The Other Democrat

One of the things I like the most about Cornell is the people it attracts. Earlier today I was looking at the list of events to see that former senator Mike Gravel was giving a talk about five minutes later.

Mike Gravel is the person who an online quiz on presidential candidates last fall said I would agree with more than any other candidate. He also shares the distinction of being one of only 3 democrats still actively campaigning for the presidency. Sure he is not fooling anyone into thinking he will win, but he is still a big name figure.

So, I immediately got up and headed over to the talk. To be honest I wasn't that impressed. He seemed to be pushing really hard for a direct democracy system like that in California where the voters can vote on making laws directly. In California I vote against all of these out of principal. They are rarely well thought out or implemented. He didn't talk at all about some of the issues that I would agree with him the most, most notably ending the war on drugs.

To be honest, I probably would have gone home pretty happy with the man though if he didn't show off his support of getting rid of all Nuclear power plants.
One Hundred Nuclear Power plants in America, no deaths resulted in decades from them, and he still thinks of them as a menace! His replacement plan: replace them with wind and solar. OK, at least he didn't mention biofuels. I would agree those two sources need to be used more. However they initially should be used to keep new fossil fuel power plants from being built. Then they should be used to replace coal power plants. Then they should be used to replace Natural Gas power plants. Then they should be used through some sort of plug in hybrid system to replace most motor fuel. Then, and only then, should serious thought go into replacing the nuclear power plants. Until then we should be expanding Nuclear, and replacing Coal, the power plant with by far the worst safety and environmental record, as fast as we can.