13 votes

Ron Paul On Nuclear Energy

He does say it's very very dangerous but he also said he's convinced it's the safest form of energy that we can have.

In light of Fukishima and how it apparently has reached California, I will say it really scares me. I don't like government interfering in business but let's say that a nuclear explosion makes life unlivable on the planet? Are monetary damages to a nuclear company going to make any difference? I feel the same way about hydro-fracking as well actually.

I hope I don't get slammed for posting this because I am a very staunch Ron Paul supporter and believe in almost all of his policies. The one that has always worried me, though, is the environment. Admittedly he has said that his views on environmentalism haven't been well elucidated (though he does think that they are strong and will work). I know he always mentions property rights when it comes to this (saying they would take care of almost all the problems).

But again, what about the case where an accident destroys a large are of land, making it unlivable? Is monetary compensation going to fix that? And even if it could, wouldn't the company just declare bankruptcy and the payments never would get made? And I also want to say that it might not even take an accident (e.g. nuclear explosion) for the dangers of something to be exposed. What then?

And lastly, wouldn't we have to rely on the court system to enforce justice? How has that been working out lately as far as courts taking on big business?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kzyi00LRfMw&feature=player_em...




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Ron Paul "Liberty Defined" Ch. "Global Warming" p. 262,277

"This radical environmental movement evolved from the antinuclear hysteria that stopped all nuclear plant development for the past thirty years, causing a severe price to be paid by our economic system. Some have estimated that the loss of efficiency resulting from this policy of obstructing development of nuclear power has cost us an estimated ten trillion dollars. Hysterical resistance to nuclear power also forced an increase in the rise of less environmentally friendly alternatives. . . . . Nuclear energy is safe and clean and cheap. If we were forced to rely on nuclear power we could easily adapt. Other countries already have."

What if the sun went out,

and even the government couldn't turn it back on?

The bottom line is you're a hopeless liberal who loves his nanny gov't.

It's time to drop the leftist baggage.

Ouch

You're certainly entitled to your opinion. I think it's an open and shut case when it comes to many of Dr. Paul's points. I'm very much against bailouts. I am very pro-constitution and pro-liberty. I have donated over $1000 to Dr. Paul's campaign(in addition to making over 500 phone calls and talking to all my friends about him). I'm not in favor of a nanny government at all. That said, I don't think it's wrong to at least question his environmental policies. If he says they're safe and reasonable, I'm more than willing to give him a chance to explain them further. But I don't think there's anything wrong w/ questioning things.

No worries, dude

It's mind boggling when people on this site reply the way he did. Questioning things is what gets people to open their eyes in the first place. It shouldn't stop there.

Without government subsidies,

Without government subsidies, Nuclear Power generation would not exist. There is no insurance companies insuring the Nuclear Power Plants because of the potential for a disaster and how big a disaster would be if one were to happen; this is why the federal government insures these facilities. If the Federal Government got out of the energy business, Nuclear Power would disappear.

If one is for Nuclear Power then they must also be for Federal Subsidies of it; for without the federal government there wouldn't be Nuclear Power.

Nuclear Energy is a scam perpetrated upon the innocent...

By now we all ought to gather that where the money is so goes the backing by a corrupt and destructive government.

It is like OIL...the powers that be have no thought of the massive death and destruction oil has brought to the world...first and formost the human has stolen the oil from the Earth and look what is happening right now...the Earth is revolting and Nuclear Energy and its operatons are getting slammed like in Japan...

Nope...better look at safe and natural ways to make electricity like tidal power which is a push-pull and and wind power and solar...all safe and guess what? Inexpensive, and that is where the reasoning stops...the rulers desire to keep humans in bondage hense...nuclear, oil and more crap.

fearless brave joyful peaceful loving grateful, compassionate

There a so many

There a so many misconceptions of nuclear power. I recommend taking the time to watch this short documentary. It will give you the whole story on the energy spectrum.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9M__yYbsZ4

Great video

at least mostly free from this hyper ventilating hysteria that we are used to. Here is the most interesting part I think - on Hormesis:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9M__yYbsZ4&t=85m15s

Yep, it's clear...Nuclear is dangerous and unstable..

.

fearless brave joyful peaceful loving grateful, compassionate

Witness Sunspots

Clearly that monster fusion reactor in the sky is unstable. I understand it could very well blow up in a few billion years. Perhaps the gubmint should do something.

West of 89
a novel of another america
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/161155#longdescr

Fantastic

This is a very interesting video! Thank you!

Michael Nystrom's fists can punch through FUD.

The Nuclear industries are an energy cartel

with monopoly control over the production of nuclear power. The industry is freed from liability by government decree, so we have no way to know how safe it is or isn't. Un-elected regulators determine what justice is. Justice isn't served but benefits are given to their cronies in the industry.

