Speaker Pelosi: Here's $50 Billion to Restore The Stimulus in Conference

By Al Giordano
(In loving memory of Guy Chichester of Rye, New Hampshire, 1936-2009.)

Much has been written about how the Senate version of the Stimulus Bill doesn't include some of the most economically stimulating items from the House version: tens of billions of dollars for public education and school construction, Head Start early childhood education, and other vital projects.
Now the bill goes to House-Senate conference. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has called the changes made in the Senate version "very damaging." US Rep. David Obey (D-WI) will be her point man on the conference.
One of the changes made by the Senate version, however, was to add a $50 billion dollar bailout for the nuclear power industry. These projects are not "shovel ready," they won't be for years, they will not be labor intensive, and w ould take at least 10 years before supplying any energy, if at all.
Worse, the addition of the nuclear bailout literally robs many Americans of jobs, and children of schools and food.
Removi ng the atomic pork is the simplest and soundest way to put that $50 billion to work truly stimulating the economy rather than trying to resurrect a failed and dangerous industry.
The House-Senate conference committee will attempt to balance many competing interests. First and foremost is that Senator Sue Collins (R-ME), one of three Republicans to support the Stimulus, has said outright that she won't vote for final passage if the overall $828 price tag increases. That is also possible not only with the two other Republicans but with some conservative Democrats in the Senate. If the bill loses just two votes on the Senate side, it will die.
Simply by removing the nuclear bailout provision, the conference committee can find $50 billion dollars to allocate to greater and better priorities without jeopardizing final passage of the bill in the Senate.
Here is the language inserted into the Senate version:
TITLE 17-INNOVATIVE TECHNOLOGY LOAN GUARANTEE PROGRAM
The Committee also recommends an additional $50,000,000,000 to support the deployment of eligible technologies under the Section 1702(b)(2) of EPACT 2005 that will contribute to transforming the energy sector. This funding will add to the existing loan guarantee authority provided in other appropriations bills to support self-financed loan guarantees. The Committee is aware of the strong interest in the program and the large number of pending applications.
Senator Robert Bennett (R-UT) is the culprit who inserted the $50 nuclear bailout into the Senate version. He didn't even vote for the Stimulus Bill.
Bennett denied to the Salt Lake Tribune that the $50 billion is for nuclear power. "It is not a bailout for the nuclear industry in any sense of the word. It is a method of attracting private capital into renewable energy."
That's a flat-out lie, according to Brad Johnson at Think Progress:
Although the loan guarantee program covers nuclear technology, carbon capture and sequestration for coal plants, as well as renewable energy, the vast bulk of requested loans - $122 billion - are for new nuclear power plants. This $50 billion nuclear throwaway nearly matches the total allocation for genuinely clean energy in the House version of the stimulus package: only $52 billion in total for smart grid, renewable energy, and energy efficiency investments.
According to a Department of Energy press release in October of 2008, the program will most certainly go to nukes:
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) today announced it has received 19 Part I applications from 17 electric power companies for federal loan guarantees to support the construction of 14 nuclear power plants in response to its June 30, 2008 solicitation. The applications reflect the intentions of those companies to build 21 new reactors, with some applications covering two reactors at the same site.
When it comes to trying to move the levers of power, the art of the surgical strike has a much better track record than the buckshot approach of "everybody call every member of Congress." A hundred phone calls to one Congressman tend to get attention more than one call apiece to a hundred legislators. And focusing on a single item - such as the $50 billion nuke bailout - tends to be more easily understood than trying to call attention to many things at once.
If I were to recommend a focus for public concern over this it would be Speaker Pelosi's bidder on the conference committee: David Obey.
Representative Obey is an environmentalist with a 95 percent rating from the League of Conservation Voters. Obey has voted against the Yucca Mountain nuclear dump in Nevada. In fact, it was Obey who fought early last year against Senator Pete Domenici's (R-NM) attempt to slip $25 billion for the same nuclear nonsense into the Energy Bill.
Even if Obey had no such previous record opposing nuclear bailouts, as the author of the House version of the Stimulus Bill he likely has other natural inclinations to restore much of the funding that the Senate did not include while it slipped in the nuclear industry pork. (Some have asked me for Obey's office phone number. It is 202-225-3365 in Washington and his district numbers are 715-842-5606 in Wausau and in Superior 715-398-4426. His website also has a contact form through which members of the public can give their opinion on legislation.)
There may be others on the conference committee that would like to be reminded about this fast and easy source to reinstating $50 billion in authentic stimulus spending by taking it from the nuclear bailout. US Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), US Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY) have cast votes against the Yucca Mountain nuke dump and both come from states where nuclear power is unpopular, and of course Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) whose constituents are well aware that the waste from nuclear power plants is a bullet aimed at their state.
But there are likely to be pro-nuclear advocates on the conference committee, too: US Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL), US Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC) come from big nuclear industry states, and various Republicans, of course.
Because the $50 billion nuclear bailout will not stimulate the economy on any scale comparative to that of the labor-intensive programs that the Senate version does not include, this ought to be a no-brainer for the likes of Pelosi, Obey and most of the House Democrats. But perhaps they could use a little carefully targeted vox populi to nudge them. In tough economic times, you can't have nukes and butter, both.

Journalist Al Giordano is publisher of Narco News and political reporter for The Field."