A debate goes nuclear

ON THE SEVENTH day, the Lord said, "Nuke 'em!"

In the Republican debate last night, Duncan Hunter, Rudy Giuliani, Jim Gilmore, and Mitt Romney all said that a nuclear strike against Iran is on the table. Romney, Gilmore, and John McCain talked about reviving nuclear power to deal with energy independence. McCain said, "Nuclear power is safe. Nuclear power is green, does not emit greenhouse gases."

There you have it from the Christian soldiers of the Republican Party, most of whom professed their faith, with McCain underscoring the piety by saying the United States is in a transcendent struggle of good and evil, with the evil of course being "radical Islam." Romney said, "We're going to have to have a strong military and an effort to combine with our allies in such a way, we combine for an effort to help move Islam toward modernity."

Never mind that our good Christian commander in chief bombed innocent Muslims back into a primitive civil war. These candidates still think they are the ones to move Islam toward modernity. No wonder some Muslims think we're on a crusade.

Never mind also that nuclear power remains a radioactive political issue, as waste issues are nowhere close to being solved. As states like Texas consider new reactors, anti-nuclear activist Tom "Smitty" Smith told the Dallas Morning News this week, "When you're looking at coal plants vs. nukes, it's sort of like quitting cigarettes and taking up crack."

Yet Republicans keep Americans addicted to the political crack of might equals right.

Giuliani said, "It's unthinkable that you would leave Saddam Hussein in charge of Iraq and be able to fight the war on terror," even though Saddam was not linked to 9/11 or Al Qaeda and did not have weapons of mass destruction. With nuclear statements like that, I doubt a lot of Muslims see these particular Christians as the ones to move them into modernity.

Derrick Z. Jackson's e-mail address is jackson@globe.com.