CQ Behind the Lines

From CQ Homeland Security

Behind the Lines for Tuesday, Sept. 20, 2011 — 3 P.M. By David C. Morrison, Special to Congressional Quarterly Dumb and dumber: The "two dumbest things" Congress asked him to do was build a 2,000-mile fence and inspect all incoming containers, ex-CBP commish carps . . . Call of duty: Airport screeners deserve a "Pompous Idiot Handling Allowance," columnist contends . . . Homeland security out, Social Security in: "After defining much of the decade since the Sept. 11 attacks, terrorism is no longer a central part of our politics," Time Magazine maintains. These and other stories lead today's homeland security coverage. --------------------------------- Jose Padilla, whom prosecutors called a "star recruit" for al Qaeda, should have received a longer sentence than the 17-year-plus term he's serving, Bloomberg's Laurence Viele Davidson quotes an appeals court ruling Monday ordering the case back for resentencing. "During 2009 and 2010, the Justice Department charged more defendants with serious terror-related offenses than in any two-year period in history," U.S. Attorney Laura E. Duffy details in a San Diego Union-Tribune op-ed. Feds: "Elaborate, expensive sting operations by the FBI are based on the premise that true terrorists will take the bait. This is not the same thing as preventing an actual attack," Petra Bartosiewicz presses, relatedly, in a Los Angeles Times op-ed. "The odds are that there is no longer a single nation in the arc of instability in which the United States is in no way militarily involved," Nick Turse wagers in a CBS News op-ed. A new GAO report reveals a rift between the military and DHS officials over border security and the National Guard's role, The Arizona Republic's Daniel Gonzalez and Dan Nowicki relate. Homies: "We have identified over $1 billion in savings. DHS is the third-largest department [but] everybody will have to take some cuts," DHS's Janet Napolitano tells The Wisconsin State Journal's Clay Barbour. An estimated 4,000 cases confront USCIS where past "terrorism-related" affiliations bar applicants previously granted political asylum or refugee status from permanent residency, The New York Times' Dan Frosch reports. The "two dumbest things" Congress asked him to do was build a 2,000-mile fence in the Southwest and to scan every incoming container, National Defense Magazine's Stew Magnuson quotes ex-CBP commish W. Ralph Basham. State and local: Anti-terror tactics adopted by the NYPD, "the country's most effective counterterrorism force, should spread to every other Western law enforcement agency," a New Algemeiner op-ed insists. After local police rounded up illegal immigrants, the Hispanic community grew "reluctant to report crimes or act as witnesses," The Beloit (Wis.) Daily News notes. For the past five years, the new police chief of Medina, Wash., commanded the State Patrol's Homeland Security Division, The Bellevue Reporter reports. Insisting on chairing the Homeland Security Commission in Nevada, Brian Sandoval clearly "is not a governor who is stepping back to rely on staff or his cabinet to run the state," The Nevada News Bureau profiles. Substance abuse: Among the agents used in recent U.S. "chemical suicides" are ammonium hydroxide, calcium hypochlorite, germanium oxide, hydrochloric acid, potassium ferrocyanide, sodium hypochlorite, sulfuric acid and trichloroethylene, The Morbidity and Mortality Weekly report relays. A bioterror attack is now more likely than a chemical strike because it is "easiest" and the attacker "doesn't need a cataclysmic effect," The Easton (Md.) Star Democrat quotes a CIA vet. Among other things that changed forever in 2001 was the role of the CDC disease detectives in the Epidemic Intelligence Service, Wired Magazine spotlights. "The American people need to know if the government response to another bioterrorism attack will be better organized, better equipped and more effective than [the anthrax mailings]," Rep. Rush D. Holt, D-N.J., relatedly, adjures in an Asbury Park Press op-ed. Bid-ness: "A strong economy is the best weapon against terrorism," a Richmond Times-Dispatch op-ed argues. "It's hard to imagine that the economic meltdown would have been so bad had we not gone into Iraq or Afghanistan," an American Prospect contributor contends. DHS's Domestic Nuclear Detection Office "is adding a device manufactured by a Danbury company to its arsenal to safeguard Americans from terrorist attacks," The Connecticut Post leads. A group of Louisiana businesses are suing Labor and DHS over proposed revisions to a federal program regarding immigrant workers, The Louisiana Record records. Financial services is "where the money is," so cybercriminals increasingly target this sector, eWeek quotes a DHS official — while infoZine hears a Secret Service official warning that cyberattacks increasingly are directed at small and medium-sized bizzes. Close air support: A threatening note found on an Alaska Airlines jet from Seattle caused police to surround the flight upon landing and rescreen passengers Monday morning, KOMO 4 News notes. "One of only a few in the nation that is jointly used by military aviation and civilian aviation," Arizona's Yuma International poses serious security problems, the Sun spotlights. A Japan-bound passenger is behind bars after LAX screeners found nearly 5 pounds of methamphetamine concealed inside TGI Fridays Potato Skins snack bags in his backpack, the L.A. Times relates. "Police