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Climatologist James Hansen Defends Nuclear Energy
First time accepted submitter prajendran writes "James Hansen, the former director of the Goddard Institute of Space Sciences, has been a strong defender of using nuclear energy to replace coal and renewable energy. He and three other researchers had written a letter, arguing just this. In this interview with rediff.com, an Indian news site, he was asked to address some concerns surrounding the issue, especially given the strong feelings generated by it. It may not be Hansen's best interview, but it did bring out his passionate side."
“Dead Peasant” insurance
Winn Dixie Stores bought life insurance policies on approximately 36,000 of its employees, without their knowledge or consent, and named itself as the policies’ beneficiary. The insurance brokerage firm that placed the policies prepared two memos describing the deceased employees as “Dead Peasants.”
The memos were evidence in a Supreme Court case. Corporations are the ones that gave the government power so they could yield it. You can't buy life insurance on a someone outside your family without their consent, why can corporations do it?
I really don't know how anyone can be anti-government and pro-corporations or vice versa really. They're the same system now. Those in power are those in power whether you want to call them President's or CEO's they're typically cut from the same class of people or are puppets controlled by the same class and it's quite obvious by now that both parties are controlled by the same set of people.
You seem intelligent but your constant anti-government posts seem to lack this fundamental understanding of power. For some reason it doesn't matter how much you tie government officials to corporate power, many people see them as at odds. Of course corporations have done a good job of conflating small business and international conglomeration so they play all the sides.
It's fairly obvious that Federal laws help big companies. They would much rather deal with one law, usually crafted with help from their lobbyist, than deal with 50 laws and lobbying 50 state governments. Small business are fine with 50 state laws because they normally only operate in one state. However, notice when the federal government does something that limits corporate power, all of a sudden it's government overreach and Wal-Mart will act like they're being pushed around like a mom and pop store, which is ridiculous.
Have you seen our laws? Do you really not see how corporate power has been crafting them for at least the last 100 years. They even act like royalty. Any big wealthy family is likely inbred and they will do anything to maintain their power. They hide their money in families so that it doesn't seem as extreme as it is. They have arranged marriages. And they are slowly taking all of the capital out of the system. Personally, I don't have kids and I'll probably be dead before things really get bad, but for those that have children, I'm baffled. With each generation, capital is condensed into smaller and smaller hands. And while it doesn't affect me that someone makes more than me, it does affect me when they take so much capital out of the system there's no way to get it back.
People think shareholders represent some kind of democratic capitalism, but the truth is, each companies stock is controlled by a few controlling parties. Often married or linked somehow. Maybe 10% of a company gets sold to what you could actually call the public, but that's just another means of taking money from the hands of the people. When you own the majority of a stock, it's quite easy to manipulate. Just like if you own the majority of land or the majority of anything.
The simple fact that money is flowing to the wealthy makes it really hard for me to believe that the government is holding corporations back. The wealthy families in the country control so much, it blows my mind that people still think the government even has power over the government. For crying out loud, our money is printed by a private organization and lent to our government. Evert dollar in our economy is lent into the system by a private entity. But sure, keep believing the government is the problem. We need to fix government, not destroy it and officially hand it over to the royalty of our day. Did our ancestors come to America to give the continent to 400 families.
Interestingly, becoming rich is good for the country. Staying ric