National Wealth Mentality Month

Lord,

I've been too busy to pray for a while, Lord, what with the Windham Regional Commission meeting and all the local fuss about economic development, health impact, and who is going to pay for what when and if this plant doesn't get its relicensing. And, to be honest, Lord, I'm an "up" kind of guy temperamentally, and I haven't known how to phrase any of my prayers in a positive way given my current despair. I mean, really, what am I supposed to say?

"Dear Lord, please make this Wackenhut security scandal go away and please make people forget that extremely low-level (itty-bitty) radiation exposure has been tied to childhood leukemia. And, as part of that, please make the American Cancer Society stop saying stuff like this:

Organs differ in their sensitivity to the effects of radiation. The thyroid gland and bone marrow are most sensitive to radiation, while the kidney, bladder, and ovary seem to be least affected. Some forms of leukemia, a type of cancer that arises in the bone marrow, appear to be the most common radiation-induced cancers.

"And please make the people of Windham County and nearby New Hampshire and Massachusetts stop imagining the scenario of a significant plume of bad stuff escaping from the plant and turning the children in local schools and day care centers into sitting ducks because there are not enough buses to evacuate all of them at once and the bus drivers, most of whom have taken the job because they have little kids in school and they like it that their work schedules can fit their wee ones' schools schedules so neatly, have panicked about the bus shortage and scampered off to load their own kids into their own private cars and drive like maniacs towards Canada?"

I just couldn't pray that kind of stuff, Lord. It's too negative.

Likewise, I couldn't pray, "Come to think of it, Lord, please make them imagine the 'no one to drive the buses even if there were enough buses' scenario 'cause we can seem somewhat reasonable when we assure them that it's kind of unlikely to be realized. But we can't seem reasonable calming them about the itty-bitty exposure thing because it's actually happening right now." Do you remember this letter of Hattie Nestel in the Vermont Guardian?

Hoping to clarify the issue for Rod and any others who may be unclear about the extremely dangerous side-effects that are created in the fission process of Vermont Yankee, I offer the following information.

Vermont Yankee was made by General Electric Company and is a Mark 1 boiling-water reactor (BWR). BWRs are prone to release radioactive gases under normal operating conditions more so than pressurized-water reactors, originally designed by Westinghouse for use in submarines. BWRs use a “single-loop” design; steam produced by uranium fuel goes directly to electric generator turbines. Pressurized water reactors, PWR, on the other hand, have two loops, one for hot water circulating through hot fuel elements and another for steam going to turbines. The second loop helps prevent radioactivity from reaching the turbines, where it can leak into the environment. Only pressurized-water reactors are used in submarines, and are less prone (though not completely immune) to radioactive leaks than Vermont Yankee.

Fenceline readings are taken around the perimeter of Vermont Yankee to measure these emissions. Bill Irwin, Vermont’s chief of radiological health, recently revealed that Vermont Yankee exceeded the state’s 20-millirem radioactive emissions limit in 1998, 2000, and 2004 and is expected to do so for 2006.

The United States National Academy of Science acknowledged in its 2005 BEIR (Biological Effects of Ionizing Radiation) VII report that there is no safe level of exposure to radiation. Furthermore, every radioactive emission from Vermont Yankee raises the background radiation on the planet.

I mean, Lord, how much of an expression of joy in your goodness would a prayer like "please make them think about the buses" be? That's why I won't do it

In its lieu, here is my mid-January prayer.

"Dear Lord, January is National Wealth Mentality Month. Please help everyone who carps about duplicity on the part of Entergy relative to the cleanup fund and who worries about their children getting leukemia and their unborn children growing third arms in utero and all of that (including disaster movie scenarios fit only for drama queens) remember that Vermont Yankee pays significant taxes in the area and has a whole lot of people on payroll."

Because, Lord, January is also International Quality of Life Month, National Be On Purpose Month, and International Life Balance Month. And quality, purpose, and balance are really what life is about.

Amen,

Fake-Rob