AN INSECURE NATION

Follow the Port Security Money

Published: February 28, 2005

efending the United States from terrorist attack requires an enormous budget, skillfully spent. So why is the federal government spending money to protect Martha's Vineyard while underfinancing New York and Los Angeles?

A new audit of spending on port security - often called the nation's "soft underbelly" - reveals a disturbing trifecta: far too little money appropriated; much of the appropriated money not spent; and much of the money that was spent going for the wrong things. This is all part of a larger problem of misplaced priorities in the homeland security budget.

If terrorists try to bring in a weapon of mass destruction, there is a good chance it will be by placing it in one of the six million shipping containers that arrive every year from overseas. The Coast Guard has estimated that the inspectors, scanning equipment and other measures needed to secure the ports would cost $5.4 billion over the next 10 years. But the federal port security grant program has allocated less than $600 million since 2002, far less than is needed, and only a small fraction of what is being spent on airport security.

Now, the Homeland Security Department's inspector general has found serious problems in how port security funds distributed between June 2002 and December 2003 were spent - or not spent. An audit said that just $107 million of the $515 million allocated - about 20 percent - had been spent by last September, an inexcusably slow pace. Many recipients failed to complete their projects within the one-year limit envisioned by the program.

The ports facing the greatest threat are ones like New York and Los Angeles, located in population-dense areas. But New York, which handles 12 percent of the nation's cargo traffic, received just 7 percent of the grants, and Los Angeles was similarly shortchanged. At the same time, security money was found for ports in St. Croix in the Virgin Islands and Martha's Vineyard, Mass.

Even the money that went to appropriate ports was, in many cases, misspent. The inspector general found that the government "funded several hundred projects despite dubious marks by its evaluators against key criteria." A grant of $180,000 for lighting went to a "small, remote facility that receives less than 20 ships per year," for improvements that an evaluation team found would have "minimal impact." One for $495,000 paid for security additions that field reviewers evaluated as "nice to haves rather than critical needs."

The audit also found that a disturbing amount of money went to private companies that operate ports, in some cases for projects that "appeared to be for a purpose other than security against an act of terrorism." It noted that there are insufficient safeguards in place to ensure that companies are not using grants to cover their normal cost of doing business. Nor does the government require these for-profit recipients to share the cost. Private companies must not be allowed to raid the port security fund to increase their bottom lines.

Port security is symptomatic of a larger problem. Security spending of all kinds is being distorted by bad choices and pork barrel politics. Wyoming received $38 per person last year, compared with New York's $5.50. The formula was improved late last year, but not enough. As Michael Chertoff, the new secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, takes up his new responsibilities, one of his highest priorities should be making sure scarce funds go where they are most needed.

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Homeland Securty = the new pork. reckless defense spending hasn't been curtailed either. the corrupt self serving professional campaigners up there in washington all want a piece of the money pie, that is why states that are not even afterthoughts for terror attacks are getting millions of dollars pumped into their economies for kneejerk 'security precautions'.

we as americans are all to blame for continually reelecting the same bunch of fiscal failures, because they supposedly represent the interests of their constituents, namely us. it's a systemic problem, where we once again are unable to balance tradition with need, thereby sticking with traditions and completely disregarding our needs. it doesn't matter red blue or purple, elected officials need to get off the spending like america needs to get off that crude. 52$/barrel and rising.

MAG: Avian Flu, On the Verge of an Epidemic
Sun Feb 20 2005 11:30:41 ET

The vicious avian flu that has killed dozens of people in Vietnam, Thailand, and elsewhere in the region "has caused the deaths of hundreds of millions of animals in nearly a dozen Asian countries" in the past two years and could kill millions of people if it becomes capable of spreading efficiently among humans, Michael Specter reports in "Nature's Bioterrorist" (p.50), in the February 28, 2005, issue of The New Yorker.

