I’ve been neglecting this blog lately. I’m trying to get pieces prepared for publication while I’m on the Publication Award from University, as well as applying for as many jobs as I can, and preparing for Christmas and all that.

But I thought I’d just pop back in briefly to let anyone who is interested know that my dialogue, “A New Euthyphro” will be published (not sure when) in the journal Think: Philosophy for Everyone.

Oh, and Merry Christmas!

A number of you have no doubt seen this map of “Jesusland.”

I’ve seen a wide range of comments on this. It’s basically an illustration of where the conservative voting states are, as opposed to the left/liberal states. Some American bloggers (leftist ones, naturally) make comments like “Isn’t it scary/interesting how all the sane states are contiguous with Canada?”

I prefer to put it another way: Look out, apparently Canada is contagious. Avoid contact.

For a long time now, New Zealand has been a nuclear free nation. Not only do we not build nuclear weapons (which I think is a good thing), we also don’t have nuclear power generation, and we don’t even let nuclear powered ships come into our waters.

Back in the 80s, Labour Prime Minister David Lange worked hard to establish opposition to nuclear weapons. Good on him, I say. But his stupid, ignorant, anti-American colleagues (one of whom, Helen Clark, is now the Prime Minister) wanted to make sure American military vessels stayed out of New Zealand waters, so they wouldn’t vote for Lange’s legislation unless it was extended to ban nuclear propulsion and nuclear power generation. A generation of uninformed lefty liberal hippie nutters become unable to draw any distinction between the two.

Folks – especially folks from New Zealand – spend just a little while studying the issue before marching with a placard or getting all self righteous about nuclear power. What would you prefer, that we keep dgging out huge chunks of the earth for coal? Or that we keep damming up rivers? Nuclear energy is not the bogeyman. The New Zealand Climate Science Coalition is bang on in its recent comments. Opposition to nuclear power is based on widespread, vigorous, self sustaining and willful ignorance, and on a seemingly deliberate campaign of deception. Bryan Leyland of the NZCSC rightly takes the Green Party to task for contributing to all of these and more.

They claim that nuclear power is ‘unsustainable given the dangers of a Chernobyl type meltdown.’ Arguing against modern nuclear power stations because one badly operated power station failed when its protective devices were shut off and without secondary containment, is the same as arguing that we should not consider modern cruise liners because the Titanic did not have radar, or opposing modern cars because a model T Ford wasn’t crash tested and didn’t have seat belts.

and

“This government is opposed to nuclear power and weapons only because, as David Lange once said to me ‘Cabinet could not understand that there is a difference between a nuclear bomb and a nuclear reactor,’” said Mr Leyland.

Well said. And just when the National Party gets new leadership in John Key, who some of us were hoping might bring an end to National’s ambiguity on the issue in a positive way, he lapses into the same politically correct ignorance driven nonsense as the left, when he affirmed that “For as long as I am leader of the National Party, the nuclear-free legislation will remain intact.”