CQ Behind the Lines

From CQ Homeland Security

Behind the Lines for Tuesday, June 7, 2011 — 3 P.M. By David C. Morrison, Special to Congressional Quarterly Overkilling the messenger: Don't prosecute NSA whistleblower who said 9/11 plot could have been detected in advance, editorialists urge . . . A new broom sweeps clean: "How in the world was the Obama administration able to round up and deport nearly 1 million people over the last 2-1/2 years?" . . . Still world's longest unguarded border: Missing Manitoba girl shelters in parked freight train, awakes in Minnesota, having slept past border security. These and other stories lead today's homeland security coverage. --------------------------------- Having failed to use an intel-gathering system that might have detected the 9/11 plot in advance, the National Security Agency now "wants to jail a whistleblower who talked about this lapse," a Charleston (W.V.) Gazette editorial chides — while a Washington Post leader, similarly, charges that Thomas Drake's prosecution for Espionage Act violations "smacks of overkill and could scare others with legitimate concerns about government programs from coming forward." Feds: The Obama administration is torn over the drone program fatally targeting militants in Pakistan, with the U.S. ambassador and some top military leaders pushing to rein in the CIA's aggressive pace of strikes, a Wall Street Journal team spotlights — as Voice of America sees three U.S. drone strikes yesterday killing "at least 18 militants," and The Long War Journal's Bill Roggio questions apparent confirmation that al Qaeda big Ilyas Kashmiri was killed in a Friday strike. Testimony in the federal trial of a Chicago businessman accused in the 2008 Mumbai attacks wrapped up yesterday as defense attorneys called only two witnesses before resting, the Sun-Times' Rummana Hussain recounts. Homies: "How in the world was the Obama administration able to round up and deport nearly 1 million people over the last 2-1/2 years?" Ruben Navarrette Jr. asks in a Rockford (Ill.) Register commentary on Secure Communities. In the year since an illegal immigrant was Tasered and later died in CBP custody, four other shootings and a stun-gun incident have raised immigrant advocates' concern, The San Diego Union-Tribune's Elizabeth Aguilera relates. A lawsuit against DHS by a CBP agent over an allegedly unconstitutional ICE search of his home has been dismissed, The Yuma Sun's James Gilbert reports. Next year's Science & Technology budget would be "drastically downsized" under a House-passed DHS spending bill, ScienceInsider's Yudhijit Bhattacharjee reports. Bid-ness: "Whether it's the threat of a bomber or a gunman, strong training across all levels goes a long way toward maintaining high levels of safety at stores and malls," STORES Media spotlights in a post-bin Laden retrospective. If al Qaeda was plotting to kill Lockheed Martin's CEO in retaliation for drone attacks in Pakistan, as recently attested in a Chicago courtroom, General Atomics Aeronautical, which builds those UAVs, would have been the more logical target, Danger Room rebukes. Sales for Utah's International Armoring, which bullet-proofs vehicles, are up 300 percent over the past 24 months in El Paso, where armored limo rides across the bloody border have become a booming business, Houston's KHOU 11 News spotlights — and see, again, Danger Room on Texas Armoring's similarly bright future. State and local: Massachusetts has opted out of ICE's Secure Communities initiative, citing a "lack of clarity" and inconsistent implementation of the national fingerprint matching program, State House News Service says. A state DHS "Map Your Neighborhood" effort last weekend was designed to ensure preparedness against disasters, particularly tornadoes, The Oklahoman reports. As the 2011 hurricane season kicks off, Ouachita Parish has named a new homeland security director, The Monroe (La.) News Star says — while The Idaho Press Tribune judges that the Gem State "ranks very low when it comes to risk, but it's not immune to devastation." Middlesex County (N.J.) health officials have unfurled a 3,000-square-foot DHS-funded GateKeeper mobile structure "used to treat victims of radiological or terrorist attacks, pandemic illness or weather emergencies," The Somerville Courier News notes. Bugs 'n bombs: A woman known for distributing Korans outside a Minnesota public library is charged in the unprovoked stabbing of two patrons, CBS Minnesota says."There's a new breed of bomb sniffing dog and the NYPD is using them on the front lines to try to help track terrorists armed with hidden explosives," NBC New York spotlights. "Americans are owed a rigorous reassessment that distinguishes between emotional conjectures and verifiable facts surrounding the [2001] anthrax letters," David Willman maintains in a McClatchy Newspapers op-ed. British manufacturers and retailers have been warned of their vulnerability to "attacks by ideologically and politically motivated groups that may seek to cause widespread casualties and disruption by poisoning food supplies," The Daily Telegraph tells. Close air support: "Some people will do anything to avoid security lines at John Wayne Airport," The Los Alamitos Patch comments, in re: a driver arrested after plowing through a chain-link fence and into a small plane. A West Point cadet is suing singer Patti LaBelle over a clash with her security team at a Houston airport that left him with a head injury, United Press International informs. An E.U. plan to lift restrictions on boarding with liquids "is under threat after the U.S. government warned it will impose further security checks if there is a partial relaxation of the ban," The Guardian reports. "The recent arrest of two Vancouver International security screeners