Obama will let congressional Democrats and Republicans take the legislative lead, but he will quietly make it clear that he'll sign virtually any pro-nuclear legislation they can pass--while publicly pretending to be mighty reluctant to do so.
Elected in 1987, the MP has been a constant thorn in the side of his own government on issues such as drug legislation and nuclear weapons.
This week one of them, Nicholas Burns, a senior State Department man, said he expected an agreement with India on the clearer separation of its civilian nuclear activities from its military ones, as well as new American legislation to exempt India from the existing anti-nuclear rules, to be in place by the time Mr Bush pays a return visit to India in early 2006.
Germany, a world leader in renewable energy, has halted operations at some of its oldest nuclear reactors and is speeding through legislation to ramp up renewable-energy investment.
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Indian legislation about the liability for nuclear accidents in effect closes to American companies the very market Mr Bush sacrificed so much to prise open.
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Supporters of this legislation have implied that our nuclear arsenal is unaffected by the current absence of U.S. production of plutonium and highly enriched uranium for weapons purposes.
The moratorium was one of a series of unilateral disarmament actions taken at that time, which included the 1993-94 legislation prohibiting design of low-yield nuclear weapons and the 1995-96 agreement on a Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).
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As the Clinton Administration began to address the possibility of conducting a number of tests for this purpose in the spring of 1993, however, those who had championed the Hatfield amendment lobbied intensively against any resumption of U.S. nuclear testing even that permitted by their legislation.
The Chinese test should also remind the U.S. Senate of the need to maintain a robust and safe nuclear deterrent capability on the eve of its consideration of legislation that would have the opposite effect.
The center-left Social Democrats said Monday they would approve the government's new plan in parliament only if a stronger commitment is made to build up wind and solar capacity, and if the legislation leaves open the possibility of closing all nuclear plants sooner than 2022.
It must be a non-negotiable condition of any further conversations with allied governments about implementation of the Helms-Burton legislation that all European and Canadian assistance to the Cuban nuclear reactor complex at Juragua -- including the supplying of any component, technical assistance or financing -- must be permanently halted.
The legislation also expressly provided for a resumption of U.S. nuclear testing in the event that other nuclear powers conducted tests.
And the lack of climate legislation meant there was no price on carbon, which would have favoured nuclear power.
Democrats are trying to pass several pieces of legislation before a more Republican Congress is sworn in in January, including the START nuclear arms treaty with Russia, a repeal of the ban on gays and lesbians serving openly in the military, and the so-called DREAM Act, which would create a path to citizenship for young illegal immigrants.
The Republican and Democratic sponsors of the legislation speak in lofty terms about the U.S. agreement to supply India with nuclear fuel and technology.
NPR: Congress Moves Toward Approval of India Nuclear Agreement
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