, for President 4 times), I and another conservative friend (it was actually Answerman who writes for INCITE) snuck in to hear him speak.

I was surprised when McCarthy had some nice words to say about Reagan & Reagans halting of new nuclear weapons development (despite Reagan's massive increases in overall military spending). Afterwards, when they opened the floor to Q&A, no one had anything to ask, so I went ahead and asked him to elaborate on his comments re: Reagan.

I got the feeling that most of the people in the room weren't too happy to hear it, but McCarthy went on a 10 minute long jag praising Reagan and criticizing Jimmy Carter. Carter had supported the Pentagon's plan to develop a neutron bomb (which kills people without doing too much damage to buildings), but Reagan had put a halt to it.

End of story.

Posted by: Beck at June 27, 2005 08:34 PM

As for my own opinion on the matter, I support keeping our nuclear arsenal as-is. I don't see any geo-political or geo-strategic advantage to reducing the arsenal, and it's not like it costs a ton to support weapons just lying in storage. As far as new spending goes, I think it's far more important to devote efforts to new technology to support the boys on the ground, to increase communication capability and response times, and to find ways to thwart OTHERS' nuclear weapons. It would be far more advantageous if we could spend $1 billion on ringing the country with truck-mounted lasers that could knock down incoming ordnance than to spend $10 billion on weapons that can only blow the other guy up after the fact.

Posted by: Beck at June 27, 2005 08:47 PM

I never quite understood why Carter wanted to expand our nuclear arsenal, unless it was the climate of the times especially in relation to Russia. But, it is the one point of aggravation that I had with him as I love Carter immensely and find him to be one of the most pious men within the Christian faith.

Now, I don't know about reducing our arsenal and it most likely would never happen, but it costs $17.6 BILLION dollars a year to maintain what we currently have in storage and that is A LOT of money.

Posted by: Rogue at June 29, 2005 09:13 AM