"a low-use segment of the population" (read this book!)
SCHUBERT%M...@mitvma.mit.edu
by Carole Gallagher, MIT Press, 1993.
From the book jacket without permission:
"For twelve years beginning in 1951, the United States government
conducted aboveground testing of nuclear weapons in the deserts of
Nevada. For more than four decades it has tried to cover up the
human and environmental devastation wrought by this testing. In
"American Ground Zero", Carole Gallagher has penetrated the veil
of official secrecy and anonymity to document the incredible untold
story of the Americans whose misfortune it was to live downwind
of the nuclear detonations- those citizens described in a top-
secret Atomic Energy Commisssion memo as "a low-use segment of
the population"- and of civilian workers and miltiary personnel
exposed to radiation at the Nevada Test Site.
The aboveground nuclear testing was "the most prodigiously
reckless program of scientific experimentation in United States
history," as Keith Schneider notes in his foreword to the book.
Many of its 126 fallout clouds floated acroos the American West
and eastward with radiation levels comparable to those released
at Chernobyl. Yet residents of the downwind areas were consistently
told that there was no danger, and were even encouraged to
"participate in a moment of history" by coming out to watch
these fallout clouds drifting over their homes."
----------
-------------------------------
There are lots of great photos, and firsthand stories told by
the people from that area who still survive. I realize that
this has no apparent Dead content other than that I'm sure
Deadheads aren't considered a "high-use segment of the population."
It's again, to me, a chilling reminder of what happens when
you choose the crookedest, vilest, greediest, dirtiest, slimiest
segment of our society to run things. Not a great survival trait.
I'll leave you with two great quotes from this book. And apologies
to anyone who *just didn't want to hear about it*
The contemplation of things as they are,
without error or confusion,
without substitution or imposture,
is in itself a nobler thing
than a whole harvest of invention. ----Francis Bacon
Those who profess to favor freedom,
and yet depreciate agitation
are men who want crops without plowing up the ground.
They want rain without thunder and lightning.
They want the ocean without the awfule roar of its waters.
Power concedes nothing without a demand.
It never did and it never will.
Find out just what people will submit to
and you have found out the exact amount
Of injustice and wrong that will be imposed upon them.
These will continue until they are resisted
with either words or blows, or with both.
The limits of tyrants are prescribed
by the endurance of those whom they oppress.
-Frederick Douglass, August 4, 1857
[the map of fallout from these tests extends eastward all the way to]
[the Atlantic Ocean, pretty much covering the entire country east of]
[Nevada. Check out this book if you want to know more.]