New-cue-lar; New-clee-ar

Father Tucker raises the "how is the word 'nuclear' pronounced?" issue. My two cents on this subject (not that anyone cares): why can't we just accept that "new-cue-lar" / "new-clee-ar" is just a difference of regional pronunciation, and move on? If tomato can be "toe-MAH-toe" or "toe-MAY-toe", and aunt can be "ant" or "ont"; if broach can be "brow-ch" or "brew-ch"; if jewelry can be "jule-ree" or "jew-ell-ree"; and on and on ad infinitum, why can nuclear be both "new-cue-lar" and "new-clee-ar"? It's clearly not an issue of clarity or confusion; when a Texan talks about "new-cue-lar wippens", you know he's referring to ICBMs, and the like. The insistence that "new-clee-ar" is the only acceptable pronunciation for the non-buffoon strikes me as nothing but snobbery, a desire to hold up Northern English as the one true English, with Southern pronunciations being some kind of degenerate dialect. T'aint so, suh, t'aint so.