Stephen Young

YouTube video by Union of Concerned Scientists "A House of Dynamite:" UCS Expert Q&A

My super smart @ucs.org colleague @lauraegrego.bsky.social answers a ton of questions generated around #AHouseofDynamite, including #nuclear weapons, missile defense, who controls US nukes, and more. Give it a look!

And that particular SSMP:

Stockpile Stewardship and Management Plan (SSMP) NNSA's Stockpile Stewardship and Management Plan is a key planning document for the Nuclear Security Enterprise.

At some point @nuclearanthro.bsky.social you asked if the FY26 Stockpile Stewardship and Management Plan was late and might be expected soon. I went back & looked & Team Biden didn't release their first SSMP until March 2022, so they were late too. Here's the page:

EPA Proposes Striking Wetlands Protections, Risking Water Quality Across US The U.S. EPA today released a revised definition of “waters of the United States, narrowing the waters protected under the Clean Water Act. Statement by Dr. Stacy Woods at the Union of Concerned Scien...

Today, the EPA released proposed revisions to the definition of “waters of the United States”, which would further erode clean water safeguards & endanger wetlands & streams across the US. “This is a destructive and unfounded attack on clean water protections," said @geostatstacy.bsky.social.

As Week One Winds Down at COP30 in Brazil, What’s at Stake and What’s Ahead “While climate disasters decimate the lives of millions, when we already have the solutions—this will never, ever be forgiven.”

As week one of #COP30 comes to a close, UCS's Rachel Cleetus highlights key issues our staff in Belém, Brazil, are closely watching. "The negotiations are at a stage now where glimmers of progress are emerging, but there’s a long way to go..."

Prefer Youtube video's to podcasts? Your wish is my command: www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ILF...
Here @ucs.org expert @lauraegrego.bsky.social review the disastrous Golden Dome anti-missile program.

📢Scientists unite!📢 You have a critical role to play in speaking truth to power. Please join us November 20 for a virtual training on how the scientific community can stand up for our democracy and push back against the growing authoritarian threat in the US.

Register: act.ucsusa.org/44007SY

Just in time for your evening commute: @ucs.org's @lauraegrego.bsky.social on the ins, outs, and myths of missile defense on the Burn Bag podcast ⬇️ 🎙️

Cyber warfare and misinformation propaganda is so much more effective than nuclear weapons.

Indeed we did. One thing HAS changed since the 1980s - launch costs have gone down dramatically, by a factor of 10. But as the trillion-dollar cost estimate shows, that is only a small fraction of the system cost. And AI, for example, doesn’t help solve the problem

Didn't we already go through all this with SDI/Star Wars 40 years ago?

The Nuclear Threshold: Will Missile Defense Systems Really Save Us? featuring Dr. Laura Grego Podcast Episode · The Burn Bag Podcast · 11/12/2025 · 46m

And Apple: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/t...

The Nuclear Threshold: Will Missile Defense Systems Really Save Us? featuring Dr. Laura Grego

Other ways to hear the Burn Bag episode with Laura include Spotify: open.spotify.com/episode/5uVJ...

Putin ally claims Russia's new nuclear missile "impossible to shoot down" "Bomb shelters will not help," former President Dmitry Medvedev said on Sunday, in a stark warning to the West over Russia's newest missile.

Deeply destabilizing: Any attempt to develop a complete defense against nuclear-armed missile attack provides a massive incentive for adversaries to expand their nuclear arsenal or otherwise develop alternative ways to attack the US and its allies. See, for example:

Golden Dome’s cost: anywhere from billions to trillions, depending on design Golden Dome’s cost: anywhere from billions to trillions, depending on design Golden Dome’s cost: anywhere from billions to trillions, depending on design

Wildly expensive: The US has already spent more than $400 billion on missile defenses over the decades, with shockingly little to show for it. With Golden Dome, which hopes to be a perfect defense against any missile defense, costs, skyrocket, to as much as $3.6 TRILLION:

YouTube video by Union of Concerned Scientists Missile Defense Countermeasures

Technically unrealistic: as experts and officials note, it is somewhat like hitting a bullet with a bullet, which sounds hard and is hard. But that ignores additional steps adversaries can take that make it even harder, including countermeasures, mass launches, and more. See:

The Nuclear Threshold: Will Missile Defense Systems Really Save Us? featuring Dr. Laura Grego - The Burn Bag Podcast The Nuclear Threshold is a three-part Burn Bag mini-series exploring how deterrence, defense, and diplomacy shape nuclear risk in the 21st century. Across three conversations with leading experts, we ...

Want to hear the bottom-line on why Golden Dome - & all long-range missile defenses - might _sound_ good but in reality are technically unrealistic, wildly expensive, and deeply destabilizing? My super smart @ucs.org colleague @lauraegrego.bsky.social has all that & more in this Burn Bag podcast.

Too many people seem to disregard the fact that it takes at a minimum 400 SBIs for each missile you want to intercept - and that assumes that the system works perfectly and each interceptor hits its intended target. China can easily overwhelm any SBI system.

Golden Dome SBIs will need to be defended from adversary attack: Experts - Breaking Defense The satellites will need to be defended "not only from adversary kinetic or local orbital issues, but also from cyber attacks, electronic jamming and laser attacks," said Patrick Binning, a professor ...

SBIs will require defensive capabilities to help protect them from adversary ASATS -- and that is a cost factor/tech challenge that is not often included in ongoing discussions about investment requirements. breakingdefense.com/2025/11/gold...

