Inside The Beltway The Future of the Past By Michael Green Historians often get calls asking for predictions about the future. If historians knew the future, we wouldn’t be in history—we would be in the executive offices at MGM Mirage or Harrah’s, and you will note that we are not. But this edition of Nevada’s Washington Watch addresses the future of Yucca Mountain, and other topics that have been and will be unfolding, as each issue does. Maybe we can learn something about the future from the past. Yucca Mountain CBS News commentator Eric Sevareid once likened being on television to being nibbled to death by ducks, which may explain why he never looked happy on television. In a sense, that’s Nevada approach to Yucca Mountain. Each time the budget comes up for review, the congressional delegation nibbles at it, reducing spending and forcing the Department of Energy to go one step forward and two steps back. Each time a case goes to trial or up for argument, it’s a setback for the repository. Each time one scientific report contradicts or questions another, it makes the dump more difficult to build. Simply to legislate it out of existence is difficult … right now. Whether it will remain difficult is another matter. The apparently final decision to locate the dump at Yucca Mountain came from George W. Bush’s administration. By next year at this time, the president will be … well, it won’t be George W. Bush. The presumptive GOP nominee, Senator John McCain of Arizona, has supported the dump, so his election might not change much. Also, Bush won Nevada’s electoral votes in 2000 and 2004. Republicans—and some independents, Democrats and members of smaller parties—will vote for a pro-Yucca Mountain candidate. So, McCain needn’t worry about Nevada on that score. His position on Yucca Mountain could cost him votes he might have gotten, but it seems unlikely to cost him any votes he definitely can expect. Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama might feel differently, whatever their backgrounds on this issue, for a couple of reasons, both historical. Read the rest by subscribing to NWW! © 2008 joyce communications