Last month we reported on the hoax that Sweden and Switzerland have "the same standard of living as the US with only half the per capita energy consumption;" this month Sweden is being used again to bolster the anti-nuclear campaign. Prime Minister Olof Palme, intone the superstitionalists (ably assisted by the mass media), lost the elections on the issue of nuclear power. The story was started by Palme himself, who claimed that he could have won the elections if he had responded to the nuclear issue a week earlier.
That reminds us of the stutterer who charged racial discrimination when a radio station refused to hire him to read the commercials. Palme, the lout who took part in an anti-American street demonstration in front of the US embassy in Stockholm, was turned out of office because the voters, groaning under the astronomical tax burden of the Swedish welfare state, were at last discovering that there ain't no such thing as a free lunch. (Which reminds us: Cordial congratulations to Nobel Laureate Milton Friedman!) When his opponent Falldin came out with a grotesque program of dismantling Swedish nuclear power (13% of capacity, 20% of actual generation) by 1985, the Swedish nuclear industry, utilities, and major power consumers kept quiet with sadistic glee they would rather have Palme voted out and relied on all the other parties of Falldin's coalition to bring him back to his senses. They didn't have to wait long. While the votes were still being counted, Falldin, with the cool insolence of a politician, denied ever having set a deadline.
He shouldn't have done that. With the USSR going nuclear at a feverish pace, the Swedish communists are violently anti-nuclear (for Soviet neutrons are progressive, capitalist neutrons reactionary), and they are going to embarrass Falldin by holding him to at least some of his anti-nuclear promises with the pro-nuclear conservatives having to agree in order to preserve the Falldin coalition.
No shortage of candidates for the Che Cheng-min award in Sweden.
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Vol. 4, No. 3
Newsletter: Access to Energy Newsletter Archive Volume: Volume 4 Issue/No.: Vol. 4, No. 3 Date: November 01, 1976 12:48 PM Title: The Che Cheng Min Award
Copyright © 2004 - Access to Energy Newsletter Archive
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