"No such virus has ever spread so quickly over such a wide geographical area," Specter notes, and, unlike most viruses, "this one has already affected a more diverse group than any other type of flu, and it has killed many animals previously thought to be resistant." One farmer whose chickens were killed by the virus says, "It's damn hard to watch. One day, they're all alive and healthy-the vets were here the week before to check them-and the next day they're dying by the thousand. It happened so quickly. They started shivering, thousands of them at once. And then they started to fall. Every one of them. They just fell over, dead." Scott Dowell, the director of the Centers for Disease Control's Thailand office, tells Specter, "The world just has no idea what it's going to see if this thing comes. When, really. It's when. I don't think we can afford the luxury of the word 'if' anymore.... The clock is ticking. We just don't know what time it is."

Robert Webster, a virologist at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, in Memphis, who has been studying avian influenza for decades, is even more stark. "This is the worst flu virus I have ever seen or worked with or read about," he says. "We have to prepare as if we were going to war-and the public needs to understand that clearly. This virus is playing its role as a natural bioterrorist. The politicians are going to say Chicken Little is at it again. And, if I'm wrong, then thank God. But if it does happen, and I fully expect that it will, there will be no place for any of us to hide. Not in the United States or in Europe or in a bunker somewhere. The virus is a very promiscuous and effective killer."

Not all politicians have ignored the threat; when Tommy Thompson, the Secretary of Health and Human Services, announced his resignation, last December, he cited an avian- influenza epidemic as one of the greatest dangers the United States faces. The World Health Organization's conservative estimate of the number of deaths that an epidemic would cause is seven million worldwide. Michael Osterholm, the director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, calculates that a pandemic on the scale of the devastating global influenza epidemic of 1918 would kill at least a hundred and eighty million people today. Specter reports on the efforts of health officials in the United States, Thailand, and other countries to contain the virus as best they can.

Thailand and Vietnam have ordered the slaughter of millions of chickens and the alteration of centuries-old farming methods, with mixed results. There is no vaccine, but, even if one could be produced to fight the constantly evolving strains of the virus, it would be impossible to meet the overwhelming demand. "Vigilance," Specter writes, "is one of the few weapons available." As one senior official at the Thai Ministry of Public Health says, "We are certainly better than we ever were at detecting viruses. But we are also much better at spreading them."

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is the avian flu a "natural bioterrorist" or long overdue population correction?

the way this release is composed makes you believe there is something that can be done to prevent an outbreak that could kill MILLIONS of people. i know. stop having so many people to get killed, then not as many will die and you won't feel so bad. someone has to say it.

and here we are getting all bent out of shape by some moron threatening to kill tens of thousands.

Al-Qaeda number two warns West it faces thousands of dead, economic collapse

Sun Feb 20, 2:53 PM ET

DUBAI (AFP) - Al-Qaeda number two Ayman al-Zawahiri warned the West it faced defeat in what he termed its "new crusade" against the Islamic world, as well as thousands of dead and economic collapse, in a videotape aired by Al-Jazeera television.

"Your new crusade will end, God willing, with the same defeat as its predecessors, but only after you have suffered tens of thousands of dead and the destruction of your economy," Zawahiri said in his message to "the peoples of the West" broadcast by the Qatar-based satellite channel.

In his message, which he said was to mark the third anniversary of the internment of Islamists at the US military base of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Zawahiri also hit out at US plans for reform in the Arab and Islamic worlds.

The US prison camp at Guantanamo "exposes the reality of the reform and democracy that the United States claims to be trying to establish in our countries", said the voice attributed to Zawahiri but whose authenticity could not immediately be verified.

He said that reform proposed by Washington would be based on the US prison camps in Cuba and in Afghanistan, as well as the Iraqi prison of Abu Ghraib, where US troops' abuse of Iraqi prisoners shocked the world.

It would also be based on "bombardments with fragmentation bombs and missiles, and on the installation of people like (Afghan President Hamid) Karzai and (outgoing Iraqi prime minister Iyad) Allawi," he added.

"If you, people of the West, think that these cardboard governments are going to keep you safe from our reaction, you are mistaken," said the Al-Qaeda number two, who appeared in good health and spoke with an automatic weapon at each side of him.

