A Washington securicrat dismisses as “absurd” Osama bin Laden’s threat yesterday to execute any Americans in captivity if 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is put to death after trial, Reuters’ Rania Oteify and Cynthia Johnston relate. Al Qaeda isn’t known to be holding any Americans at the moment, though an allied Taliban faction captured an American private in eastern Afghanistan last June, The Associated Press’ Sarah El Deeb adds — while The Christian Science Monitor’s Dan Murphy wonders, perhaps redundantly: “Is Osama bin Laden out of touch?”
Feds: “Security threats against members of Congress is not a partisan issue, and they should not be treated that way,” The Washington Post’s Ben Pershing has House GOP Whip Eric Cantor avowing yesterday — and check Mike Madden’s Salon take.“Killing people without due process is . . . never acceptable if carried out in secret. Mr. Obama must explain and publicly justify targeted killings,” The Times of London’s Ben Macintyre maintains — as Agence France-Presse has a legal expert telling lawmakers drone strikes could put CIA officers in foreign courts facing war crimes prosecution. Opponents of Bush-era detainee practices hope reports of White House shifts on detention policies are “simply trial balloons the president himself will eventually pop,” the Los Angeles Times’ Julian E. Barnes and David S. Cloud survey.
Homies: “The names ‘Department of Homeland Security’ and ‘Department of Defense’ are redundant. Which one should we drop?” The Hartford Courant’s Robert M. Thorson leads, terming the “homeland security” locution “noxious.” President Obama’s pick to head the TSA has managed to keep his nomination on track for consideration after the spring recess, The Wall Street Journal’s Keith Johnson updates — as CNN’s Mark M. Ahlers hears Robert Harding hedging on screener unionization, while assuring that “any such plan should be done in a way that would not hurt national security,” and Government Executive’s Chris Strohm has the top Senate homeland overseer seeking “five IG reports into the nominee’s previous work.”
State and local: Competing E-Verify bills drew advocates for both sides to a heated Rhode Island House hearing, The Providence Journal reports. New York State homeland security boss Thomas Donlon is yet another Paterson administration deserter, The Albany Times Union tells. While American Jewish institutions must take terrorism “awareness, preparedness and resiliency efforts seriously . . . our response will be appropriate and measured, devoid of the fear that terrorism seeks to instill,” a Jewish Telegraph Agency op-ed inveighs. An Ohio man detained Tuesday allegedly pulled up to a Defense Supply Center Columbus gate announcing he had an explosive device in his vehicle, WBNS 10 News notes. The Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, a border watch group composed of private citizens, has decided to disband, The Arizona Daily Star relays.
Chasing the dime: The European Commission says it wants its own system to track terrorist finances, one that would require the United States to contribute info on its own citizens’ transactions, The New York Times tells. Concerns about Mexican drug mayhem have created a growing demand at the border for bulletproof vehicles, the CEO of International Armoring Corp. tells The El Paso Times. As in most countries — the United States included, if less so — private guards outnumber police 7 to 1 in Guatemala, most of them untrained, uneducated and inexperienced, GlobalPost spotlights. Seeking an in to the sweet homeland security market, LifeLock Inc. has added ex-DHS secretary Tom Ridge to its board of directors, Phoenix Business Journal relates — as The Washington Business Journal sees his successor, Mike Chertoff, joining the BAE Systems board.
Bugs ‘n bombs: Union County, N.J., self-storage managers are cooperating with public-safety officials on random searches for hazardous materials that could potentially be used in explosives, Suburban News notes. From its 1980s inception, the “right-to-carry” movement has increased licensed concealed-gun carriers from fewer than 1 million to a record 6 million today, MSNBC surveys. Two years ago Afghan insurgents obtained several U.S. military systems used to jam signals that detonate IEDs, possibly passing them along to Iran for reverse engineering, Nextgov notes. Nuclear terrorism remains an intelligence priority, but so far terrorist groups haven’t displayed an ability to launch a large-scale WMD attack, Xinhua hears a senior intel officer briefing.
Close air support: A Qantas pilot was allowed to keep flying for three years despite repeatedly complaining of urges to crash one of the jumbo jets, The Sydney Morning Herald reports. Heather Mills, Paul McCartney’s ex, was livid when Heathrow screeners ordered her artificial leg removed and swabbed for explosives, The Daily Mirror mentions — while MusicRooms sees former Pussycat Dolls singer Kimberly Wyatt tweeting that she was “attacked by 10 security workers” at Heathrow because of a “Bullets 4 Peace” pendant. Some 18,000 people on TSA’s “selectee list” are subjected to third and fourth once-overs of passports and other extras, but those “who appeal never get confirmation they were on a list, much less learn why,” The Mansfield (Ohio) News Journal notes.
