I've got to give credit where credit's due.  CNN.com has front-paged a story about Erich Scherfen, a pilot who honorably served 13 years in the military protecting America, being placed on Homeland Security and the Transportation Security Administration's terrorist watchlist, potentially threatening his career as an airline pilot.  Why?  For the sole reason that he married a Muslim and converted to Islam himself.

While researching an unpublished diary I discovered a group of terrorists that are flying under homeland security's radar. Not only are they aliens to our country, but also to earth. Luckily for us ignorant citizens there is a worldwide shadow organization helping to hunt them down, and kill them.

There was a very important diary posted here last night through much of today on the death of Hiu Lui Ng.  It was by Gorette, and if you missed it: http://www.dailykos.com/...

You should also check out the original New York Times article on this incident, which is one of the most horrific stories of human cruelty I've heard in a long time: http://www.nytimes.com/...

Keith Olbermann addressed this awhile ago on his show, and his words--dripping with anger--summed up how I felt about this last night.  Here is my original comment in that diary: http://www.dailykos.com/...

As the recent recipient of a Implanted Cardiac Device, I knew that TSA had some things in store for me as I flew from Austin to Jacksonville for a family reunion. Upon reflection, I see how futile their search techniques are.

Homeland Security, arguably the most incompetent agency in the astonishingly incompetent Bush Administration, has announced that it wants to spend tens of million dollars fighting hurricanes. That's right, HS, loser by a knockout against Hurricane Katrina, has staggered to it's feet and declared that it wants a rematch, not just against another hurricane but against all hurricanes.

The project has been given an estimated price tag of around $64m (£32m) over six years. Scientists will first conduct tests using models and small scale experiments before the most promising idea is developed for large scale testing.

Among the plans is a scheme to seed hurricanes with microscopic particles of salt that have been released into a storm from an aircraft. Research has shown that such seeding can cause hurricanes to dump large quantities of rain over the sea before it reaches land. The rainfall also carries away the heat that powers the hurricane, weakening it.

I'll give you one guess what Congress did.

Aw! You cheated! How did you know they sent a Sternly Worded Letter^TM?

On the heels of faulting the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for misinterpreting a congressional mandate to scan 100 percent of passenger air cargo, House Homeland Security Chairman Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) has decried the department's resistance to scanning 100 percent of US-bound maritime cargo for terrorist threats as well.

Congress established both requirements in the Implementing Recommendations of the 9/11 Commission Act (PL 110-053), signed by President Bush on August 3, 2007. In a letter dated August 5, Thompson accused Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff of actively resisting compliance with the maritime cargo screening mandate in the past year.

Subscription only Congressional Quarterly has an excerpt of the latest SWL^TM:

"Your actions to hinder progress on this vital homeland security initiative are very troubling and may have put at risk our nation’s security," Thompson wrote Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff. "The unilateral decision to ignore the 100-percent scanning runs afoul of the act and puts our ports at risk. By what authority did you determine that you could ignore the congressionally mandated 100-percent cargo screening requirement in favor of a ‘high risk trade corridor?’"

Answer: None. But they're doing it anyway. What are you going to do about it? Cut Homeland Security funding? Write a new law demanding that they follow the old one, like the FISA bill?

Congress is an advisory board to these guys. They'll get their "muscle" back under an Obama administration, but not because it's really there. Rather, because he'll permit them to have it.

But let's remember during our next round of sighs and cries of "spineless Dems!" that Congressional complicity with this sort of lawlessness is chiefly facilitated by Republicans, who simply refuse to lift a finger to defend the power and prerogatives of the offices they hold. Any effort this Congress might make to rein this "administration" in is a non-starter precisely because Republicans would rather cash paychecks in a shadow Congress than actually stand up for the power they appear to fight so hard to retain every two years. For all the frustration we feel at subpoenas that go unenforced and SWLs^TM that evaporate into the ether, the fact is that Republicans didn't issue any when they were in charge, and will almost never join in issuing them now.

Once again, though, it has to be noted how the same principles are at work across the entire spectrum of "governance" under this "administration." It's not just another policy disagreement in some remote corner of government, even though that's how it'll be treated. And it's not even that it should be more important because it deals with "homeland security." It's a single, unified principle at work.

As sick to death as many of you were of FISA, it was never about a single surveillance law. It was about the fallout that comes from being too politically flexible about what "the law" is and what it means to live by it. Want privacy? Well, what if the "government" doesn't? Want homeland security? Well, what if the "government" doesn't? Want environmental stability? Well, what if the "government" doesn't?

Seriously. What if they just... don't?

Today, in this story, it's homeland security laws being flouted. Elsewhere, in other stories, it's the defiance of subpoenas by the Justice Department. The Defense Department. The Environmental Protection Agency. The Education Department. The General Services Administration. Or more recently, even the allegation that the White House ordered the forgery of a document designed to justify having dragged us into this never-ending war, and the laws such an operation would violate.

It's all the same issue. And truthfully, I haven't got a whole lot of hope that we're going to be able to "heal" our way out of it with "sensible compromise."

What's the "sensible compromise" between the rule of law and its defiance, anyway?