are hunting a mystery man who wore a fake pilot's uniform to try to fool staff at Auckland Airport into letting him into restricted areas," The New Zealand Herald leads. Airport screeners deserve a "Pompous Idiot Handling Allowance," a Daily News & Analysis item insists. Paved roads to hell: "Golden Gate Bridge operators and law enforcement continue to enforce heightened security measures that have been put in place since the terrorist attacks," Marinscope mentions. Heightened security on the country's military bases after 9/11 "literally sent Huntsville's proposed southern bypass that was to cross Redstone Arsenal back to the drawing board," The Huntsville (Ala.) Times recollects. "For years, a trucking security program called First Observer has warned of the potential danger of a car or truck bomb," Land Line Magazine spotlights. Over the next 18 months, the Canada Border Services Agency will screen and process commercial goods trucked into Canada through a new system," B.C. Local News notes. Talking terror: The number of extremist militias in the United States has surged in the last few years, jumping from 43 groups in 2007 to more than 300 in 2010, Kristin Volk and Danielle Cohen survey for Cleveland's WEWS 5 News. "Happily, al Qaeda itself is on a downward trajectory—but terrorism as such is not going away [because it] is a tactic, not a movement, Philip Jenkins finds in The American Conservative. "There's good reason to believe the al Qaeda threat was never as 'existential' as it was cracked up to be," Gene Healy argues in Reason. "Were al Qaeda's leaders as smart about grand strategy as they were about the tactics of the most notorious suicide attack in history?" Jeffrey Laurenti asks in The Times of Trenton, answering: Not really. "The U.S. government's definition of terrorism almost guarantees that the so-called war on terrorism will be a failure — and will last forever," James Bovard blasts in Iran's PressTV. Yet more mind-numbing 9/11 natter: "The events of 9/11 were elaborately staged to instill fear into the American people to make them easier to manipulate for political purposes," Veterans Today editor James Fetzer jabs, similarly, for the Islamic Republic News Agency. "It's time for Americans to grow up and have a mature conversation about 9/11 and uncomfortable truths," In These Times' David Sirota insists. "A functioning democracy needs to take a more distanced approach," Harper's Magazine's Scott Horton concurs. "Aside from a happy interlude spanning the post-World War II era until 9/11, American life had traditionally been quite fear-driven, [and so 9/11] thus triggered a reversion to the historical mean," The Globalist's Stephan Richter asserts. "After defining much of the decade since the Sept. 11 attacks, terrorism is no longer a central part of our politics," Time Magazine's Michael Crowley comments. "Sept. 11 stands alone as an event, and we should resist the easy path to lump it together with the disasters of the past," Ted Widmer adjures in The New York Times. Courts and rights: Three North Carolina men facing multiple felony charges for allegedly plotting terror attacks went on trial at the federal courthouse in New Bern on Monday, Raleigh's ABC 11 News notes. A former Port Authority official hailed for helping two people escape the World Trade Center on Sept. 11 has been handed at least a year's sentence on bribery charges pertaining to post-attack graft, The Associated Press reports. The lawyer for a Illinois university student accused of threatening a Virginia Tech-style massacre on campus says a proposed state law to restrict bond for suspects in similar cases is unfair, St. Louis Today tells. Over there: A high-risk terrorist jailed for helping a July 7, 2005, bomb plotter has won an appeal to stay in Britain lest he be mistreated in his native Somalia, The Mirror mentions. U.K. counterterror cops arrested seven people in Birmingham, fearing they were in the "advanced stages" of planning a mass-casualty attack, The Guardian reports. An annual port security drill in Taipei won heightened attention after skyscrapers around Taiwan were threatened with chemical attacks, Taiwan Focus relates. India has "neutralized 51 terror modules" since the 2008 Mumbai attacks and Pakistan and Afghanistan are epicenters of terror, The Times of India quotes the home minister. Invader's remorse: "Following the latest surge of violence in Iraq, a Pew Research Center poll released Monday has found that a substantial majority of Americans now believe the continuing bloodshed in the country almost makes it seem as if the 2003 U.S. invasion might have actually been somewhat pointless," The Onion reports. "Approximately 83 percent of Americans surveyed said recent incidents such as a car bomb explosion that killed 40 in the city of Kut, the executions of seven worshippers outside a mosque in Youssifiyah, and a series of other attacks that have left scores of Iraqis dead and wounded were the kinds of events that, if they didn't know better, might make them think the lengthy occupation really wasn't worth it in the slightest. Forty-three percent of Americans said if someone wanted to, they could very nearly make the assessment . . . that perhaps the United States wasted valuable resources on an unwinnable, nearly impossible endeavor." See also, in The Onion: "Republicans Praise Nixon Administration For Allowing Qaddafi To Rule Libya So He Could One Day Be Overthrown." 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.