Our Awful Situation

Archive for the ‘Homeland Insecurity’ Category

Terrorist Watch List Hits One Million Names

Posted by Charlie Kilo on July 15th, 2008

Absolutely ridiculous!

The nation’s terrorist watch list has hit one million names, according to a tally maintained by the American Civil Liberties Union based upon the government’s own reported numbers for the size of the list.

“Members of Congress, nuns, war heroes and other ’suspicious characters,’ with names like Robert Johnson and Gary Smith, have become trapped in the Kafkaesque clutches of this list, with little hope of escape,” said Caroline Fredrickson, director of the ACLU Washington Legislative Office. “Congress needs to fix it, the Terrorist Screening Center needs to fix it, or the next president needs to fix it, but it has to be done soon.”

It is definitely fascism when it happens to you

Posted by Charlie Kilo on May 15th, 2008

This editor visited the USSR and draconian nations such as Paul Kagame’s Rwanda, Yoweri Museveni’s Uganda, Hun Sen’s Cambodia, the former military junta’s Thailand, surveillance society Singapore, and Muslim monarchy Brunei Darussalam. Nothing compares to what occurred at Washington National Airport. It is yet another sign of the fact that the United States has entered a phase of fascist control. There’s only one question that remains: Is the slide reversible?

In Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff’s world of an “Israelized” America, the terms SPOT (Screening Passengers by Observation Technique) and BDO (Behavior Detection Officer) are the new acronyms of Stasi-like control of the American citizenry by a government that treats anyone as a suspicious person in the same manner that Israel mistreats its own Arab citizens and Palestinians.

Sunday, this editor and his colleague faced the Chertoffian menace at Washington’s Reagan National Airport while heading to the gate to board a flight to Houston.

It is now clear from a review of the events that unfolded that I was pre-selected for an intensive search and battery of questions even before arriving in line for the security screening. A Transportation Security Administration (TSA) screener was overheard saying, “the guy with the beard.” Since I was the only person in line who also had a beard, it was evident that a red flag had earlier been raised.

What followed, was worse than anything I had previously encountered while leaving Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport, itself a revolting display of ingratitude to citizens of the country that bankrolls Israel, or the Israeli-run screening process at Amsterdam’s Schipol Airport.

First, I was instructed to enter a glass isolation chamber and point out my belongings that were exiting the X-ray machine. Anyone with claustrophobia would really enjoy being placed in such a chamber and have to speak to the screener through small holes in the glass.

I was then led to an area where all my carry-on bags were emptied. I was also forced to empty my pockets of everything. A bevy of screeners then proceeded to go through my wallet examining everything: cash, credit cards, VA medical benefits card, National Press Club card, voter’s registration card, and driver’s license. Then came an examination of my press credentials and related IDs: Investigative Reporters and Editors (IRE) card, Society of Professional Journalists card, National Archives research card, Library of Congress card, three press credentials, and membership card in Association for Intelligence Officers (AFIO).

In a blatant violation of the First and Fourth Amendments, my reporter’s notebooks, containing names of contacts in Houston and around the world were paged through by the screeners. Another screener asked if I minded being probed in “certain private areas.” He then asked if I’d like the examination to be conducted in private. I replied, “No, let everyone see this.” He then proceeded to examine my groin area.

Then came the battery of questions.

Feds to Collect Millions of DNA Profiles Yearly, Stay Out if You Can

Posted by Charlie Kilo on May 13th, 2008

Sorry, I know I’ve used this line before but its a “brave new world”, ur…maybe its 1984…or Minority Report…

The feds will soon be collecting about one million DNA samples a year under a new program that lets federal agents collect cheek swabs from citizens merely arrested for any federal crime or from any non-citizen detained by federal agents — including visitors to the country who have visas.

The intent is build a massive database of DNA samples (.pdf) that police can use to catch rapists and murderers, but even the innocent should fear being in the database, due to the vagaries of how cold case DNA searches can easily pinpoint an innocent person.

