Excellent work, Terry. The proud display of principle, courage, integrity, serving in the public interest is ennobling and hopefully will be a clarion call for others in the main stream media. The response of the media to continual criticism of presenting only the “liberal” side of issues (characterizing the newspapers in Utah as “libera,l” is the summit of all oxymoronic labels) has been perpetual and persistent self-emasculation until there is no content worth the descriptor “news.” How jarring to upset a television broadcast of hypnotic overly-dramatized recitation of the police blotter items and local fenderbenders with actual content of local importance.. How inopportune! Congratulations and cheers!!
For those who do not oppose (un)Divine Strake here are a few thoughts:
• The claim that these minuscule amounts of radiation are insufficient to cause harm are naive and incomplete. Exposure-dose-effect studies were done on populations previously unexposed to the DNA altering effects of ionizing radiation. The recognized air-borne trail of cancers and other medical maladies documented down wind from the original tests are only first generation effects. Other DNA alterations also occurred likely to produce more defects, problems or increased incidences of medical diseases in later generations. This already affected population will be more affected by subsequent exposures, even at lower doses. These dosing expectations are not accurately applicable to this population.
• For more than 20 years, behind the current location of the medical library, the Medical College of the University of Utah, Department of Anatomy conducted a research program in conjunction with the then Atomic Energy Commission studying the effects of exposure to radiation by injecting a colony of Beagle dogs with varying doses of various radioactive compounds. The results were not pretty.
• Although not nuclear testing, this proposed testing serves only to further a misguided plan to develop a new generation of atomic bombs. With the vast military superiority of the U.S. there is no military need to add a new nuclear arsenal. On a human level, it is inconceivable that the United States, after the unnecessary horror and long-term physical damage done to civilian Japanese citizens, would lose all common sense and pursue another nuclear program. Now that Rumsfeld has exited the DOD (but not the building, yet), perhaps convincing Congress to stop such development of such a program would be an effective way to stop the testing permanently.
• Regarding the claim that these blasts will not put radioactive material in the air. There is inadequate science to support those statements. Theoretically they are thoroughly contaminated with multiple radioactive elements in various isotope configurations with half-lives lasting thousands of years. Considering the potential consequences, caution should be the most important guiding principle.
Terry, I encourage you to step out of the box more often. Consider turning the evening and nightly news programs into television programs that contain actual news. The media no longer adequately fulfills it’s original mission needed in a democracy: to maintain an informed citizenry. Along that line, here is an OpEd I was unable to get published in our local newspapers. Perhaps it is time to debate this issue as well.
NEWS OR JUST NEWSINESS: THE LEGACY OF MEDIA CONGLOMERATION
"That news is important and that news matters is readily demonstrated in the adage that an informed electorate is necessary for the survival of a democracy.
"Unfortunately, in broadcast television, both nationally and locally, news content has been lessened even though an overwhelming portion of the population acknowledges that television is their primary, if not only, source for news. A recent study has concluded that, although there are more news outlets, there is, overall, less news being delivered.
"A few years ago the Federal Communication Commission relaxed restrictions, thus allowing media conglomerates to control even larger numbers of media outlets, primarily affecting broadcast outlets. In Utah three of the four major over-the-air broadcast television stations are now owned by these corporate mega-giants, the fourth is locally owned and controlled.
"These conglomerate-owned network affiliates have scheduled additional thirty minute blocks of evening news. Ideally, that would increase the amount of news broadcast. Paradoxically, with more air time, the newsworthy content in these programs has not increased, but seems to have drastically diminished. Apparently events now considered to be air worthy are mostly fire and police response situations with an occasional human interest story.
"This is a time when international events are roiling and rapidly approaching critical mass. Washington D.C., the epicenter of our government, is caught in a spasm repetitively belching mountains of newsworthy dramas. Some aspects of the recent Utah Legislature efforts warrant significant scrutiny. These are the events that shape all of our lives, permanently and indelibly.
"Inconceivably, local television news directors consider the most appropriate and informative content to be motor vehicle accidents, out of state high speed car chases, residential drug busts, spiced up with incessant chattering back-and-forth banter about unrelated topics.
"It is understandable that programming additional blocks of local evening news, by being less expensive to produce, can improve the financial bottom line. Unfortunately, this cost-cutting blitzkrieg severely overshot any reasonable mark and seemed to have eliminated the support system (or research staff) that directed actual news content into the 12 to 15 minutes of air time available for news (leaving time for weather and sports).
"There have been occasions when the local reporting on each station has raised much needed concern and action. Other spots have provided public awareness of potential safety hazards on the market or financial scams preying on the innocent and/or elderly.
"The benefits, accolades and awards for these occasional items do not excuse the routine daily elimination or downgrading of newsworthy items. These recognitions ably demonstrate that our local stations are capable of much better quality work product.
"This BREAKING NEWS crap is becoming tiresome and annoying! Just the fact that a fender-bender, drug bust, or even house fire is in progress does not qualify it as “breaking news.” How do our professional broadcast journalists keep a straight face when they deliver this hype? Utah has matured beyond the point that these items can be routinely justified as the most appropriate material for informative news content in a broadcast.
"Having missed an evening news or nightly news broadcast, I have never gone to bed wondering about car crashes, drug busts and out-of-state police car chases. I have, however, wondered what happened in the world that might be important, effect my sensibilities or impact my life.
"Although the ratings-grabbing philosophy of “if it bleeds, it leads” may be in operation, that pandering to the universal and primal hunger for gore and disaster does not grant permission to cannibalize the entire broadcast for a grand parade of more apparitions of the same caliber.
"These “local” television stations are transmitting for free over airwaves owned by “we the people.” They seem to have forgotten that the founding and core principal of commercial broadcast television was that, in return for the free use of our airwaves, they would provide us with value and enlightenment in addition to entertainment.
"Maintaining an informed electorate may not be easy, but it is important.
Denzer
