Here’s another good reason to register to vote before next year’s elections :

A US department of energy panel of experts which provided independent oversight of the development of the US nuclear arsenal has been quietly disbanded by the Bush administration, it emerged yesterday.

The decision to close down the national nuclear security administration advisory committee - required by law to hold public hearings and issue public reports on nuclear weapons issues - has come just days before a closed-door meeting at a US air force base in Nebraska to discuss the development of a new generation of tactical “mini nukes” and “bunker buster” bombs, as well as an eventual resumption of nuclear testing.

Ed Markey, a senate congressman and co-chairman of a congressional taskforce on non-proliferation, said: “Instead of seeking balanced expert advice and analysis about this important topic, the department of energy has disbanded the one forum for honest, unbiased external review of its nuclear weapons policies.”
. . .
“The Bush administration is considering policy changes that will alter the role of nuclear weapons in national defence,” Mr Markey said. “Given the importance and sheer complexity of the issues raised … why was the only independent contemplative body studying nuclear weapons disbanded - and disbanded in such a surreptitious fashion?”

Why isn’t the fact that we’ve got the most powerful and technologically advanced military on Earth enough for these people? Now he wants to make “mini-nukes”? Every time I hear about the Bush Administration’s desire to develop new nuclear weapons, it reawakens my cold-war childhood fear of nuclear annihilation. The fact that Bush and his buddies are acting like kids in a candy store when it comes to nuclear weapons scares the hell out of me.