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bananas's JournalColin Wilson RIP, author of The Outsider, Religion and the Rebel, The Occult, ...
I just learned that Colin Wilson passed last December.
Here are some words by Gary Lachman (aka Gary Valentine of Blondie).
Colin Wilson
I was in Holland speaking at a conference on Hermeticism when I heard the news of Colin’s passing. As synchronicity would have it, one of the people I spoke about was him; I even had that wonderful photograph of him in his early days, with the rollneck jumper and cracked tea mug, sitting by his typewriter as part of my presentation. As you might expect, the news shook me and I was not on best form, but I think the audience appreciated what I had to say. Colin was included in the talk because of his belief in humanity and its need for heroes.
He wanted us to see through what he called “the fallacy of insignificance,” the belief that we are pointless, unimportant accidents in a purposeless universe, as most of the intellectuals who dismissed his work humbly accepted. He knew better and so did everyone who read his books. He lamented the loss of the hero but he was a hero to us all. I know he certainly was one to me.
If anything I’ve written has any value at all, it is because it is informed with the brilliant ideas that came from his encyclopedic mind. To get an education you needn’t go to Oxford, Cambridge or an Ivy League school. You only have to read The Outsider, or The Occult, or Mysteries, or any of the many remarkable books on philosophy, literature, psychology, criminology, the occult, parapsychology and the rest that he wrote and follow his leads. If you do I assure you you will get an education you can’t obtain at any of those schools or elsewhere.
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I had the great honor of getting several sheets to the wind with him on more than one occasion and believe me, Husserl is much more understandable under such conditions. He was a hero to me and a mentor but even more he was and remains a very good friend. He made all of us Outsiders very much at home.
Can Japan’s democracy survive Abe’s designs?
Can Japan’s democracy survive Abe’s designs?
by William Pesek
Bloomberg
Jul 7, 2014
Sunday shoppers in Tokyo could be forgiven for wondering if they had been transported to Tibet or Myanmar as a man climbed atop a pedestrian crosswalk, voiced his reason to the crowd via megaphone and set himself ablaze.
Self-immolation as political protest is almost unheard of in developed nations. The middle-aged man, identified only by the family name Yamashiro, said igniting himself was the only way to show Prime Minister Shinzo Abe his anger at a plan that some see as violating the spirit Japan’s pacifist constitution.
While extreme, Yamashiro’s fury isn’t uncommon. One day later, thousands demonstrated outside Abe’s residence against this “reinterpretation” of a constitution that he lacks the votes to amend. Public opposition didn’t stop Abe’s Cabinet from rubber-stamping his semantic end run around the law, which raises a vital question: Will Japan’s democracy survive Abe?
For the third time since taking office in December 2012 Abe did exactly what all too many of his 126 million people oppose. Earlier, he rushed into law a controversial secrecy bill that could send reporters and whiste-blowers to jail on varied and ambiguous grounds, then he pushed to restart reactors shut on safety grounds after the March 2011 Fukushima disaster.
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Along with the secrecy law, Abe stacked the board of national broadcaster NHK with like-minded conservatives. NHK, it’s worth adding, barely covered the suicide attempt in Shinjuku on Sunday, June 29. Is it because it didn’t fit with the Abe narrative?
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Summary of the court order regarding the restart of the Oi reactors.
Summary of the court order issued by the Fukui Court regarding the restart of the Oi reactors.
A very insightful vision of the risks involved in restarting nuclear power plants (in Japan especially).
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0Bx3334ZjJANlSEM4d1RQTXpPY00/edit
fukui-akw-urteil-engl-juni2014.pdf
16 pages, English.
Outcry prompts expedited plan to move fuel at Kewaunee nuclear plant
Outcry prompts expedited plan to move fuel at Kewaunee nuclear plant
By Thomas Content of the Journal Sentinel
July 6, 2014
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The company accelerated plans to remove and encase the spent fuel to address concerns raised by members of the local community, Kanz said.
Last year, residents and officials in the Kewaunee County Town of Carlton criticized Dominion after the company said it would take the full 60 years allowed by the federal government to decommission the power plant.
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Some of the fuel will have cooled in the reactor for only three years, but most of it will have been in the storage pool much longer. NAC's technology allows for it to transfer fuel after it's cooled for four years, but it's seeking approval to transfer a small amount of fuel faster.
In order to store fuel that's been in the pool less than four years in a cask, the NRC will ask Dominion to "demonstrate that the thermal and radioactive levels of that fuel can be safely stored in the cask," said Mitlyng.
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DOE: It’ll cost $12B to complete Oak Ridge cleanup
DOE: It’ll cost $12B to complete Oak Ridge cleanup
July 6, 2014 by Frank Munger
The government has invested extraordinary resources over the past 30 years to deal with environmental legacies of the nuclear weapons program in Oak Ridge, which began with the World War II Manhattan Project. Mountains of radioactive waste have been moved, and a lot of cleanup has been accomplished. But a lot remains to be done — and it won’t be cheap.
The U.S. Department of Energy estimates it will cost about $12 billion to finish the Oak Ridge cleanup work by 2046, the completion date DOE negotiated with environmental regulators.
The completion date and the overall cost could be impacted by how much funding Congress appropriates for the cleanup program and how wisely and efficiently the money is spent.