Dr. Paul has worked for years to promote the free market requirement for profit and loss including losses from liabilities from personal injury and property damage.

So I am OK with our differing opinion on the safety of nuclear power.

Free includes debt-free!

Exactly. Let's demystify it.

What caused the Chernobyl disaster? The government papered over the poor design and poor maintenance. The government lied to the people about the effect of the meltdown. The government led the awful cleanup.

Let's say Hyundai owned the reactor. Wouldn't they be making design and construction improvements multiple times a year? Wouldn't they be careful not to put their employees or customers at risk? Wouldn't they be open and honest, subject to review and audit?

It's specifically government involvement that makes nuclear power dangerous.

Perhaps one of the most dangerous forms of commercial energy has been solar and solar-related. Whether it's a hydroelectric dam that can wash an entire town away, wind turbines that chop up birds and catch small planes, or those trendy poison-filled fire-starting solar panels, trying to directly harness energy from the sun has been a heck of a challenge. Keep in mind, it's ALL solar energy.

Nuclear power has the most consistent and reliable release of power possible. Speaking on a technical standpoint, it will probably become so safe in the near future that nobody will even think about it.

But that doesn't matter. A free market will -find- the best sources of energy for the best situations. Freedom is the answer. Government will lie to you, because it can get away with it. How many millions of lives have been lost as a direct effect of government lies?

Michael Nystrom's fists can punch through FUD.

Actually the 'Free Market'

Actually the 'Free Market' already decided on Nuclear Power Generation, and that is why the Government had to step in to bring it to fruition; because it costs to much to build the plants and there was no insurance companies willing to insure them even if and when they did get built.

Risky

And Al Gore invented the Internet. (-: They say that the government brought us the Internet. No they didn't. A few programmers did, long ago, and it was making its way into the market when the government found it to be useful.

The idea that any project is "too big to start" is wrong. If the free market had already decided that nuclear power is a go, it would have started it at a slightly different time in a slightly different order with a slightly different liability structure. The difference is that the free market would have found the best ways to do it, where the government found the way to shove the square peg in the round hole.

Besides that, the government doesn't have any wealth or insurance to give. They can only take it from us to give back to us, so that they can take all of the credit for the final result and none of the blame for stealing our wealth.

Michael Nystrom's fists can punch through FUD.

-1

Yes, how dare I happily and politely give my view of it, which happens to be modeled after Ron Paul's view of it, while engaged in a pleasant and relevant debate. Better vote me down before I do it again.

Michael Nystrom's fists can punch through FUD.

Many of the programmers worked for DARPA

Jon Postel tracked and organized the RFCs that built the Internet.

That might be the reason for the down vote. (shrugs)

Free includes debt-free!

The 'Free Market' is the

The 'Free Market' is the system which denied the Nuclear Power Industry the ability to start in the '60's and '70's; I am perfectly fine with that. However, the federal government wasn't fine with that outcome, so they took it upon themselves to subsidize the creation of the facilities, the insurance of those facilities -if anything went wrong, and the storage of the waste which was a byproduct of the energy creation. Without the government we wouldn't have Nuclear Power today; we might be thinking about it know, but we wouldn't have it.

I am fine with letting the market sort it out, but make no mistake the market said no to nuclear power many years ago; maybe with modern designs the market may have said yes to nuclear power today, but now with the government involved the new designs are not even being considered. look into the nuclear power plants which are to be build or are in the process of being built, they are using an old design. All of the modern designs which might of actually been considered by a 'Free Market' are being scrapped by the government controlled nuclear power industry.

Hmm

Yeah, I think I agree with you.

Michael Nystrom's fists can punch through FUD.

Answering Rhetoric

Would corporations make design and construction improvements multiple times a year? Possibly. And it is also possible for a government to do so as well. Whether or not a business or government does so is more related to cultural development and education/wisdom than sociological title or "sector."

Would corporations care for their employees/customers? The track record is poor for anyone with high positions of power to be able to and also to manifest great communion with "the base of their tower."

Would they be open and honest, subject to review and audit? A publicly run government is supposed to be the most honest and open system in current human culture. A private corporation is even less bound by that maxim.

Yes, government fails. But it is not that it is "government" that causes it to fail. It is the disconnection caused by pride and chaos (sin). When someone shepherds a flock of sheep that are not theirs to be responsible for, there are often abuses and negligence.

We cry out for freedom and responsibility, but I am not convinced that we should push so boldly towards that path until there is a societal increase in understanding and the expression of understanding. Building without first taking an accounting is horribly great pride that brings chaos. It seems that his understanding this is why Dr. Paul does not express the same sort of urgency and fear that so many people do in our society.

