The nuclear quagmire unfolding in Japan should bring some realism into the discussion about whether or not the world should be expanding nuclear energy across the globe. The issue has to be the consequences of something going wrong, and the alternatives.

So many of the nuclear industry people that I have met over the years, and there has been a number, especially when I was chair of the Citizens Advisory Board for the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion plant, the nation's only operating uranium enrichment. That facility, which is run by two coal large coal fired power plants on the Ohio River, (which, in combination with most of the other plants in the nuclear fuel cycle, which are essential for the operation of nuclear power plants, and which most are run by coal) runs counter to the oft repeated BS by the nuclear industry and a bunch of ill-informed reporters that nuclear power doesn't result in the release of carbon into the air. In fact, nuclear power does produce a significant amount of carbon releases.

And while that should be added into the discussion about nuclear power rather than, as many reporters and lobbyists from the industry have tried to say, that nuclear power don't emit greenhouse gasses, the issue before us today is whether or not the risk of global catastrophe for being able to be totally electrified at every second of every day when there are alternatives to being almost as electrified without the risk of global consequences. Hopefully saner minds will prevail.

It is disappointing that the administration came out with a statement, delivered by, of all interests, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, an agency that has no credibility amongst folks that know, that the situation in Japan didn't matter - they were pressing ahead with more nuke plants in the US.

Obama is developing a problematic pattern. He speaks too soon. He shouldn't have allowed these comments about nuclear power to be made when the situation was still unfolding. He shouldn't have made the comments about Libya when he knew he wasn't going to do anything and the situation was still fluid. It boxes him in. And not into a good box, either.

Yesterday, many pundits, including pro nuclear pundits, said that the next 24 hours were critical. Well, that 24 hours have passed and one can only say that things are worse. So what are these pundits saying now? We'll see.