for conspiring to export drugs has once again raised the question: Who's screening the screeners at Canada's major airports?" Postmedia News ponders. On a rail: Rep. Tim Bishop, D-N.Y., decries the House's failure last week to support his amendment boosting rail and mass transit security funding by $75 million, The East Hampton Press reports. Officials won't say much about how a missing Manitoba girl who took shelter in a parked freight train awoke in Minnesota, having slipped (or slept) past border security, The Canadian Press reports. Doubts are already surfacing about the effectiveness of arming of portion of the police securing London's subways and trains to deter terrorist attacks, Top Secret Writer relates. The director of the recently bombed Minsk subway was fired after a YouTube vid surfaced of three young men entering the Maskowskaya station through unlocked doors at 3:45 a.m., Belarus News notes. Courts and rights: A California man accused of making terrorist threats against a Michigan mosque will argue that, as a Muslim convert, it makes little sense for him to attack a Muslim house of worship, CNN says. A St. Louis youth soccer coach was charged in federal court with impersonating a homeland security officer to avoid repaying a $100,000 loan from a girlfriend, the Post-Dispatch reports. Debate following the bin Laden raid "reveals just how wedded much of America's national-security establishment is to the theory and practice of torture . . . What has happened to us?" an American Conservative contributor questions. Ways and means: The Bush-era war on terrorism "brought with it . . . an unprecedented expansion of extra-constitutional state power," Jack Hunter essays in, again, The American Conservative, condemning the extension of three Patriot Act provisions. "I have no objection to capturing terrorists and using state-of-the-art interrogation techniques on them. But not without the right to be seen by an attorney, and to face criminal charges within a reasonable amount of time," Yori Yanover essays for Grand Street News. "While clandestine warfare is not new, the boldness of the bin Laden hit is. It is as if counterterrorism reconfigured that classic line from 'Treasure of the Sierra Madre': 'We don't need no stinkin' badges, we got drones and SEALs,'" Conn M. Hallinan comments in Harper's Magazine. Killing most-wanted terrorists and "chasing militants from one Afghanistan-Pakistan border region to the next come with high costs and are not yet putting militant outfits out of business," The Christian Science Monitor's Ben Arnoldy assesses after a drone strike on "the new bin Laden." Talking terror: In a USA Today/Gallup poll, 54 percent of Americans "felt that bin Laden's death would make us safer from terrorism [but] wishful thinking doesn't make the post-bin Laden world any less dangerous," The American's Katherine Faley stresses. Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, insists that a Yemen-based American-born imam is maneuvering to succeed bin Laden as the mastermind of follow-on attacks against the United States, The Houston Chronicle's Stewart Powell reports. The Pakistani Taliban's claim of a cross-border attack on a security checkpost appears to signal the adoption of a new strategy of mounting large-scale attacks, the Post's Ali Shah analyzes. Terrorists will increasingly act like modern day multi-national firms outsourcing mass atrocity attacks, The Belfast Telegraph hears a U.S. expert warning. Over there: Five U.K. terror convicts "are set for early release from prison — and the probation service fears that they will be unable to keep tabs on them," The Sunday Mercury mentions — as The London Evening Standard sees four New Scotland Yard officers cleared of beating up an unarmed al Qaeda suspect. As reprisal killings mount, "there is little sympathy for families associated with the foreign and homegrown Qaeda fighters who slaughtered tens of thousands of Iraqis," The New York Times spotlights. Police in Spain's Canary Islands last week arrested a Moroccan suspected of "recruiting children for terrorist purposes," Agence France-Presse reports. One second to midnight: "Despite being constantly tempted by the seductive power of having an apocalyptic arsenal at his fingertips, President Obama somehow made it through another day without unlocking the box on his desk that houses 'the button' and launching all 5,113 U.S. nuclear warheads," The Onion reports. "Though the president confirmed his schedule was packed with security briefings, public appearances, and Cabinet meetings, he said he couldn't help but steal a few glances at the bright red button, which is 'right there, staring at [him], all the time.' Today marks the 841st-straight day Obama has withstood the button's powerful allure. 'I think I was closer to pressing the button today than I have ever been,' Obama said during a press conference, adding that he would be lying if he said he wasn't thinking about the button right at that very moment. 'Let me be clear: I do not want to start a thermonuclear war. But knowing that I could at any moment, and that it would be so easy, well, it almost feels like I'm being tested or something.'" Source: CQ Homeland Security --------------------------------- Other CQ Roll Call Products CQ Floor Video CQ.com CQ Weekly CQ Today CQ Amendment Text CQ BillTrack CQ Budget Tracker CQ Energy & Climate CQ HealthBeat CQ Homeland Security CQ Hot Docs CQ House Action Reports CQ LawTrack CQ MoneyLine CQ StateTrack CQ Politics Roll Call See all CQ Roll Call products Rob Margetta, CQ Homeland Security Editor Arwen Bicknell, Behind the Lines Editor Published by CQ Roll Call To sign up for CQ Roll Call's free newsletters, click here. Source: CQ Homeland Security Copyright © 2011 CQ Roll Call. All rights reserved.