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!
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What has NNSA wrought?
From "Bohemian Tragedy" - Vanity Fair (April 1st, 2007)
Is this really what I want to be doing? Sneaking into the exclusive Bohemian Grove, on the Saturday night when roughly 2,500 of America’s richest, mostly right-wing Republicans are kicking off their annual July “encampment”? The members of the San Francisco–based Bohemian Club are mostly all here, partying boisterously in this primeval stand of gargantuan redwoods 75 miles north of the city, or will be during the next 16 days. Over the years all the usual suspects have made appearances: Rumsfeld, Kissinger, two former C.I.A. directors (including Papa Bush), the masters of war and the oilgarchs, the Bechtels and the Basses, the board members of top military contractors—such as Halliburton, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and the Carlyle Group—Rockefellers, Morgans, captains of industry and C.E.O.’s across the spectrum of American capitalism. The interlocking corporate web—cemented by prep-school, college, and golf-club affiliations, blood, marriage, and mutual self-interest—that makes up the American ruling class. Many of the guys, in other words, who have been running the country into the ground and ripping us off for decades...
Several small groups are already making their way along Edwards Road, passing one humongous redwood after another, to the lake, and I fall in with them. After a few minutes we reach the lake, which was donated, along with the original sewage system, by the Bechtel family. The lake is small, an acre or so, and on the other side of it a looming four-story statue of an owl casts its reflection on the water. The statue is a little creepy. It has a slightly diabolical vibe. It was sculpted by Haig Patigian, a great pal of Jock’s great-grandfather’s. In front of the Owl there is a stage. This is where the effigy of a child called Dull Care will soon be mock-sacrificed by a group of men wearing red robes with sharp-pointed hoods, then placed in a little boat with a carved skull on the tip of its prow, set on fire, and sent across the lake...
Ha, ha, ha, Perry knows who the master is and will do exactly what Bechtel wants. Not even he can stop what is going to happen. Bechtel made a ton of money off LANL and that is why they want that contract so bad, now the will have free reign to steal everything.
June 3, 2018 at 7:24 PM
This is why Bechtel needs to bring down fury on the place to rid it of the technical staff. We should start anew with a new "technical" staff that gets it and will obey Bechtel. Word is that Bechtel has been very effective at lobbying for the contract, part of the pitch may be that they are going to make scientists and engineers suffer, apparently DC likes this.
Have fun guys, I recall talking to a manager that was relo'ed to LLNL when they got that contract, he would wail on the technical talent for not sucking up to him. He was really offended.
that's what you have to look forward to, if this rumormill is true..
Purdue people are showing up at LANL this week. Something is up.
Do you mean be compliant to Bechtel's for-profit rules or face the consequences?
June 4, 2018 at 8:52 AM
Well, "DC" may like it but LANL will no longer employ scientists and engineers. If you think anyone else can maintain the nuclear stockpile, you are sadly mistaken. If you think the nuclear stockpile needs no maintenance, you are delusional, potentially catastrophically so. Sad that so many (or so vocal a few) think LANL is a "compliance" laboratory, not a scientific one. Revenge of the C students is alive.
The technical staff understand all things technical. They do not obey stupidity. Making the staff suffer will ultimately lead to failure.
The possible plan, if North Korea agrees to a disarm than the United States will no longer need a credible deterrent so in that case Bechtel can run LANL. If North Korea does not agree to disarm than the United States will still need a credible deterrent so any other contractor than Bechtel will get the LANL contract. So don't expect a decision until after the Trump-Kim meeting.
Twaddle.
This demonstrates exactly why no one should believe rumors on a blog. We had a nuclear deterrent before North Korea ever fired off a nuke, we deter people other than North Korea today, and we'll still want to deter people other than North Korea in the future.
It's just another random, stupid DOE contract award. There's no plan at all.
So much for June 6th.
For what is it worth the new talk is that a decision was made in mid-May but somehow some issues arose and lawyers are now involved. This is not even the official protest period which will be open to the public. Wallace has reserved a room every day for the announcement but is being told to keep everything under wraps. Obviously something very odd is happing and this whole thing puts NNSA in bad light since we are now going year three of this, can these guys do anything. I think we can safely assume that the privatization of the labs has been a total disasters. Can anyone point to a single benefit to either LLNL or LANL since the contract change? You can argue all you want about possible anti-benefits but please provide one thing that improved.
FYI don't believe a word about open communication, forthright conversations, no retaliation blah blah blah. Went thru it myself, now I know better.
Big surprise.
June 5, 2018 at 6:30 PM
This is the most naive and self-serving post I've ever seen. Really??!! NK is the only reason for a credible US nuclear deterrent?? What a load of BS! No knowledge or thought, just pure Bechtel worship. Or ass-kissing. Whatever. Get a clue about the world and the history of the US nuclear weapons program and its successes, instead of your little Bechtel bubble that will burst any day now.
Some rumors are that NNSA has not announced anything yet because they are going through everything to make sure that their decision can be justified. This could mean Bechtel since they know they are going be a bad reaction and lots of questions if that is the case. This whole 3 year saga has been pretty crazy.
6:30 PM
Like North Korea is the only nuclear weapon state or NW aspirant state? What about Russia? Pakistan? China? Iran?
What's even sadder, it's the same vocal people who think 100% compliance equates to 100% safety.
I hear we may know 10AM Friday. People seem very worried it is going to be Bechtel.
Meet the new boss. Same as the old boss. We won’t get fooled again.
UC WON, Great Rumors about all the North Korea Talk, Fake news.
Ahhhh!!!! My world is falling apart, I curse the universe! I said UC would never bid, they bid, I said UC would never win, they won. How could I be sooooo wrong?