[ RadSafe ] Minute amount of enriched uranium missing

[Stabin, Michael]

Bob writ:

"we have more reporters than we have news"

I would just qualify that to say that "we have more reporters than we
have news that people wish to hear about".

Also the thrust of Stew's comments. We have 24 hour coverage of OJ
Simpson, Scott Peterson and Michael Jackson while tribal wars change
borders and governments on many continents, wholesale slaughters of
ethnic groups continue until they reach some numerical value that
warrants our attention, disease and famine affect the poor but not the
rich in many places, and so on. There is plenty of news out there, but
people simply don't have the stomach for the unpleasant news nor the
intellectual stamina to listen long enough to understand the
complexities that cause the changes in the world that we live in. "A
speck of plutonium can cause cancer" and "everyone who worked at this
plant deserves a sack of money because they worked around a radiation
source" - this is easier to deal with, and far more fun. Reporters, on
the whole, can probably understand and report on the real world more
effectively than they do, but, like cocaine dealers, they are bound by
the need to make profits and must feed the preferred habits of their
users. If they don't, their competitors will.

Mike

Michael G. Stabin, PhD, CHP
Assistant Professor of Radiology and Radiological Sciences 
Department of Radiology and Radiological Sciences 
Vanderbilt University 
1161 21st Avenue South
Nashville, TN 37232-2675 
Phone (615) 343-0068
Fax   (615) 322-3764
Pager (615) 835-5153
e-mail     michael.g.stabin at vanderbilt.edu 
internet   www.doseinfo-radar.com

 
-----Original Message-----
From: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] On
Behalf Of Flood, John
Sent: Monday, June 27, 2005 10:33 AM
To: 'John Jacobus'; farbersa at optonline.net; George Stanford
Cc: radsafe
Subject: RE: [ RadSafe ] Minute amount of enriched uranium missing

The fundamental problems are two-fold: 1) in a free enterprise economy
with a free press, bad news is big business, and 2) supply and demand -
we have more reporters than we have news, hence we have a news industry
that cannot survive financially on the naturally-occurring supply of
news.

Bob Flood
Nevada Test Site