The reality is that continued reliance on fossil fuel results in spreading uranium (through coal fly ash) and and CO2 (all fossil fuels) and none of the (so called) clean power sources like wind and solar can provide a steady baseline of energy

Nuclear is the method to get us through the next 50 years without continuing with to increase the production of greenhouse gases, fear mongering over nuclear pollution (uranium from coal fly ash produces more annually than the accidents that you mentions) only drives us deeper into dependence on fossil fuels

Is it s tough choice? Yes, but getting emotional over the scary work 'nuclear' does not make a better decision

The proposal was to make containment of radioactive material and avoiding off-site contamination in an accident a legally binding agreement
http://www-ns.iaea.org/downloa... (bottom of page 15)

The actual wording includes the term 'shall', which in a regulatory sense is a pretty absolute statement, it ends with the statement, "these objectives also shall be applied at existing plants"

So, any nuclear operator in the planet would be out of legal compliance if they have any existing nuclear plant that 'may' present a risk of losing containment... Yeah, that would cost a shit-ton of money for the industry to just tread water and would greatly INCREASE the dependence of coal energy in the short to mid term

Everybody seems to ignore that coal also releases Uranium into the atmosphere due to fly ash, this author estimates that annual release to be 1.069 PBq/yr
http://nuclearaustralia.blogsp...

This is far beyond estimates that "40 trillion becquerels released into Pacific ocean" had escaped from Fukushima
http://www.forbes.com/sites/ti...

Where is the shouting for coal to clean up its act?
Nuclear has become the whipping boy for the Green political party and Greenpeace, who in turn seem to be operating well in favor of the coal industry over the interests of the general population

I think that the idea with the screw worm flies was to release so many sterile males that they would breed with the wild females resulting in no young, while this technique will produce young that will die

I suppose that this would have benefits by preventing the female from finding another fertile male to occupy their time

Followed by a permanent appearance of Michael Crichton on Faux news lying about how this is just like Andromeda Strain or some other hack novel he put together

American Dad already established the Kim is an alien back story

this^

Nostalgia for the things we found fascinating when we were teens sets a bar that can rarely be exceeded

Just wait twenty years for all the complaining about how the 10th Transformer's movie will never live up to the first one, what with all of the stunning dialog and pacing of the first one

Foggy memories and the halo of nostalgia have a way of turning crap into gold

It would be hilarious to bring back jar jar, but make him more serious than Mace Windu at a funeral

Something about all of jarjar's stumbling luck was an expression of natural force abilities and the sith decided to turn the entire race into their new warriors

Sure... don't believe me. How about Lee Atwater, the architect of the 'Southern Strategy' and adviser to Nixon and Reagan:

You start out in 1954 by saying, "Nigger, nigger, nigger." By 1968, you can't say "nigger" — that hurts you. Backfires. So you say stuff like forced busing, states' rights and all that stuff. You're getting so abstract now [that] you're talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you're talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is [that] blacks get hurt worse than whites. And subconsciously maybe that is part of it. I'm not saying that. But I'm saying that if it is getting that abstract, and that coded, that we are doing away with the racial problem one way or the other. You follow me — because obviously sitting around saying, "We want to cut this," is much more abstract than even the busing thing, and a hell of a lot more abstract than "Nigger, nigger."
-Lee Atwater
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D...

Sure, if you go back to the 40s and 50s, you will find that most of the south was Dems and there were even Dem Senators who had been Klan members

Then this little thing call the Civil Rights Movement came along. Some of the former Klansmen (Sen Byrd is a good example) turned their backs on their past and worked to convince people to no longer be associated with that group

By the 70s many people in the South were disillusioned with the Dem party because of the support of civil rights and they were attracted to the Republican party due to the Southern Strategy that was promoted by Nixon and Reagan

Since that time 'States Rights' was the dog whistle to call the racists and klansmen to the GOP and they have gone over in droves, there is no surprise to find that the ranks of the gop are littered with people of that mindset

I was more inclined to think Europe and Japan, but I suppose that having no argument leads you to just shout about them damn commies

That's ok, I guess it would suck to live with an out dated view of the world, particularly when you are trying real hard to ignore that which is plainly obvious

I have found progressives more inclined to ask questions of their critics than conservatives

It has to do with mental makeup, that is to say progressives are a great deal more curious about the world around them, while conservatives already know how everything is and just want to shut up those who disagree with them

Providing secular laws and education seems to be the key in blunting the effect of religious zealotry

We can easily identify those leaders who fight against secularism as the promoters of religious radicalism and refuse to vote for them

With Iridium the approach was to hand ff the transmission between satellites until it was within range of of a ground station to connect to a terrestrial network, or reach another satellite phone, usually one or two hops

They may use a similar approach, although Iridium initially involved the governments in the countries that they maintained gateways in as part of the corporate structure. See Wired story, "The United Nations of Iridium"
http://archive.wired.com/wired...

It would make a lot of sense to use the satellite network as the primary routing mechanism and only maintain gateways in geographic locations that Musk has strong political influence in. This would limit political interference from countries that practice censorship and limit money lost to graft and bribery

This ^

Furthermore, Musk has gone beyond ideas or demos and delivered profitable companies delivering these technologies

I would say put your eggs into many baskets, this endeavor represents another basket