h/t Instapundit
As President-elect Donald Trump and Congress seek to "put America first," they should give special attention to an export sector America has been putting last: nuclear energy.
A focus on making nuclear reactors for export may seem quixotic. After all, nuclear power plants in the U.S. are struggling against cheap natural gas and heavily subsidized renewables. And historically, nuclear plants have been built locally, not manufactured.
But global demand for electricity is set to rise 70% over the next 25 years, mostly due to increased energy demand in developing nations.
And technological advances mean that new nuclear reactor components can increasingly be mass-manufactured in factories and shipped around the world for reassembly on site.
What’s at stake is a market worth $500 to $740 billion over the next decade, according to the Commerce Department, and hundreds of thousands of high-skill and high-wage jobs.
U.S. leadership on nuclear dates back to 1953, when President Eisenhower announced a U.S.-led effort "to provide abundant electrical energy in the power-starved areas of the world." It was called "Atoms for Peace."
It was a win-win for U.S. and energy-hungry developing nations. Thanks to this effort, the U.S. today gets 20% of its electricity from nuclear plants, which employ 32,000 workers directly and create an additional 200,000 jobs in the economy. And simply helping China to build four nuclear plants has created 20,000 jobs in 20 U.S. states, according to Westinghouse, whose nuclear division is based in the USA but owned by the Japanese conglomerate Toshiba.
#4
Put more money into fusion research. Not the turkey known as ITER. But the small scale designs whether they are from MIT, Sandia Labs or any of the commercial projects. Partner with the UK, Japan, South Korea and the EU. The potential payoff is huge. If we can get D-T reactors on linefocus on the Proton-Boron 11 reaction cyclle. Has the potential to be direct to electricity with no need for turbines or waste. The current DOE fusion research is more about producing phd's than juice
#5
Please, please advance the battery technology along with the nuclear power. The TVA has not issued a license for a nuclear power plant in many decades...was ready to begin again a few years ago, but stopped by the idiot boy Obama.
#7
The need is not specifically electric batteries but energy storage technology. For portability, it might turn out to be more effective to use nuclear energy to convert H, C & O into liquid hydrocarbon fuels (synthetic gasoline?) than to electricity stored in heavy and/or expensive and/or environmentally damaging batteries.
[The American Interest] The rising stars of the Democratic Party have been airing criticisms of President Obama lately, covering them with only the thinnest of veils. The Wall Street Journal reports:
Though they rarely mention the president by name or address his policies, Labor Secretary Tom Perez and Minnesota Rep. Keith Ellison have sent a clear message that Mr. Obama has left the party in a weakened state.
Messers. Perez and Ellison—along with state chairmen Jaime Harrison of South Carolina and Ray Buckley of New Hampshire, who are also candidates for chairman of the DNC, are seeking a mandate to reverse Obama-era tactics that cut funding and attention to local parties and left Democrats with far less power in Congress, governorships and state legislatures than when his presidency began.
#3
When the Republicans put 2 dozen candidates into the running the dims put 2 out there. One was corrupt and the other was an old commie.
That is because the corrupt one had enough power to keep it all to herself from the git go. And nobody in the Dim party challenged it. Everybody on the left is to blame, everybody.
#9
Great U.S. Presidents, and even good ones, are usually rooted in local politics. They are citizens of real places, and they carry the concerns and the insights of those places into office. Obama was a member of the New York Times tribe, people for whom an absence of local loyalties is a sign of enlightenment.
I'm inclined to think it has another basis. Then again, I'm not a professional in that area.
I'm willing to believe that Russia sought to hack the U.S. election, but I still find the evidence lacking. That skepticism applies to the latest sensation -- a report that Russian proxies in Ukraine are employing the same malicious software used on the U.S. Democratic National Committee.
For months, I have been parsing stories of the great Russian hack -- the anonymous leaks from U.S. administration officials, the two fact-poor statements from the U.S. intelligence community, the distant echoes of briefings received by U.S. legislators -- for technical evidence. But so far, the only evidence pointing to Russian government involvement comes from cybersecurity companies that have studied Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) 28, a hacker collective that has attacked many targets over the years -- including the DNC in 2016
Don't get me wrong. It stands to reason that Russian intelligence was interested in the U.S. election campaign, and it's a distinct possibility that it leaked what it found to the press via WikiLeaks, despite the latter's denials. Russian President Vladimir Putin dislikes Hillary Clinton, and he probably would have been happy to hurt her chances of getting elected -- thus, by default, helping Trump. It's all quite logical, which is why a third of Americans believe Russia influenced the outcome of the election.
In the real world outside of soap operas and spy novels, however, any conclusions concerning the hackers' identity, motives and goals need to be based on solid, demonstrable evidence. At this point, it's inadequate. This is particularly unfortunate given that the DNC hacks were among the defining events of the raging propaganda wars of 2016.
