Ace in the hole

摘要

Could Yucca mountain help the Democrats in November? Most Nevadans loathe the plan for a nuclear dump at the mountain, which has been shoved down their throats by the federal government. Nevada is a swing state, which George Bush won by barely three percentage points in 2000. Meanwhile, John Kerry has long been noisily against the dump. Once, this looked a bit quixotic. After all, most people outside Nevada thought the matter had been stitched up. The process of preparing the site has been going on for nearly 20 years. Over $5 billion has already been spent on it. And the Bush administration seemed determined to put the dump into operation in 2010. But a surprising court ruling has suddenly thrown a spanner in the works.