Nuclear-Free Library Zone

BPSCG

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Berkeley's public library will face a showdown with the city's Peace and Justice Commission tonight over whether a service contract for the book check-out system violates the city's nuclear-free ordinance.
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:confused:
The dispute centers on a five-year, $63,000 contract the library wants to sign with 3M, an international technology company based in Minnesota, to service five scanner machines library patrons use to check out books.

But 3M, a company with operations in 60 countries, refused to sign Berkeley's nuclear-free disclosure form as required by the Nuclear Free Berkeley Act passed by voters in 1986.

As a result, the library's self-checkout machines have not been serviced in about six months. Library officials say 3M is the only company authorized by the manufacturer to fix the machines, which were purchased in 2004.

The library asked the Peace and Justice Commission for a waiver, but at its Jan. 5 meeting the commission voted 7-1, with two abstentions, to reject the request. The library is now appealing the decision to the City Council.
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Does it really get more ridiculous than this?

Funniest thing I have seen in a week (and this includes PETA and their "sea kittens").

:catfight:
 
Oh brother. I was going to post that myself, but I don't want to be the source of "wacky Berkeley news stories".

The city council approved a compromise two year contract with 3M yesterday. I wrote to my representative and asked him to vote in favor of common sense (meaning, of course, for the libraries), but he was one of the dissenters against the compromise. As a Berkeley resident, I will take full responsibility if there is a nuclear war in the meantime.

Dear Council Member Arreguin,

I am writing to you regarding the city's proposed contract with 3M to maintain the libraries' automated checkout machines. I urge you to vote for common sense- and by that I mean in favor of the libraries. Berkeley's residents deserve decent working services in return for our hard earned taxpayer dollars, not political grandstanding and hyperbole about how doing business with 3M will lead to nuclear war.

Very truly yours,

Bill Ravdin
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Is it me or is California getting loopier by the year? Is it the water?
 
uruk said:
Is it me or is California getting loopier by the year? Is it the water?
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California's a big place. We have this kind of loopiness in Berkeley, as well as the controversy last year over the Marine recruitment center. This is not typical for the entire state. California voters approved Prop 8, also backward thinking but of a different kind. Berkeley is of course overwhelmingly opposed to Prop 8, so I'm not out of step here on every issue.

I know a couple of other library ladies in Berkeley, who were none too thrilled to learn about this latest local development.
 
ravdin said:
California's a big place. We have this kind of loopiness in Berkeley, as well as the controversy last year over the Marine recruitment center. This is not typical for the entire state. California voters approved Prop 8, also backward thinking but of a different kind. Berkeley is of course overwhelmingly opposed to Prop 8, so I'm not out of step here on every issue.

I know a couple of other library ladies in Berkeley, who were none too thrilled to learn about this latest local development.
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I know I was making a generalization. I'm from Texas and there is no end to the generalizations aimed at Texans. It just seems that it is the loud mouthed yahoos that get noticed the most and give the rest of us a bad rep.

I was just noting that California seems to have quite a "unique" crop of yahoos.
 
uruk said:
I know I was making a generalization. I'm from Texas and there is no end to the generalizations aimed at Texans. It just seems that it is the loud mouthed yahoos that get noticed the most and give the rest of us a bad rep.

I was just noting that California seems to have quite a "unique" crop of yahoos.
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True enough, and believe me, no offense taken (I make fun of Texans a lot so I wouldn't have a leg to stand on anyway).
 
As a Sacramentan, I am worried about the looniness from Berkeley managing to somehow get over the Coastal Range and infect us.
 
About 8 years ago my dad moved from Orange County, CA to San Francisco, CA. Without changing a single political viewpoint, he went from being a token liberal to a token conservative overnight.
 
As I am fond of saying, a "conservative" in Berkeley is anyone to the right of Mao.
 
There has to be a rational explanation for this. I can't handle the alternative. What's on this disclosure form?

Edit: Think I found it here.

I guess 3M works with nukes every once in a while and that the statute is overly broad.
 
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"Work for nuclear weapons" is any work the purpose of which is the development, testing, production, maintenance or storage of nuclear weapons or the components of nuclear weapons; or any secret or classified research or evaluation of nuclear weapons; or any operation, management or administration of such work.

"Nuclear weapon" is any device, the intended explosion of which results from the energy released by reactions involving atomic nuclei, either fission or fusion or both. This definition of nuclear weapons includes the means of transporting, guiding, propelling or triggering the weapon if and only if such means is destroyed or rendered useless in the normal propelling, triggering, or detonation of the weapon.

"Component of a nuclear weapon" is any device, radioactive or non-radioactive, the primary intended function of which is to contribute to the operation of a nuclear weapon (or be a part of a nuclear weapon)
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So, if 3M sells a single floppy disk to a company that is anyway involved in thinking about a "Nuclear weapon", that's game over? :boggled:
 
KingMerv00 said:
There has to be a rational explanation for this.
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Gord_in_Toronto said:
So, if 3M sells a single floppy disk to a company that is anyway involved in thinking about a "Nuclear weapon", that's game over? :boggled:
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Why are y'all so surprised? This is Berkeley you're talking about. Code Pink Central.

What I find surprising is that after all the time he's spent living there, ravdin hasn't tried to pull his head off his shoulders with his bare hands. The Democratic People's Republic of Alexandria, Virginia, which passed a resolution a few years ago calling for the repeal of the USA Patriot Act (during which Mayor William Euille and much of the Alexandria City Council demonstrated they hadn't the slightest idea what they didn't like about the act) is a right-wing neocon haven compared to Berkeley, and I just about have a stroke every time I open the Alexandria Gazette Packet, the weekly cheerleader for the local left-wing politics. If ravdin doesn't literally take up his sword and slay every time he goes outside, he's by far a better man than I am.
 
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