Thanks to an amendment in the Violence Against Women Act of 2005 that was sponsored by Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Arizona), the feds now have the authority to immediately take DNA from any arrestee or ‘detained’ non-citizen and immediately upload it to the FBI’s CODIS database.  That database is currently fed by federal law enforcement agencies and all 50 states, a few of which collect and upload DNA samples from people arrested, but not convicted of a crime. 

More

National DNA database gets kickstart from feds

Posted by Charlie Kilo on May 2nd, 2008

Its a brave new world:

With virtually no fanfare, President Bush signed into law a plan ordering the government to take no more than six months to set up a “national contingency plan” to screen newborns’ DNA in case of a “public health emergency.”

The new law requires that the results of the program – including “information … research, and data on newborn screening” – shall be assembled by a “central clearinghouse” and made available on the Internet.

According to congressional records, S.1858, sponsored by Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., was approved in the Senate Dec. 13, in the House April 8 and signed by Bush April 24.

“Soon, under this bill, the DNA of all citizens will be housed in government genomic biobanks and considered governmental property for government research,” said Twila Brase, president of the Citizens’ Council on Health Care. “The DNA taken at birth from every citizen is essentially owned by the government, and every citizen becomes a potential subject of government-sponsored genetic research.”

Using clergy during times of martial law

Posted by Charlie Kilo on April 19th, 2008

It shouldn’t surprise anyone that the government is enlisting the help of clergy members to help control the population in times of martial law. Watch this:

Administration Set to Use New Spy Program in U.S

Posted by Charlie Kilo on April 14th, 2008

Are you “warm on it”?

The Bush administration said yesterday that it plans to start using the nation’s most advanced spy technology for domestic purposes soon, rebuffing challenges by House Democrats over the idea’s legal authority.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said his department will activate his department’s new domestic satellite surveillance office in stages, starting as soon as possible with traditional scientific and homeland security activities — such as tracking hurricane damage, monitoring climate change and creating terrain maps.

Sophisticated overhead sensor data will be used for law enforcement once privacy and civil rights concerns are resolved, he said. The department has previously said the program will not intercept communications.

“There is no basis to suggest that this process is in any way insufficient to protect the privacy and civil liberties of Americans,” Chertoff wrote to Reps. Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss.) and Jane Harman (D-Calif.), chairmen of the House Homeland Security Committee and its intelligence subcommittee, respectively, in letters released yesterday.

“I think we’ve fully addressed anybody’s concerns,” Chertoff added in remarks last week to bloggers. “I think the way is now clear to stand it up and go warm on it.”

Report finds Boise most vulnerable in the West to attack

Posted by Charlie Kilo on April 5th, 2008

What happens when you place mathematical theory before common sense? Via MSNBC:

Quick: Name the Western U.S. city most vulnerable to a terrorist attack. Is it Los Angeles, with its crowded roads that make quick escape impossible? San Francisco and its iconic bridge? Or Seattle with its Space Needle and busy port?

Try Boise, Idaho, with its, um, potatoes.

A new study funded largely by the Department of Homeland Security ranked 132 American cities according to vulnerability to terrorist attacks. Boise was the only city in the western half of the country to make the top 10.

It came from four years of work and a series of mathematical formulas developed by Walter W. Piegorsch, a professor at the University of Arizona, with help from Susan Cutter at the University of South Carolina and Frank Hardisty at Pennsylvania State University. The study was published in December by Risk Analysis, a well-regarded journal.

The researchers assessed the vulnerability of each city to a terrorist attack based on three things: socioeconomics, infrastructure, and geophysical hazards such as the potential for flooding or fire.

The analysis measured not whether a city would make an attractive target to a terrorist but rather how well it could withstand an attack, Piegorsch said.

“This wasn’t a question of what places a terrorist wants,” Piegorsch said. “The targetability is not an issue here; it’s the vulnerability if they were targeted.”

The researchers color-coded that vulnerability, assigning green to areas with low vulnerability to a terrorist incident and resulting casualties, yellow to those with high vulnerability but low casualties, and red to those with high marks in both vulnerability and casualties.

Sounds like more wasteful spending on fancy color coding charts and worthless studies by the department of Homeland Insecurity.

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