I Want You to Understand Chicago Politics Chicago 2025-11-08 I want you to understand what it is like to live in Chicago during this time. Every day my phone buzzes. It is a neighborhood group: four people were kidnapped at the corner drugstore. A friend a mile away sends a Slack message: she was at the scene when masked men assaulted and abducted two people on the street. A plumber working on my pipes is distraught, and I find out that two of his employees were kidnapped that morning. A week later it happens again. An email arrives. Agents with guns have chased a teacher into the school where she works. They did not have a warrant. They dragged her away, ignoring her and her colleagues’ pleas to show proof of her documentation. That evening I stand a few feet from the parents of Rayito de Sol and listen to them describe, with anguish, how good Ms. Diana was to their children. What it is like to have strangers with guns traumatize your kids. For a teacher to hide a three-year-old child for fear they might be killed. How their relatives will no longer leave the house. I hear the pain and fury in their voices, and I wonder who will be next. Understand what it is to pray in Chicago. On September 19th, Reverend David Black, lead pastor at First Presbyterian Church of Chicago, was praying outside the ICE detention center in Broadview when a DHS agent shot him in the head with pepper balls. Pepper balls are never supposed to be fired at the head because they can seriously injure, or even kill. “We could hear them laughing as they were shooting us from the roof,” Black recalled. He is not the only member of the clergy ICE has assaulted. Methodist pastor Hannah Kardon was violently arrested on October 17th, and Baptist pastor Michael Woolf was shot with pepper balls on November 1st. Understand what it is to sleep in Chicago. On the night of September 30th, federal agents rappelled from a Black Hawk helicopter to execute a raid on an apartment building on the South Sho…

Kyle Kingsbury is not a journalist. He is not an op-ed writer.

He is a computer safety researcher.

And he has written one of the most compelling, comprehensive accounts of the ongoing hell in Chicago that you could possibly imagine.

In under 1600 words.

aphyr.com/posts/397-i-...

Declassified cable reinforces proliferation concerns about high-assay low-enriched uranium fuel The declassified document reveals an urgent need for an international review of the proliferation risks of HALEU.

🚨 JUST IN: A newly declassified cable reinforces proliferation concerns about high-assay low-enriched uranium fuel, and reveals an urgent need for an international review of #HALEU use, writes Ed Lyman (@nucsafetyucs.bsky.social).

#uranium #enrichment #proliferation #IAEA #safeguards #nukesky

From the askscience community on Reddit: AskScience AMA Series: A House of Dynamite, ask a nuclear weapons expert anything! Explore this post and more from the askscience community

My colleague @lauraegrego.bsky.social is doing a Reddit "Ask Me Anything (AMA) on #AHouseofDynamite. She is answering a house-full of compelling questions with aplomb. You can take a gander - and add your own questions - here:

And as Dr. Forté concludes: "These executive orders represent a continued attack on science by the Trump administration that has been well documented and opposed by UCS."

And as Dr. Beyea says, “The fact that there is uncertainty in risks at low doses is not a justification for claiming that the risk there is zero.”

But, as @nucsafetyucs.bsky.social says, "“There is no scientific basis for a change to the status quo, and President Trump’s attempt to force the NRC to abandon LNT is brazen political influence on science akin to the war on climate change mitigation, vaccines, and more.”

Will Politics Put More People’s Health at Risk from Radiation Exposure? The Trump administration's attack on the science underlying regulations that protect the public from the health risks of radiation exposure could affect many government rules.

My brilliant @ucs.org colleague Chanese Forté interviews two other brilliant folks, Dr. Jan Beyea, and @nucsafetyucs.bsky.social, on the Trump administration's moves to undermine sensible, science-based limits on radiation exposure. Team Trump seems to wants to promote nuclear power at any cost.

The end of the Oil Age won’t come from scarcity — it’ll come from irrelevance. Solar, wind, and batteries aren’t waiting for permission; they’re simply better.
When the new paradigm outperforms the old on cost, speed, and resilience, history doesn’t argue — it moves on. #EnergyTransition #BESS #EV

Tell Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins to Fund SNAP Now Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins has the power to stop needless suffering. She can use contingency funds to ensure no American experiences a lapse in benefits just trying to buy food for their fam...

1 in 8 Americans did not receive their monthly food benefits on Saturday, despite evidence and two judicial rulings affirming that the Trump administration can and should use the contingency funds for these benefits. Tell them to put politics aside and fund SNAP now. act.ucsusa.org/47y8Hta

Don't Get the Wrong Takeaway from 'A House of Dynamite' Director Kathryn Bigelow's new nuclear thriller 'A House of Dynamite' hinges on the failure of the US anti-missile system.

At a time when the Trump administration is marketing its so-called “Golden Dome,” a proposed “impenetrable” missile shield around the US, the energy created by A House of Dynamite could be directed to a plan that not only won’t work but will make the problem worse.

What Trump’s nuclear weapons tests could mean for America and the world Trump’s command risks a global arms race while the Doomsday clock ticks closer than ever to midnight, experts say

Excellent piece on Trump's call to resume nuclear testing in The Independent (and not just because is cites me & my @ucs.org colleague @dkspaulding.bsky.social).
BLUF for Trump, as duly noted by our @nuclearban.bsky.social colleague: Melissa Park: "This is no way to win the Nobel Peace Prize."