w00t!
Bush's nuclear plan bombs
Republican-led committee cuts off funds for new H-bomb, construction of giant laser
By Ian Hoffman, STAFF WRITER
H-bomb designers and builders of the world's largest laser were awestruck Monday by a greater power -- the congressional appropriator.
In a fell swoop, a powerful Republican lawmaker led Senate and House Democrats in killing the Bush administration's requests for a nuclear bunker buster and new nuclear weapons, as well as cutting $25 million from the National Ignition Facility.
Under pressure from House and Senate leaders to deliver multiple appropriations bills before the weekend, Senate Energy and Water Appropriations chairman Pete Domenici, R-N.M., and other defenders of the administration's push for new and modified nuclear-weapons research yielded to a united front posed by House Energy and Water Appropriations chairman David Hobson, R-Ohio, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.
Together, the trio cut $27.5 million for the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator, a modification of a high-yield nuclear bomb at Lawrence Livermore nuclear weapons lab and Sandia National Laboratories-California.
They also cut $9 million for an "advanced concepts" project to explore new weapons designs, replacing it with a project to make existing H-bombs more secure and more dependable in the face of aging, to be called the "reliable replacement warhead" program.
Arms-control advocates praised the move and Hobson for single-handedly blocking the administration's plans.
"I think it's fair to say he simply did not buy the administration's proposals for a new generation of weapons, did not see the need for such weapons and did not like their high costs," said Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Washington-based Arms Control Association.
It was a bold play by Hobson, who calls himself a "country lawyer from Springfield" and does little to disguise his contempt for a nuclear-weapons establishment that he calls bloated and unaccountable.
Read the rest here
Bush's nuclear plan bombs
Republican-led committee cuts off funds for new H-bomb, construction of giant laser
By Ian Hoffman, STAFF WRITER
H-bomb designers and builders of the world's largest laser were awestruck Monday by a greater power -- the congressional appropriator.
In a fell swoop, a powerful Republican lawmaker led Senate and House Democrats in killing the Bush administration's requests for a nuclear bunker buster and new nuclear weapons, as well as cutting $25 million from the National Ignition Facility.
Under pressure from House and Senate leaders to deliver multiple appropriations bills before the weekend, Senate Energy and Water Appropriations chairman Pete Domenici, R-N.M., and other defenders of the administration's push for new and modified nuclear-weapons research yielded to a united front posed by House Energy and Water Appropriations chairman David Hobson, R-Ohio, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.
Together, the trio cut $27.5 million for the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator, a modification of a high-yield nuclear bomb at Lawrence Livermore nuclear weapons lab and Sandia National Laboratories-California.
They also cut $9 million for an "advanced concepts" project to explore new weapons designs, replacing it with a project to make existing H-bombs more secure and more dependable in the face of aging, to be called the "reliable replacement warhead" program.
Arms-control advocates praised the move and Hobson for single-handedly blocking the administration's plans.
"I think it's fair to say he simply did not buy the administration's proposals for a new generation of weapons, did not see the need for such weapons and did not like their high costs," said Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Washington-based Arms Control Association.
It was a bold play by Hobson, who calls himself a "country lawyer from Springfield" and does little to disguise his contempt for a nuclear-weapons establishment that he calls bloated and unaccountable.
Read the rest here