DOE’s Office of Environmental Management recently held a community workshop in Oak Ridge to discuss cleanup priorities, mandates and possible partnerships or alternative strategies that could speed the cleanup effort and get more bang for the buck.
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Japan’s Fukushima plant faces danger of overheating
Source: Press TV
The operator of Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant reportedly has only nine days to repair one of its reactors to prevent dangerous overheating.
Reports say the technicians of Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) switched off the cooling system at the fifth reactor unit of the plant on Sunday following a water leak there. An investigation by engineers showed 1,300 liters of water leaked from a cooling system.
“The source of the leak was a 3 mm-diameter hole near a flow valve,” a TEPCO statement said.
If the system is not repaired in nine days, temperatures will exceed the dangerous threshold of 65 degrees. Such a temperature would increase the possibility of dangerous reactions and further radiation leaks in the plant.
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Read more: http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/07/07/370209/fukushima-plant-faces-overheating-danger/
Germany demands full explanation from US on arrested spy
Source: Telegraph
Germany caught 'CIA double agent' with weather app on his computer
A suspected double agent under arrest in Germany has been spying for the CIA for two years, German intelligence officials investigating the case now believe.
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The country's top security official has demanded a full American response to German investigations. "I expect everyone now to assist quickly in clearing up the accusations - and quick and clear statements, from the USA too," Thomas de Maiziere, the Interior minister said.
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In a damning piece of evidence, investigators said they had found an encrypted communication programme hidden on his computer.
The hidden programme was disguised as a weather app, and activated by searching for a weather forecast for New York.
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Convinced they were hunting down a Russian agent, they were astonished when he confessed he to spying for the Americans.
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Read more: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/10949568/Germany-demands-full-explanation-from-US-on-arrested-spy.html
Residential solar will be cheaper than grid electricity in 25 states by 2015 says utility CEO
Residential solar will be cheaper than grid electricity in 25 states by 2015 says utility CEO
by HoundDog
Sat Jul 05, 2014
Cynthia Shahan of Clean Technica reports Residential Solar Cheaper Than Grid Electricity In 25 States By 2015, Utility CEO States. The cost of solar panels has come down 75% in the last four years. Although a trade war with China and India over low cost solar panels will be a "bump in the road," this basic trend is going to continue as the learning curve for the global solar photovoltaic industry is now well established at a 20% reduction of unit manufacturing cost for every doubling of the installed base.
David Crane, CEO of utility NRG sees major disruptive impact for the traditional U.S. utilities industries, and he has decided to "switch rather than fight."
David Crane, who runs NRG Energy, says that in fully half the states of the union, electricity from residential solar panels will be cost-competitive with that delivered by local electric utilities by next year.
Another important matter is that electric vehicles will enable a more decentralized, self-sufficient energy system. John writes: “Once homes can not only generate but store energy, it’s at least possible they could decouple from the grid entirely–meaning they’re lost to their local utility forever.”
“Crane is positioning NRG to be the supplier of solar arrays, fuel cells, and microturbines to power customers in this age of grid obsolescence,” Navigant Research writes. “It’s remarkable to see a utility betting on the grid’s eventual obsolescence, but it’s important to note that within that framework, NRG is still maintaining its core business as a power provider.”
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China, S. Korea voice concerns over Japan military policy
Source: China Daily/Asia News Network
The presidents of China and the Republic of Korea shared their nations' concerns over Japan's new military policy on Friday, days after Tokyo announced a landmark shift in its military stance.
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Xi, making a two-day visit to Seoul, met his South Korean counterpart Park Geun-hye at a special luncheon meeting, their second meeting in two days.
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Xi said in an address at Seoul National University earlier in the day, “When the war against Japan was at its most intense, the Chinese and Korean people shared their suffering and helped each other with sweat and blood.
“Past experience, if not forgotten, is a guide for the future,” he said while meeting ROK National Assembly Speaker Chung Ui-hwa. “In line with that spirit, the two countries can jointly hold memorial activities next year.”
Next year marks the 70th anniversary of victory in China's War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, and of the liberation of the Korean Peninsula from Japan's colonial rule.
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Read more: http://www.chinapost.com.tw/asia/korea/2014/07/06/411726/China-S.htm
Transcript of Estonian FM Bombshell Revelation - by Martin Hellman
Transcript of Estonian FM Bombshell Revelation
Posted on June 19, 2014 by Nuclear Risk
My March 6 post introduced the bombshell revelation contained in Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet’s intercepted, leaked, and authenticated phone conversation, in which he says, “there is now stronger and stronger understanding that behind (the) snipers … it was not Yanukovych, but it was somebody from the new coalition.” I have been surprised not to be able to find a complete transcript of the almost 11 minute conversation, so I produced one and include it immediately after my signature line below. I believe it to be at least 99% accurate, but if anyone finds an error or has a different interpretation of what was said, please post it as a comment, indicating where in the YouTube audio it is located. Some other useful information:
1. German public television sent an investigative reporting team, which interviewed wounded protesters and gathered other evidence. They independently concluded that there was a serious possibility that Paet’s allegation was correct. See my April 14 post for details and links.
2. Mainstream American media continue to either ignore this significant evidence, or to cover it in misleading ways. In particular, as of this writing (11:30 PM PDT on 19 JUNE 2014):
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3. My June 4 post presents strong evidence that the new Ukrainian government’s National Guard has killed unarmed protesters – behavior that, in February, President Obama said would not be tolerated by Yanukovych.
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