Unsafe guess: "We will see additional attacks unfold in primarily New York City and Washington, D.C., in the next five- to six-month timeframe," spooks suppose . . . Cannon fodder: "We are the ones living in the bull's-eye, hoping against hope the next bomber is as dumb as the [last] one," NYC scribe scowls . . . Time's a-wastin': "We have to have a decade of really profound, deep, change . . . to defeat terrorism," 2012 wannabe Newt Gingrich claims. These and other stories lead today's homeland security coverage.
“There is a strong belief in the U.S counterterrorism community that we will see additional attacks unfold in primarily New York City and Washington, D.C., in the next five- to six-month timeframe,” a Stratfor Global Intelligence exec tells J.J. Green of D.C.’s WTOP Radio News. Almost six years after issuing their landmark report, the 9/11 Commission heads this week once again vented frustration that as progress still stalls on key recommendations, “the threat from al Qaeda remains serious,” CNN’s Mike M. Ahlers relates.
Quo vadis: Among other changes, the commishes urge President Obama to empower the Director of National Intelligence to force info-sharing in the intel community, Security Management’s Matthew Harwood adds. “It’s uncanny how similar the 9/11 panel’s findings are to Tuesday’s Senate Intelligence Committee verdict on the so-called underwear bomber,” The Washington Post’s Jeff Stein blogs. “We are living in the bull’s-eye, hoping against hope the next bomber is . . . as dumb as the [last] one,” New York Daily News columnist Michael Daly sums up. “We have to have a decade of really profound, deep, change . . . to defeat terrorism,” putative 2012 GOP challenger Newt Gingrich proclaims to Politico’s Mike Allen.
Feds: Speakingof the DNI, Obama may name a replacement for Dennis Blair as early as today, ABC News’ Jake Tapper tells. Hammered for months by Republicans as soft on terrorism, team Obama is “suddenly playing offense” by proposing to allow delays in Mirandizing terror suspects, The Associated Press’ Pete Yost surveys. DHS’s Janet Napolitano announced yesterday that Coast Guard commandant Thad Allen will run the Gulf ofMexico oil spill response even after his imminent retirement, a New Orleans Times-Picayune team relates. The Secret Service pulled over notorious gatecrashers Michaele and Tareq Salahi on Wednesday when their limo turned into an off-limits driveway near the White House, CBS News’ Peter Maer reports.
State and local: Mayors from Ohio, Minnesota and New Jersey met with White House officials to discuss government help to cities confronting domestic radicalization, The St. Paul Pioneer Press relays. “Preparing for damaging nor’easters, communicable disease outbreaks or terrorism can be daunting,” but an Atlantic County government website “is ready to tackle the task,” Shore News Today spotlights. A $18 million interoperable radio comm system for Tennessee Homeland Security District 3 is now in the hands of emergency managers, The Cleveland Daily Banner informs. “San Diego tourism officials have backed off plans to launch a marketing campaign in Arizona to clear up what they see as confusion over the city’s stance on the state’s new immigration law,” The Arizona Republic leads.
Chasing the dime: A think-tank report suggests the “virtual fence” failed because CBP rushed into it without a well-thought-out plan or sufficiently supervising prime contractor Boeing, Security Director News notes. A remote-wipe feature on Blackberry and iPhone smart phones protects privacy but “also allow the accomplices of criminals and terrorists captured by law enforcement remotely to erase all incriminating and intelligence-relevant data,” ZDNet alerts. Authorities are probing four suspicious packages, found not to contain threatening materials, sent to Toyota’s U.S. facilities in the past week, Reuters reports. Officials in Pakistan’s Punjab province “have received death threats from terrorists, as targeted killings, kidnappings and extortion are being termed the ‘new ways’ to garner funds,” The International News notes.
Bugs ‘n bombs: Independence Mall was evacuated for more than three hours yesterday after a deflated balloon filled with white powder was found near the Liberty Bell, The Philadelphia Inquirer informs. A three-day terror exercise in L.A. earlier this week had state, local and national agencies coping with an improvised nuclear bomb planted at the Los Angeles Coliseum, United Press International informs. Canadian customs has charged a California man with trying to smuggle in more than 100 weapons, “including a selection of vicious, cruel and unorthodox arms that would make Batman blush,” The Ottawa Citizen says. A package of live buzzing flies delivered to the New Zealand agriculture minister’s office caused cabinet ministers to be evacuated from their offices, Deutsche Presse Agentur records.
Close air support: Though TSA is spending millions annually on behavioral detection officers trained to spot terrorists on the concourse, “the program doesn’t seem to be working,” CBS News investigates — while AOL News has a GAO report that trashes the Screening Passengers by Observation Techniques program sparking calls for TSA’s reorganization. A U.S. attorney has charged a Puerto Rico man with trying to take a stun gun, four box cutters, pepper spray and a switch blade onto a flight, Reuters reports — while The Atlanta Journal-Constitution sees smoke locking down the tunnel at that city’s airport linking checkpoints to boarding gates. TSA will relocate its full-body scanners to primary positions at Tampa airport’s airsides in June, meaning more passengers will be funneled through them on a “largely random” basis, the Tribune tells.