Our push for freedom and responsibility should be honest and humble. We should not be carried away into captivity by the work of our own hands. Why continue in the same cycles that bring us the MIC and fascist government simply under different banners?

Reducing our electrical demand is the pinnacle of diligence in this matter, not covering up the sin of our gluttony by trying to dwarf it with a large production capability.

Unintended consequences

Consider the meaning of moral hazard. What is the motivation of a government, and what is the motivation of a company? This is the reason why government-run industries tend to suck and private industries tend to flourish.

Consider the two parts of a task, the cost and the recipient. Let's say my roof got torn up in a storm. If I spend my own money to get my own roof fixed, I'm going to look for the best return on my investment. If I'm told to spend someone else's money to fix my roof, such as an insurance voucher, then I'm going to get the most expensive roof possible, even if it's wasted money. If I'm told to spend my own money to fix some stranger's roof, I'm going to spend the least amount possible to get the roof to pass inspection, even if it's cardboard. If I spend someone else's money to fix someone else's roof, then there's no reason for me to save money or pick a good roof, so it's the worst of both worlds.

Private companies spend their own money to fill their own needs.

Government bureaucracies spend someone else's money to fill someone else's needs.

Michael Nystrom's fists can punch through FUD.

There is no such thing as true deregulation

I understand the common argument of free-market regulation and I am not opposed to the free-market in principle. It is the natural law regardless of what system we set up for ourselves to come to grips with interacting with life/each other. However, the true linchpin in preserving the integrity of most any normal socioeconomic transaction is individual judgment/self-control/godly fear (which is wisdom), not strategically placed fear of suffering.

We can either fear suffering or we can fear causing suffering. There is a large difference there and that difference orbits the core of our culture's sickness. We should be less concerned with the hiding the symptoms and more concerned with rectifying the discord.

It is true that, in our culture, expecting the conduct of private industry to be upright is not commonly warranted except where the private corporation fears consequence (whether reactionary [libertarian] or predatory [fascism]). And this is the same regulator of government, fear, that is in place when we declare our right to bear arms. I am not opposed to such "fall-backs." But it is worth noting that, sadly, most people won't change their basic daily rituals in order to express greater wisdom and liberty, but they will buy guns and prepare for war. Continuing in fear only leads to more fear.

It is only by acting upon greater wisdom that we can live in true liberty rather than simply giving the appearance of liberty. It is a failing movement to dress up a rotting mess and place it in fresh hands in hopes of making it more lovely. The only way to transform bondage into liberty is to understand that there is no escape from bondage in this world. By living in accord with natural laws, we become more free. By rebelling, we condemn ourselves.

In truth we should be able to build smaller structures (physical and theoretical) that are cared for and "living" rather than building a large tower that always falls over dead from the flood of fools racing to the top. There is no shame in accepting one's bonds while exploring the limits of those bonds, but there is shame in pretending to not be bound while casting chains onto others.

It is certainly foolish to press on the brakes while still pressing on the gas. Unless you're drifting.

Coming closer to my closing, as with parents, an organization's righteousness can easily be gauged by how quickly they resort to "fear tactics." More so, their righteousness can also easily be gauged by how determined they are to lift up those in their care to a point in which the cared for become able to care for others.

... And if the brakes are applied with wisdom and gentleness, if there is still a cancer among us, it certainly must be removed or it will continue to spoil the whole. But be warned, without wisdom and gentleness, our movement will become an auto-immune disease (wasting away ourselves). Hopefully, our goal should be to lift up anyone who is "lost" so that we are all working together without fear of each other while fearing for the goodwill and healthy growth of all living things.

Hubris

Yes we are "drunk" on our monopoly of money, energy, power you name it. Will Buissneses keep their employees and customers in mind or will they continue to act as they please. Well my thought is that nothing will change until there is once again competition in our markets. Why does buisness thub its nose at us? Because they know we have to buy their products and services. There is no competition. If these buisnesses had to worry about the bottom line and loosing customers they would treat us much differently. I referred to Friedman in an earlier reply but ill do it again; From the same book. (see Monopoly ) A monopoly is and can be a great boon to a feild of buissness. Its large amount of capital of creates a means of doing something grand that a small buisness wouldnt have the capital or manpower to make a reality. But he also follows to say that this situation will only exist in the realm of competition and a "level playing field." He uses the example of Standard Oil, often the architype of whats bad in a monopoly. The price of oil and oil based products durring the period of time that Standard ruled the market actually dropped. Eventually their predatory buissness practices led to the anti-trust laws that broke the company into several smaller companies. But Freidman Points out what the historybooks leave out. That Standard Had already shot itself in the foot. You see they made Kerosene. The big wigs saw no use for the other by-products of the refining process. They grew too big and were not flexible enough to move with the changing marketplace and gulf among others spurng up in texas to refine gasoline. As long as competition is part of the equation a monopoly is too cumbersome to react to the market.

