To the Point
Cash for Clunkers: Does Haste Make Waste?
Cash for Clunkers has run through almost a billion federal dollars in just ten days. With the Senate poised to come up with another two billion, are taxpayers funding a consumer frenzy that would have happened anyway? Also, Bill Clinton Meets Kim Jong Il in North Korea, and there's more trouble for the Large Hadron Collider, the world’s most expensive and most ambitious machine for studying Physics
By Warren Olney • • 50m ListenCash for Clunkers has run through almost a billion federal dollars in just ten days. With the Senate poised to come up with another two billion, are taxpayers funding a consumer frenzy that would have happened anyway? Also, Bill Clinton Meets Kim Jong Il in North Korea, and after 15 years the world's most expensive machine for studying physics still can't be turned on. What's wrong with Switzerland's Large Hadron Collider and what does it mean for learning about the origin of the Universe?
Banner image: Customers negotiate a deal at a Ford dealership August 3, 2009 in Countryside, Illinois. Photo: Scott Olson/Getty Images
In this episode
3 storiesBill Clinton Meets Kim Jong Il in North Korea
The White House says Bill Clinton's visit to North Korea is "solely private," and that any official comment might "jeopardize" his mission. He's there to secure the release of two American journalists recently sentenced to 12 years at hard labor.
Read the story8 minCash for Clunkers: Does Haste Make Waste?
Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood says it "has worked better than any other stimulus program that was conceived." Starting slowly on July 1, " Cash for Clunkers " then exploded through almost $1 billion in the ten days.
Read the story34 minSetbacks at Massive Particle Accelerator
The Large Hadron Collider is a 17-mile underground racetrack where atomic particles will be accelerated to energies of seven trillion electron volts and be smashed together. When it was unveiled in Switzerland last September, some critics worried it might generate so much energy that a black hole would swallow the planet.
Read the story9 min