Coming and going: “The failed Times Square bombing exposed the unsolved threat hidden among the massive flow of Americans going abroad: Homegrown jihadists who travel undetected to terrorist havens,” AP leads. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey is “finally getting” $41 million promised to it by DHS, NY1 notes — as The Woodland Daily Democrat sees Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger leading California’s largest-ever port security full-scale exercise this week. “If terrorists are already here, where are they? Is Al Shabaab trying to hide in the legitimate Somali community?” San Antonio’s KENS 5 News asks in re: an FBI APB on a possible wanted Somalian extremist.
Courts and rights: A Pakistani man arrested in Massachusetts last week had the Times Square bomb bid suspect’s phone number and first name in his cell phone and written on an envelope, The Boston Globe reports. Chief defendant Faisal Shahzad’s “extraordinary level of cooperation” is a boon to investigators, but legalists disagree whether this assistance will help him in court, The New York Times assesses — as Agence France-Presse finds prosecutors releasing a letter saying Shahzad waived his rights to an attorney every day. A federal judge yesterday declined to dismiss charges against four men accused of plotting to bomb synagogues in the Bronx, NY1 News notes.
Over there: U.S. officials have known about young Muslim cleric Anwar al- Awlaki at least since 9/11, but his “profile has come front and center” having been linked to three terror cases in the past year, The Christian Science Monitor profiles. The anarchist firebombing of an Ottawa bank has prompted official vows to bolster security at the upcoming Toronto G20 summit, the Star says. Dutch security officials, meantime, are taking seriously a suspect arrested in Iraq who claims info on terrorist plans to attack Dutch or Danish fans at the World Cup in South Africa, AP reports.
Screening checkpoint: “It isn’t every day that an audience’s sympathy switches away from the hero to the guy [conspiring] to detonate a dirty bomb in New York City,” a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette columnist cracks in re: the Jack Bauer torture fest in the concluding episodes of FOX’s “24.” A “scary, gripping, responsibility-inducing, at times borderline exploitative” doomsday doc about nuclear dangers, “ Countdown to Zero” (Magnolia Pictures) “is that rare thing, a piece of responsible fearmongering,” Entertainment Weekly advises. At the Cannes film festival, too, the Los Angeles Times is wowed by “Carlos” (IFC Films), Olivier Assayas’ “globetrotting and epic” five-plus-hour docudrama about Seventies ur-terrorist Carlos the Jackal. Sri Lankan rapper and terror war denouncer M.I.A. is “raising eyebrows” with “Born Free,” an ultra-violent nine-minute music vid depicting American-esque troops “capturing and torturing redheaded men and boys in a presumed allegory,” RTT News leads.
Kulture Kanyon: Brit artist Fletcher Crossman “says there were times when he . . . wondered if he should keep going with the series,” The Charleston City Paper curtain-raises for “State of Shock,” an exhibit of paintings depicting the assassination of President Obama. In his new show, “How to Paint Moo-Ham-Mud” opening Monday at Pratt Institute, artist Joshua Stulman “critically examines the use of Islam to justify terrorist actions,” The Brooklyn Paper previews — and read an encomium to “Everybody Draw Mohammed Day” in The National Review. “I’ve already gotten some crazy Tea-Bagger-type rants,” David Goodwillie tells The Villager of Netizen response to his domestic terror novel, “American Subversive” (Scribner). More than 5,000 London financial district security guards have been instructed by police to report people taking photographs, recording footage or even making sketches, The Guardian learns. “He is a long-haired rocker who plays a mean riff . . . and now he has been unveiled as the government’s latest weapon in the fight against al Qaeda,” the Times of London leads in a profile of Muslim music maker Salman Ahmad.
Shocking the conscience: MI5, Britain’s domestic security agency, “has come under scrutiny as it has emerged the secret service have been using the threat of making people complete DIY tasks as part of their interrogation process,” The Spoof spoofs. “The story came to light due to the claim of a yet undisclosed source recently released from Guantanamo Bay. ‘I got out of one torture center and straight into another when I got back to the U.K. Out there I was strung up for 23 hours a day and the other hour, just as light relief, I was beaten for fun with a big stick,’ he says. But when he got back to the U.K., it got much worse. Desperate to nail some bad guy terrorists, MI5 are claimed to have gone too far in the fight against terror. ‘At first it was gentle provocation. They put me in a darkened room and I’d get the smell of emulsion straight away. Then I’d hear someone scraping some paint off some wood then sanding it down — it was horrific,’ the source recalls . . . The head of MI5, known as ‘K,’ has denied any abuse. Speaking outside his newly refurbished London home, he said, ‘There’s no truth to these allegations. Now piss off.’”
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