Zawahiri, hunted by the US and believed to be hiding on the Pakistani-Afghan border, warned the West: "Your real safety lies in treating the Muslim nation on the basis of respect and ceasing aggression (against it)."

The United States is currently holding hundreds of detainees from more than 20 countries in Guantanamo Bay. Most were captured in Afghanistan in autumn 2001, suspected of supporting the Taliban rulers of the country or Al-Qaeda.

It was the Islamic militant leader's second message in 10 days, an audiotape having been aired by the same Qatar-based channel on February 10. That voice recording hit out at the US concept of freedom, charging that it was a cloak for spreading corruption and injustice in the Islamic world.

In a videotape broadcast by Al-Jazeera on November 29, Zawahiri vowed Al-Qaeda would pursue its fight against the United States.

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congratulations, you're a dumbass!

a few minor problems with this story. besides being from the AFP and involving the wahabbi propaganda machine al jazeera, the timeliness of this tape is questionable.

i guess in whatever cave this dirtbag is holed up in, they forgot to tell him the following:

- there were elections in afghanistan.
- there were elections in iraq
- the killing of tens of thousands of the hundreds of millions of americans is already occurring without jihad influence. this current threat is called the automobile. and they aren't even packed with explosives, unless you count combustible fuel.

and where exactly is this muslim nation you speak of? and since when does some guy referencing stale news have any authority to speak on behalf of a billion people around the world? the most devout followers of this false prophet seem to be the media outlets.

Supreme Court Skeptical of Medical Marijuana at Raich-Monson Hearing - Decision Expected in Spring 2005

Washington DC, Nov 29. The Supreme Court reacted skeptically to claims by Prop. 215 patients Angel Raich and Diane Monson that federal laws against marijuana should not apply to their personal possession and cultivation of marijuana for medical purposese under California law.

The government asked the court to overturn a ruling by the Ninth Cicuit Court of Appeals, which held that personal medical use of marijuana by Prop. 215 patients did not fall under the federal powers to regulate interstate commerce.

Attorneys for Raich and Monson argued that their case was substantially different from that in the Supreme Court's 1942 Wickard v Filburn decision, in which it held that the government could prohibit Filburn from growing wheat for use on his own farm. Their argument, presented by libertarian constitutional law scholar Randy Barnett, was tailored to appeal to the court's conservative majority, whose recent rulings have tended to favor federalism and tighter limitations on federal powers under the commerce clause.

However, Justice Antonin Scalia, a leading conservative voice on the court, launched into Barnett's contention that Raich's and Monson's marijuana growing was different from Filburn's wheat.

"It looks like Wickard to me," said Scalia, "I used to laugh at Wickard, but that's what it says."

Barnett explained that Filburn's wheat was not just for personal consumption, but was used for a commercial livestock-feeding enterprise, unlike his clients' marijuana, which was for strictly non-economic, personal medical use.

"But Congress has done this in other areas, like with endangered species," Scalia observed, "You can't have eagle feathers, no matter where you got them, for example."

Taking issue with Barnett's claim that medical marijuana is "isolated" from the larger market, Justice Scalia exclaimed, "I understand some communes grow marijuana for medical usage!"

Two other conservative justices, Kennedy and Souter, joined in the attack, suggesting that patients' use of marijuana would affect the interstate market. "Can't we infer from the enormous commercial market that possession of the drug is proof of participation in the market?" Kennedy asked.

Citing with particular concern California NORML's estimate that as many as 100,000 patients are using medical marijuana in California, Justice Souter dismissed as "unsupportable" Barnett's assertion that the impact on interstate commerce would be "trivial."

(California NORML notes that the government has so far failed to provide an iota of evidence that any medical marijuana from California has leaked into interstate commerce, prices in which have held steady since passage of Prop 215. NORML also notes that federal arrests for personal use quantities are extremely rare and have no impact on the market, whereas arrests for distribution, which do impact the market, would not be affected by Raich .)

From the liberal side, Justice Stephen Breyer criticized Raich and Monson for not having applied to the FDA to get marijuana rescheduled. "How can we take for a fact that medical marijuana actually exists?," he asked, "Medicine by regulation is better than medicine by referendum,"

Breyer appeared oblivious of the government's 30-year history of blocking rescheduling petitions and medical marijuana research and development.