#2
The story that needs to be addressed before I even look at this is the one about how we allow the situation to develop in the first place. We need to secure our electoral process. This is our fault.
“The Democratic Party lost not only the presidential election, but also elections in the Congress, where the Republicans now have a majority. Was that my doing too?”
“They are losing on all fronts and look for someone else to blame. I believe, this is, how should I say, humiliating. One should know how to lose with grace,” he said.
#6
I still say the real damage was what was IN the emails not the fact that the hack occurred...the media and the Dims are covering up the cesspool of corruption and manipulation that was the Clinton campaign.
Had the emails been good old fashioned political strategy and exchanges of talking points or ideas for an ad campaign, it would have come to nothing. BUT, we all know what was in those emails and any voter that bothered to look was appalled.
[DAWN] WHEN Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif ... served two non-consecutive terms as prime minister, heads the Pakistain Moslem League (Nawaz). Noted for his spectacular corruption, the 1998 Pak nuclear test, border war with India, and for being tossed by General Musharraf... or members of his government speak about terrorism- and militancy-related issues, it often only serves to expose their lack of understanding of the matter or their wilful denial of the facts, or perhaps both. Addressing parliamentarians in Sarajevo, Mr Sharif claimed not only that all sanctuaries of Al Qaeda and the Pak Taliban have been eliminated in Pakistain, but that there is no presence of the holy warriorIslamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... group either in the country. He went on to claim credit, as has become his practice, for the multiple successes in the fight against militancy. Perhaps on all counts, Mr Sharif is wrong. To begin with, while military operations have cleared Fata of the strongholds of the banned TTP, the steady pace of holy warrior attacks in tribal areas and the provinces suggests the continued existence of terrorist hideouts in the country. Indeed, that is the reason the military leadership has demanded greater action in Punjab 1.) Little Orphan Annie's bodyguard
2.) A province of Pakistain ruled by one of the Sharif brothers
3.) A province of India. It is majority (60 percent) Sikh and Hindoo (37 percent), which means it has relatively few Moslem riots.... -- a vast jihadist infrastructure there operates undamaged and in plain sight. On Al Qaeda, while there have been great successes and the global attraction of its so-called brand has diminished, can the prime minister or indeed any official here realistically claim that every last strand of the group in Pakistain has been found and eliminated? What is the likelihood that Ayman al-Zawahiri ... Formerly second in command of al-Qaeda, now the head cheese, occasionally described as the real brains of the outfit. Formerly the Mister Big of Egyptian Islamic Jihad. Bumped off Abdullah Azzam with a car boom in the course of one of their little disputes. Is thought to have composed bin Laden's fatwa entitled World Islamic Front Against Jews and Crusaders. Currently residing in the North Wazoo area assuming he's not dead like Mullah Omar. He lost major face when he ordered the nascent Islamic State to cease and desist and merge with the orthodx al-Qaeda spring, al-Nusra... is hiding on Pak soil?
Moreover, in recent times, several of the biggest terrorist attacks in Pakistain have been claimed by IS. While those claims have been contested, the existence of IS propaganda cells here cannot be denied. So while Mr Sharif may be right that several successes have been won in the fight against militancy, the principal lesson has been that success is hard-fought and hard-earned.
It is, however, Mr Sharif’s careless words about IS that rankle most. For several reasons, IS has not emerged yet as the biggest militancy threat in the country -- but it could if the state is not vigilant. In neighbouring Afghanistan, its growth is often linked to the mass arrival of the TTP and anti-Pakistain Death Eaters in eastern Afghanistan. While there are certainly domestic reasons for the expansion of IS in Afghanistan, the very existence of a Pak-Afghan nexus should be alarming for Pakistain. Moreover, in recent times, several of the biggest terrorist attacks in Pakistain have been claimed by IS. While those claims have been contested, the existence of IS propaganda cells here cannot be denied. So while Mr Sharif may be right that several successes have been won in the fight against militancy, the principal lesson has been that success is hard-fought and hard-earned. Politicians claiming credit for things they have not done is routine. But in the fight against militancy, it is the continuing lack of seriousness of the politicianship that is alarming.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/23/2016 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11126 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
[DAWN] PAKISTAN has faced multiple active terrorism threats over the past 15 years, which now constitute an existential threat to the state. In order to deal with this, Pakistain enacted an anti-terrorism law in 1997, subsequently improved to meet emergent threats through a number of amendments.
This law not only includes provisions for the punishment of bandidosturbans but also offers a comprehensive framework for dealing with terrorism on the lam. It enables preventive detention of terrorists, redefines the required evidence for conviction, lays down simplified trial procedures for the speedy disposal of terrorism-related cases and constitutes special anti-terrorism courts. Additionally, it also provisions witness protection programmes.
From this law follows all actions to confront terrorism in Pakistain, including the National Action Plan. Its expansive powers, together with the now expired Protection of Pakistain Act, have been widely criticised for falling short of international human rights
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
12/23/2016 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11125 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.