Declaration

If we are free, and I do believe that we have a form of freedom (especially relative to one another), it is not within the capabilities of any government to grant what already is. Our forefathers' declaration and delineation of rights, despite being subverted rather rapidly, should be received by us as more of a warning to the corrupt than a system to be modified by Men/Women who impose their will through rights which they stole.

In other words;
The truth is that we are not tasked with overturning the money changers' table, we are tasked with doing good when we know to do good. If that was the case of our cumulative conduct, the government would be asking for bailouts instead of taking them at the point of a sword. More so, we would probably be glad to give it to them based upon honest recognition of meeting true societal needs.

Illusion (2)

I'll say again, differently, in this post:
The federal government is afraid of competition (and it is not afraid of competition). We have let it rule our minds so that we believe the answer to our problems is a new free market. So long as that is the case, we are bound. But the "market" is inherently free! And it is/we are being held hostage by the restriction of "decay" (namely pride and chaos) taking shape in our minds (read: lack of wisdom/understanding). If we acted upon the existing "powers" with the understanding that free-market cause and effect is our responsibility and we express the wisdom of true liberty, the government would immediately have the competition that we are currently convinced doesn't exist.

Could you please look at this video ?

It was posted on The Daily Paul I think yesterday...it is about 2 hours, but well worth the time... thanks.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=lEV5A...

fearless brave joyful peaceful loving grateful, compassionate

I watched it all.

I don't like it. I have to honestly give it a negative review. It used total bulls--t at the beginning, and unfortunately the matrix they they send people to by the end of the video is full of some bad traps for well-intentioned liberty-loving people. It makes some very good points, and it does direct us to be the peaceful loving responsible people we should be, but the fact that it presents some total nonsense like perpetual motion, alien encounters with ancient civilizations, and the over-importance of the properties of a common geometric shape gives all of us libertarians a bad name. This is the kind of conspiracy-nut libertarian we are all painted to be, and that's unfortunate.

Would I be willing to go into battle shoulder-to-shoulder with this guy? Sure. Would I trust him in a leadership position? No.

After seeing all sides of an argument, the truth usually becomes very obvious. We have a great ability to reason through facts and pick the truths out of them. There is plenty of truth in this video, and there are also plenty of lies. I try my best to only recommend philosophical videos that I fully agree with. Tom Woods' videos are a great example. And Ron Paul is a great example of this principle, in that he never votes for a bill that he believes is wrong in any of its points.

Freedom is the answer, indeed. If you know the truth, you're obligated to spread the truth. Honor lost is a bad stain.

I had been recommending people go to inflation.us for help and advice. Now it seems to have been co-opted by greedy liars, and instead of recommending any fundamentally sound stock tips, they're recommending investing in social media companies. The honorable people from NIA have either left or have been producing more videos on their own, while the inflation.us website is getting stinky.

Michael Nystrom's fists can punch through FUD.

And now

they're advertising perpetual motion machines. I will let the rest of the show play, but this should be enough to make most people turn it off.

Michael Nystrom's fists can punch through FUD.

Ummm, I'm sorry

I will give my honest opinion after having carefully watched 20 minutes so far. This movie is just bull. I'm sure I'll get lots and lots of -1's for this, but I have to be honest.

This man apparently was so impressed by a simple geometric shape known as a torus, finds it anywhere he looks for it, and believes that it has mystical power. They're going on to explain it with space aliens now. I don't know what to make of all of that.

He mentioned smart people like Buckminster Fuller and Albert Einstein. Buckminster Fuller loved to apply geometry to engineering because HE WAS AN ENGINEER! Even Buckminster Fuller himself said, "Everything you've learned in school as "obvious" becomes less and less obvious as you begin to study the universe. For example, there are no solids in the universe. There's not even a suggestion of a solid. There are no absolute continuums. There are no surfaces. There are no straight lines."

How could multiple civilizations have come up with matching patterns without directly contacting eachother? Frankly, can't two kids come up with the same picture when playing with a Spirograph?

The triangle is a neat geometric shape, too. I like to make cardboard packaging for delicate circuit boards and plastics using triangles. It's a nice strong shape. Other people like to make roofs on houses with triangles. We're from completely different industries and backgrounds, but we come up with the same shape.

The torus isn't much more complex than that.

But what is this video about? Aliens?

More than that, how on earth does this video get 1,874 likes and only 51 dislikes?! Is it required watching for everyone who wants to join L. Ron Hubbard?

Michael Nystrom's fists can punch through FUD.

Thank you for your voice of

Thank you for your voice of reason.