For those just tuning in here, I live in the state of Michigan.  As such, I am surrounded on two sides by Canada.  While I haven't gone recently (a few years) due to a lack of funds, earlier on this decade I would go to Canada when I had the chance - especially when I spent a couple of years in northern Michigan in the tiny city of Sault Sainte Marie, MI, which is a stone's throw from its twin city of the same name in Canada.  The border crossing process had usually been rather simple for me, with the most that I got asked is "Where'd you go? How long were you there?  Bringing back lots of money?  Alright have a good one."  I suppose it was a bit naive of me to think that things would go south in the couple of years since I've been to Canada, especially in lieu of revelations that Homeland Security can take your laptop at the border if they feel like it.

Like most things in life you stay naive of it, happily nested in a world of "it can't/won't happen to me" until - sure enough - it does.

It looks like Americans' 4th Amendment rights stop at the border. The Washington Post's Ellen Nakashima has a report today that a wide range of electronic devices may be seized by customs and immigration, searched, kept indefinitely, and shared with other government agencies.

Just 360 days ago, in the Emergency Operations Center in the basement of Minneapolis City Hall, I had the honor and pleasure as a member of the House Public Safety Policy Committee of personally thanking the Emergency Management directors responding to the 35W bridge collapse. They are heroes, whose preparation, training, and good judgment saved dozens of lives that night.

Unfortunately, I also heard bad news that day. A whistleblower told me that MnDOT did not have the appropriate person on the job. A few weeks later, we learned that Sonia Pitt, the director of Homeland Security and Emergency Management at MnDOT, had failed to return home after the bridge collapse - for TEN DAYS.

More after the fold...

crossposted from unbossed

The National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) website is an interesting one to check in on to see what is going on in government. NTEU represents about 150,000 federal employees working in 31 federal agencies and departments.  The NTEU has also been an aggressive opponent of privatization.

Here is a the NTEU take on the battle over privatizing Homeland Security's Human Resource work. The lucky Privateer is Lockheed-Martin.

Is Naomi Wolf's predicted "fascist shift" accelerating, using the anti-migrant controversy as another "facilitating issue"?

As The NYT reported Sunday, a simple traffic stop of Juana Villegas, an illegal immigrant from Mexico who was nine months pregnant, turned into another case of Homeland Security Hell, of criminalizing poverty or the "crime" of not having "proper paperwork", in this case by torture.

But this was first reported at Political Salsa on June 13th by Tim Chavez, who heard her and described the torture, reminding him of Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. It seems the war supposedly started to combat terrorism has now come home to torment anyone without the right paperwork: without papers, they're demons...
But is this even more sinister??

I'm sure all you liberal-lily-livered-bin-laden-sympathizing-constitution-as-suicide-pact-surrender-monkey-terrorist- appeasers who used to whine about "profiling" will now cry about Excessive Force!  Some people are just never satisfied.  Instead of complaining, you should be celebrating.  Now the TSA and airport police offer equal opportunity beatings. Yay!

Here's the tape...  Good thing these Uber-Patriots are Protecting The Homeland, right?

But wait, it gets better....

Because thats the plan apparently being considered by the Gestapo, oh, I mean Homeland Security.  An RFP has apparently been drawn up and issued to Lampered Less Lethal, a Canadian firm specializing apparently in non-lethal torture devices.Lampered Less Lethal.

Conventional wisdom dictates that cabinet positions are selected between the November election and inauguration, while VPs are selected before the convention.  But with Barack Obama's unique challenge to persuade voters that he has sufficient experience to be president on day one (thanks to Hillary) and concerns about his ability to protect America (also thanks to Hillary), perhaps this conventional wisdom should be challenged.

This diary examines this issue and attempts to construct a cabinet of individuals that would put these concerns about Obama to rest, while putting McCain on the defensive.

According to the Washington Times, a senior DHS official has expressed interest in a "safety braclet" that could:

• take the place of an airline boarding pass

• contain personal information about the traveler

• be able to monitor the whereabouts of each passenger and his/her luggage

• shock the wearer on command, completely immobilizing him/her for several minutes

Video is available hereat the bottom right.

More after the flip.

Every feel like livestock when you fly?  DHS is exploring a new technology (warning, Moonie Times link) which, if it makes to airlines, will guarantee I will never fly again:

A senior government official with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has expressed great interest in a so-called safety bracelet that would serve as a stun device, similar to that of a police Taser®. According to this promotional video found at the Lamperd Less Lethal website, the bracelet would be worn by all airline passengers.

Check out what this piece of terror would do...

In a measured if frustrated piece in the Washington Times here, former FBI director William Webster examines the utter mess the Bush administration has made of the US's intelligence services. How any Republican can hold his or head up after Webster's analysis is beyond me: this is a national security scandal...and a tailor-made opportunity for Obama to go right at McCain on Bush's abysmal record.

Spread the word. The intell establishment is ripe for change, too.

I'd have to say yes. And no.

When trust and faith have been so abused and no one feels safe or secure and our collective future is at stake, I'd have to say no, it's not the same as usual. When more people than ever in our nation's history are involved and engaged in an election and political conversation and debate, no it's not the same as usual. When just about every important issue that we as a nation, as a planet are facing and seriously looking for ways to change, no it's not the same as usual.

Yet, there are different view points, different ideas, different experiences, different priorities for all of us and we are engaged in standing up for what we believe is the most important issue and/or stance, then yes. It is the same. Pandering, flip-flopping, media bias, Republican vs. Democrat, Man vs. Woman, Black vs. White, Religion (whose is the right one?), YES, it is the same. Money, campaign finance, the haves, the have- nots, right wing, left wing, conservative, liberal, centrist. Yes, it is the same.

We had three to choose from now it is down to two. Follow me.