CQ Behind the Lines

From CQ Homeland Security

Behind the Lines for Tuesday, Aug. 2, 2011 — 3 P.M. By David C. Morrison, Special to Congressional Quarterly Beaming it like Beckham: Brit soccer star sparks CIA security alert by posting snap of White House security staff on Twitter during guided tour . . . Arguably, a self-licking ice cream cone: Joe Biden charging his Secret Service detail $2,200 a month to rent cottage near his Delaware home . . . Cold case thaw: Feebs following up on "most promising lead to date" pertaining to pride-injuring 1971 D.B. Cooper skyjacking. These and other stories lead today's homeland security coverage. --------------------------------- Manchester United "football" star Rio Ferdinand sparked a CIA security alert when he posted a picture of White House security staff on Twitter during a guided tour, The London Daily Mail mentions. Veep Joe Biden is collecting $2,200 a month from his Secret Service protection detail for use of a rental cottage adjacent to the waterfront home he owns in Wilmington, Del., The Washington Times' Jim McElhatton disapprovingly details. Feds: The much-covered Aspen Security Forum came to a close Saturday "with the realization that even DHS will not be immune to cutbacks in light of the nation's current budget crisis," The Aspen Daily News' Dorothy M. Atkins leads. D.C.-area developers "received some unwelcome — though not altogether unexpected — news last week when the GSA canceled a search for more than 1 million square feet of office space for DHS agencies, The Washington Post's Jonathan O'Connell recounts. Nicholas Schmidle's "cinematic" New Yorker recreation of the Osama bin Laden takedown "provides previously undisclosed details about the raid," the Post's Jason Ukman also recommends. Cold Case File: Forty years after D.B. Cooper's "gutsy" extortion-skyjacking, The Daily Telegraph's Alex Hannaford hops the pond to ponder "America's only unsolved hijacking, one that the FBI still considers open and which it is, understandably, still very keen to solve" — while The Seattle Post-Intelligencer's Casey McNerthney finds the bureau following up on what it calls "our most promising" lead to date. "Lee Harvey Oswald, James Earl Ray, Sirhan Sirhan, Osama bin Laden — all of them are innocent of the great crimes they were accused of committing by the United States government," Saman Mohammadi insists in OpEdNews. Bid-ness: "The enduring lesson for a post-9/11 world: America's work force plays a crucial role in preventing potential terror attacks," The Associated Press spotlights. CBP has signed a $24.4 million contract with Kellogg Brown & Root to repair and maintain border barriers, roads, lighting and electrical systems along Arizona's southern border, the Daily Star sees Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' office announcing. Hundreds of thousands of skilled workers, despite adequate training and background, aren't eligible for jobs with federal agencies or contractors due to a security clearance backlog, The Newark Star-Ledger spotlights. "Movie stars visiting Ontario may now bring their own private security guards, after an amendment to the law that film industry experts say will help keep the Toronto film industry alive," Postmedia News notes. State and local: "The recent terrorist attack in Norway has communities around the world terrified. Could something like that happen here in Columbus [Ga.]?" WLTZ 38 News explores — while the Ledger Enquirer sees Columbus's federal courthouse relaxing security measures heightened in the wake of bin Laden's death. A "ring of steel" involving hooking up 3,000 closed-circuit cameras is coming into fruition in Gotham to fight terrorist and criminal activities, Deutsche Presse Agentur leads. Essex County, N.J. officials are taking flak over their handling of the bidding process for an ICE detention facility, a contract potentially worth tens of millions of dollars, The Newark Star-Ledger relates — while Laredo's KGNS 8 News sees CBP staging "the first ever Citizen's Academy" at World Trade Bridge. "Anniston police Chief Layton McGrady says his officers won't have any trouble enforcing Alabama's new immigration law but believes it will cause overcrowding in the city jail," the Star leads. Bugs 'n bombs: Since 9/11, "most sports-loving Americans have accepted — even welcomed — the security-for-easy access trade-off" involved in safeguarding stadiums and arenas, AP explores. A New Zealand hobby beekeeper questions if a tub of U.S. honey that slipped past authorities is one of many possibly dangerous breaks in border security, The Wellington Post reports. "DHS is active and vigorously engaged in protecting agriculture and our food supply," the department's director of Food, Agriculture and Veterinary Defense tells The Dairy Herd Network. Washington is contemplating talks with Saudi Arabia over a potential India-style civilian nuclear pact, but Israeli concerns and Iranian rivalry could complicate matters, The Christian Science Monitor mentions. U.S.