TOP TEN REASONS YUCCA SUCKS

1. Putting highly toxic radioactive waste in and around volcanoes and earthquake faults is a recipe for A Really Bad Day.

2. The Air Force drops really, really big bombs right next door. Bombs + high level radioactive waste = A Really Bad Day.

3. Nevada is the driest state in the United States, and that means we need water. A lot. And one of the big sources of water just happens to be under Yucca Mountain. Leaching radioactive waste into our pristine aquifers will not improve water quality.

4. Yucca Mountain doesn’t belong to the United States government. By internationally recognized treaty, it belongs to the Western Shoshone Nation. 'Spose the U.S. might start taking those treaty obligations seriously? Sometime soon?

5. The Department of Energy has failed to comply with the technical and legal requirements set for using the mountain as a dump site. The agency bureaucrats’ two favorite words? “Trust Us!”

6. The Department of Energy doesn’t even have a completed design for the site. Their two favorite words again…

7. The Department of Energy does not have a detailed plan in place if something goes wrong because nothing, apparently, could possibly go worng, go worng, go worng... Just in case, though, the general idea for a response involves robots. Seriously.

The Department of Energy has Gov. Schwarzenegger on speed-dial.

8. Shipping the dangerously radioactive waste from throughout the entire United States creates endless opportunities for terrorists or accidents to spill the material in millions of backyards. Such an event would be A Really Bad Day for anyone in the neighborhood.

9. The latest Department of Energy plan is to put metal umbrellas over the canisters holding the toxic radioactive waste to keep water from rusting holes in the cans. But the idea is to wait 100 years before putting the umbrellas up. Seriously. Volunteers to install the umbrellas are being recruited from the High School Class of 2108.

10. The Department of Energy says "not to worry," that as a Highly Responsible Federal Agency, they will come up with a plan to deal with any problems. Just like their friends at FEMA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers came up with a plan to deal with Hurricane Katrina.