Coming and going: A mentally ill man on the London Tube in a judge’s wig with wires strapped to his wrists prompted the first activation of Operation Andromeda, Scotland Yard’s new response to “spontaneous sighting of a suspected suicide bomber,” The Daily Telegraph relates. There is less than meets the eye to a series of alarming reports regarding a U.S. intel warning of possible al Qaeda attacks on ships off the coast of Yemen, Newsweek notes. Heightened port security standards would put a dent in cargo theft, which the International Cargo Security Council estimates costs U.S. shippers $25 billion a year, a Security Park op-ed observes. In an escalation of the battle against Indian Ocean buccaneers, a Somali pirate was killed this week in a gunfight between a cargo ship and a pirate skiff, Danger Room relates.
Courts and rights: Federal prosecutors have added felony charges to a long list of misdemeanors filed against an ex-DHS officer who allegedly made unauthorized traffic stops about which he then falsified reports, The Rome (Ga.) News-Tribune tells. The daughter of one of four men convicted in the Holy Land Foundation terror financing case is attacking plans to transfer the convicts to a more secure prison, The Dallas Morning News notes. Word that a new chief judicial officer is being appointed to the Pentagon’s Office of Military Commissions suggests Gitmo tribunals will soon resume, Newsweek, again, notes — while The Washington Post spotlights two Gitmo detainees turned informer who are held in relative comfort but with little chance of release.
Over there: Kenyan terror police have arrested a watch-listed Somalia-born American, The Winona (Minn.) Daily News notes. A Canadian man facing 11 counts of attempted murder denied the charges, but admitted to sending tainted water and explosive devices to a variety of people, The National Post notes. Obeying a Taliban decree, three cell phone providers in a district near Kandahar turn off their antennas every nightfall, The Wall Street Journal relates. Security experts say recent police raids in Indonesia indicate a growing terrorism threat there, Voice of America spotlights.
Screening Room: Bush-era speech-writer Marc Thiessen cites the Joker from “Batman: The Dark Knight” (Warner Bros.) to rebut Obama on Guantanamo’s role as a recruitment tool for terrorists, Media Matters derides. In a Huffington Post homage to network residual checks, David Dean Bottrell fondly recalls appearing on CBS’ “Criminal Minds” as an emotionally unstable scientist who was trying to plant an anthrax bomb in a D.C. subway station. “Is it finally O.K. to have a few laughs at terrorism’s expense? Does this movie disempower terrorists by poking fun at them?” a poster on Elan: The Guide to Global Muslim Culture blogs in re: Chris Morris’s new comedy “Four Lions” (Warp Films). “Art in Action,” screening at Montreal’s Cinema Politica, is an “inspiring film about one ambitious couple and the growth of their art and humanitarian group: the Action Terroriste Socialement Acceptable,” The Concordian recounts.
Kulture Kanyon: A work by a Lebanese-Canadian playwright that imagines a dialogue between a terrorist bomber and one of his victims is among 10 plays on offer in this year’s Magnetic North Theatre Festival, CBC News notes. “Tourism / Terrorism,” a new release by The So So Glos “was a surprise to me,” an Altsounds.com critic leads. Sebastian Faulks’ “A Week in December” (Doubleday), a New York Times pan reads, features “a young Muslim plotting to attack a London hospital, and a hedge fund manager betting that England’s staunchest bank is about to fail. Guess which one is the villain?” Photographer Simon Roberts, recently tapped as Britain’s official Election Artist, worries he may become an innocent victim of U.K. anti-terrorism laws, Amateur Photographer spotlights. “Even terrorist organizations have started to get in on the criminal action,” a Forbes commentary on art theft takes note.
Natty Dread: “It turns out that one of America’s favorite places to drink rum, listen to reggae, and get mugged five blocks from their hotel has revealed itself as one of America’s strongest allies in the War On Terror,” The Spoof spoofs in re: Jamaica. “For decades, Americans have enjoyed the hospitality of this small, beautiful country, and welcomed the friendliness of the people to the point of teasing them for their stereotypical term, ‘Yea, Mon!’ on countless talk shows, sitcoms, and stand-up routines. No more, however, as American terrorism experts have finally realized the truth: Jamaicans have been trying to warn us of the dangers of another small country, Yemen, a country hanging off the ass-end of Saudi Arabia. The Jamaican people have long been telling any American who would listen that Yemen is a danger to them. To wit: American: ‘Excuse me, sir, but can you tell me if Iraq is going to attack us?’ Jamaican: ‘Yea, Mon!’ (In reality, his accent is distorting the name, ‘Yemen’.)”
No comments:
Post a Comment