fusor

Nobel Laureates Endorse Barack Obama

Not that I want to get political or anything on a site dedicated to science, but 61 Nobel Laureates speaking in unison warrants some attention:

An Open Letter to the American People

This year's presidential election is among the most significant in our nation's history. The country urgently needs a visionary leader who can ensure the future of our traditional strengths in science and technology and who can harness those strengths to address many of our greatest problems: energy, disease, climate change, security, and economic competitiveness.

    We are convinced that Senator Barack Obama is such a leader, and we urge you to join us in supporting him.

Not that I needed any persuading.

What's a Few More Billion

....when your country is already drowning in red ink and paper money?  Not much, according to Tennessee's own Lamar Alexander, freshly minted authority on all things nuclear. Lamar laments that the U.S. is not contributing more to the the billion dollar boondoggle in France:

"That's an embarrassing mistake by Congress. That's what it is," Alexander said Friday during a visit to Oak Ridge, where he attended the annual meeting of the East Tennessee Economic Council.

In its omnibus appropriations bill for fiscal 2008,

Congress included only $10.7 million for U.S. work on the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor - a multinational, multibillion-dollar project that's supposed to demonstrate the capabilities of nuclear fusion as an unlimited energy source for the 21st century.