Moniz clears first hurdle in Senate

Moniz clears first hurdle in Senate Senate energy committee gives Ernest Moniz thumbs-up By: Andrew Restuccia, POLITICO April 19, 2013 05:19 AM EDT Massachusetts Institute of Technology physics professor Ernest Moniz has emerged as the anti-Chuck Hagel, easily passing his first Senate test and even winning support from conservative Republicans. The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee voted 21-1 Thursday morning to approve Moniz’s nomination for energy secretary. Only one Republican, Sen. Tim Scott, voted against him. And his vote reflected broader frustration with President Barack Obama’s fiscal 2014 budget request, not Moniz’s record. Obama’s decision to choose Moniz reflects a broader effort to find a political middle ground on energy policy after Republicans spent years battering outgoing Energy Secretary Steven Chu. While Moniz has an academic background similar to Chu’s, his résumé differs in several important ways. Moniz is a seasoned veteran of Washington, having served as an undersecretary at the Energy Department during the Clinton administration, and he has testified before Congress more than nine times in the past decade. Wyden has said Moniz could get a vote on the Senate floor this month, but his confirmation isn’t a slam-dunk yet. Scott has threatened to place a hold on Moniz’s nomination over cuts proposed in Obama’s fiscal 2014 budget to a mixed oxide nuclear fuel facility in the Republican senator’s state of South Carolina. The MOX project is part of a U.S.-Russia nuclear nonproliferation agreement to dispose of 34 metric tons of weapons-grade plutonium by mixing it into uranium fuel pellets for commercial reactors. The project has been plagued by cost overruns. Scott said after the vote Thursday that he has “no idea” whether he’ll put a hold on Moniz’s nomination in the full Senate.

Plutonium Shots on NIF.

Tri-Valley Cares needs to be on this if they aren't already. We need to make sure that NNSA and LLNL does not make good on promises to pursue such stupid ideas as doing Plutonium experiments on NIF. The stupidity arises from the fact that a huge population is placed at risk in the short and long term. Why do this kind of experiment in a heavily populated area? Only a moron would push that kind of imbecile area. Do it somewhere else in the god forsaken hills of Los Alamos. Why should the communities in the Bay Area be subjected to such increased risk just because the lab's NIF has failed twice and is trying the Hail Mary pass of doing an SNM experiment just to justify their existence? Those Laser EoS techniques and the people analyzing the raw data are all just BAD anyways. You know what comes next after they do the experiment. They'll figure out that they need larger samples. More risk for the local population. Stop this imbecilic pursuit. They wan...

Trump is to gut the labs.

The budget has a 20% decrease to DOE office of science, 20% cut to NIH. NASA also gets a cut. This will have a huge negative effect on the lab. Crazy, juts crazy. He also wants to cut NEA and PBS, this may not seem like a big deal but they get very little money and do great things.

LLNL un-diversity

Actual post from Dec. 15 from one of the streams. This is a real topic. As far as promoting women and minorities even if their qualifications are not as good as the white male scientists, I am all for it. We need diversity at the lab and if that is what it takes, so be it. Quit your whining. Look around the lab, what do you see? White male geezers. How many African Americans do you see at the lab? Virtually none. LLNL is one of the MOST undiverse places you will see. Face it folks, LLNL is an institution of white male privilege and they don't want to give up their privileged positions. California, a state of majority Hispanics has the "crown jewel" LLNL nestled in the middle of it with very FEW Hispanics at all!

Anonymous said…

Senator Lindsey Graham has blocked the vote and wishes to talk with Moniz. Presumably, arm twisting to get monies flowing to South Carolina.

4/25/2013 6:42 PM

Tennessee (Oak Ridge/Y-12) and those South Carolina (SRL) politicians know how to play hard ball.

Not so with the ultra-liberal politicians now controlling the New Mexico delegation and some of those from California. No wonder LLNL and LANL are in such deep budgetary trouble.

The loss of "St. Pete" as a powerfully, conservative Senator from NM has been particularly hard on Los Alamos. The best idea that Democrats in NM can come up with when money is short is to turn LANL into an 'environmental research park' and, perhaps, a 'renewable energy research Center of Excellence'. Quit pathetic, really. No wonder the NM economy has been in a deep recession for over a year! It now has the worst economy of ANY of the 50 states.

4/26/2013 11:08 PM

The liberal Democrats who now control both Senate seats and the Congressional seat for Northern NM seem to be eager to commit economic "Hari-Kari" with their defense related installations in NM.

I'm surprised that the voters of NM aren't more up in arms about the loss of good jobs and good pay under the stewardship of this clueless crew in Washington DC.

4/28/2013 1:05 PM

New Mexico is the land of "something for nothing." There won't be lost jobs; the Democratic Congressional delegation will ensure that. The jobs will still be there after LANL "goes green." Just more clean up and environmental work and less need for scientists and engineers. Lots of jobs for NM under-educated Hispanics.

4/28/2013 7:20 PM

LLNL - The True Story -

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