-supplied radiation monitors are now scanning shipping containers at Spain's Port of Barcelona "for possible nuclear and radiological weapons substances," Global Security Newswire notes. Close air support: A Tennessee mother charged with disorderly conduct after berating TSA officers trying to pat down her teenage daughter is defending her conduct in print, The Westport News notes — as The Hill hears the woman arrested for "counter-groping" a Phoenix TSAer explaining that her abduction as a child and has made her loathe to be touched. "It's encouraging that TSA — despite occasional missteps like the recent invasive search of a dying 95-year-old woman — is thinking proactively about improving a system that frustrates many," The Chicago Tribune applauds. TSA will introduce new behavior detection techniques at checkpoints as early as next month, Politico quotes chief John Pistole. "The installation of aerobridges at modern airports is a routine affair, not normally associated with security threats. Except in India, that is," The Hindu leads. Borders and papers: "In an era when terrorism and illegal immigration have transformed driver's licenses into sophisticated mini-documents festooned with holograms and bar codes, beating the system has never been easier," The Washington Post spotlights. Farmers across the country are rallying to fight a Republican-sponsored bill that would force them and all other employers to verify the legal immigration status of their workers, The New York Times leads. Local Latinos say they are increasingly being profiled by Border Patrol agents, The Detroit Free Press reports. Tightened security along the border is pushing human smugglers to forsake the treacherous trek across mountains and deserts in favor of ferrying illegal immigrants by sea, Reuters reports. Oslo 7/22: The recent killings in Norway "highlight the rise of anti-Muslim, anti-immigration feelings in Europe and the United States that could impede tackling other forms of homegrown terrorism," Christopher Alessi leads in a CFR Analysis Brief. "If a network of people is discovered to be involved in the Norway massacre . . . it might just give a micron of appearance of credibility to un-credible people like Janet Napolitano, who claim America's biggest threat comes from white guys," The Dakota Voice's Gina Miller growls. "The [attacks] — and the presumptions about who was responsible — suggest that the true threat to European democracy is not Islam or Muslims but, once again, fascism and racists," Gary Younge argues in The Nation. Far from being an anti-Islamist, the Oslo killer "is a deluded man who imagined himself leading a takeover of Europe, even if he had to serve as a Muslim proxy to do it," Daniel Greenfield counters in FrontPage Magazine. Talking terror: "According to risk modeler RMS, the FBI believes that most U.S. domestic attacks are carried out by lone offenders to promote their own grievances and agendas," Insurance Networking News' Pat Speer notes. (Not so, Tony Elliott rebuts in UFO Digest: "With each terrorist attack recorded since the 1990's, a CIA link can be found.") By rounding up more than a dozen Earth Liberation Front activists in just hours, the FBI's Operation Backfire, still the largest domestic terror investigation in U.S. history, "all but killed ELF's desire to form large eco-terror cells," FOX News' Dan Springer is told. "Even in the best of cases — say, the successful demobilization of the IRA in 1998 — terrorist groups don't merely magically disarm and deradicalize overnight. And the Taliban is a particularly prickly nemesis," Teun van Dongen asserts in The National Interest, in re: Afghan negotiations. Courts and rights: Mexico has arrested an ex-police officer accused of masterminding the attack last year that killed a U.S. Consulate employee, her husband and one other in Ciudad Juarez, The Washington Times tells. The Somerville Courier News applauds New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie "for not being afraid to call out stupidity tinged with racism" in tapping a Muslim lawyer who'd defended post-9/11 detainees to sit on the Superior Court — and check AP's profile of Sohail Mohammed. A federal judge last week ruled that relatives of those killed by terror-designated Colombian paramilitaries may sue Chiquita over claims of torture, extrajudicial killings, war crimes and crimes against humanity, Courthouse News Service says. Over there: The mass killing in Norway could easily serve as a blueprint for other anti-Muslim militants elsewhere, South Africa's Mail & Guardian hears a top official in Germany's counterterror agency fretting. Contrary to Rep. Peter King's stated concerns about Somali American Al Shabaab recruits, "there are no Somalia returnees who have been charged with planning to attack America," Karen Greenberg counters in The Guardian. "The U.S. military is not allowed to actively target terrorist groups within the Philippines.We were there strictly as advisers," an ex-Green Beret reminds The Voice of America, in re: Washington's "quiet counterterrorism effort" there. Beijing blames Islamic radicals trained in Pakistan for attacks over the weekend in western China that left at least 19 dead, the Los Angeles Times tells. Time to get real: "Shortly after 3 p.m. yesterday, the Federal Aviation Administration ordered the immediate grounding of all commercial and private aircraft, a result of top officials' collective realization that humankind was never meant to fly," The Onion reports. "'It is wrong — nay, foolish — for lowly man to aspire to the realm of birds and dare to soar across the firmament in unholy flight,' said FAA administrator Randy Babbitt, announcing the indefinite cancellation of all 87,000 daily flights through U.S. airspace. 'Alas, man's destiny lies not amongst the clouds. So let us be guided by hubristic folly no longer and embrace our terrestrial provenance.' Addressing concerns from thousands of disaffected passengers, Babbitt also stated that man was not meant to be reunited with any luggage that had been bumped onto a later flight." See, also, in The Onion: "Democrats, Republicans Celebrate Pitiful Excuse For Common Ground." 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.