Back to the same old crap....

One week on vacation - one week as one of the thousand "bennies." (The funny thing is I think I view the "bennies" the same way the residents do - I Don't Wanna Be A Benny!). A week to recharge - a week to bodysurf - a week of sun. Now back to work and back to the news.

It is such a different feel to be on vacation. While I read newspapers and watched the news I was without a PC. No blogs to read, no Common Dreams. So my news was slanted and had little to do, IMO, with reality. Just cursory reports on Bolton, on Iraq, on Iran...

So much to comment on. But I think it very appropriate that my re-entry begins with a silent nod to the victims in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. A call to end the war, a call to end the nuclear arms race...

Today, the "official" nuclear powers could annihilate the world many times over. And 40 other countries have the know-how to join their club. Sixty years after Hiroshima, who can say with confidence: "Never again"?

Never again?
60 years since the first use of a nuclear weapon in war. 160,000 people died when the bomb was dropped at 8.15am on Hiroshima, with another 77,062 dying later.
$27bn is spent each year by the US on nuclear weapons and related programs
11, 000 active, deliverable nuclear weapons in the world. The US has 6,390, Russia 3,242 and Britain 200
15,654 sq miles, total land area used by US nuclear weapons bases and facilities
4 other states known or thought to have nuclear weapons: India, Israel, Pakistan, North Korea
5 acknowledged nuclear states: China, France, Russia, United Kingdom, United States
1 number of islands vaporized by nuclear testing: Elugelab, Micronesia, 1952
16 in length of 'Davy Crockett', the smallest nuclear weapon ever produced
40 states with technical ability to make nuclear weapons, including Egypt and South Korea
30,000 Kazakh conscripts served at Semipalatinsk, the Soviet test site. There were 456 tests conducted between 1945 and 1991 at the site
100 maximum number of those Kazakh conscripts still alive today
200 estimated number of nuclear weapons possessed by Israel
0 estimated number of nuclear weapons possessed by all the Arab states
100,000 people were members of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament in 1984
150 estimated number of nuclear weapons possessed by India
75 estimated number of nuclear weapons possessed by Pakistan
40, 000 people are currently members of CND
900 years is the time it will take for radioactive elements in Pripyat, near Chernobyl, to decay to safe levels following the disaster 19 years ago