Ironically, on the same day Breyer was speaking, the U.S. Court of Appeals in the District of Columbia dealt another blow to medical marijuana research by rejecting a lawsuit by the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies to force the DEA and NIDA to respond to two research applications that had been delayed for a year and a half. The applications were for two 10-gram samples of marijuana for use in a vaporizer study co-sponsored by Cal NORML and MAPS. A few days later, after three and a half years of delay, the DEA denied an application by MAPS to establish a medical marijuana research facility at the University of Massachusetts, effectively shutting the door on the only possible path to development of medical marijuana for FDA approval.

Justice Breyer had no suggestion as to how Raich and Monson might relieve their distress while waiting for the FDA, an agency notorious for lengthy approval delays..

Justices O'Connor, Ginsburg, and possibly Stevens appeared sympathetic to Raich's claims. "As I understand it, if California's law applies, then none of this homegrown or medical-use marijuana will be on any interstate market, " said O'Connor, "And it is in the area of something traditionally regulated by states."

"There is, in this record, a showing that, for at least one of the two plaintiffs, there were some 30-odd drugs taken," Ginsburg noted, "None of them worked. This was the only one that would."

However, U.S. Solicitor General Paul Clement argued that the Institute of Medicine had determined that smoked marijuana has no future as medicine.

Clement warned that a finding for the patients would seriously undermine the Controlled Substances Act . "Any little island of lawful possession of non-contraband marijuana, for example, poses a real challenge to the statutory regime" he said.

From the tenor of the hearings, most observers predicted that at least six of the nine justices would side with the government. However, attorney Robert Raich, who is representing his wife, Angel, said a victory was still possible if Justices Scalia and Thomas proved true to their prior decisions.

Justice Thomas, who has been the most outspoken critic of expansive federal powers under the commerce clause, was silent at the hearings, as is his habit.

Chief Justice Rehnquist, the ninth and potentially deciding vote, was absent due to illness from thyroid cancer, but is expected to take part in the decision. Rehnquist is widely viewed as sympathetic to the government. In the event that he cannot take part in the decision, there could be a 4 - 4 tie. In that case, the Ninth Circuit's decision would remain valid within the circuit, but not nationally.

California NORML is advising medical marijuana supporters to brace for an adverse decision. While a ruling against Raich would not affect state law, it could well inspire another DEA crackdown against medical cannabis clubs. A similar crackdown followed the Court's decision against the Oakland Cannabis Buyers' Cooperative in 2001.

A loss for Raich would strip federal defendants of any opportunity to mention medical marijuana in their defense. This would adversely impact several Prop. 215 defendants with pending cases that involve personal use cultivation, including Steve McWilliams, Judy and Lynn Osburn, Keith Alden, Gary and Anna Barrett, and Bryan Epis, some of whom would face likely prison terms.

A defeat for Raich would also embolden local law enforcement agents hostile to Prop. 215 to call on the feds to harass patients and medical marijuana activists.

On the other hand, a victory for Raich would free patients from the threat of harassment for personal possession and cultivation of medical cannabis. Although it would not directly affect laws against distribution, a favorable decision would likely encourage public officials to support further reforms to legally regulate medical marijuana. "The Supreme Court has a choice," says Dale Gieringer, "Either recognize patients' right to medicine, or continue criminalizing, arresting and prosecuting the many Americans who find cannabis beneficial."

Whatever happens, medical marijuana advocates aren't backing down."Medical marijuana is here to stay," says Gieringer, "we aren't giving up until federal cannabis prohibition is repealed."

The court is expected to announce its decision in three or four months, or by June at the latest.

Marijuana is the Drug War keystone. Subtract 25 million current U.S. pot users from the battlefield and 40 Billion dollar war budgets are difficult to justify. Without Marijuana, insufficient people remain to arrest, evict, drug test, prosecute, jail and parole. Without Marijuana, police, judges, attorneys and jailers will pursue other criminals. Without Cannabis, asset forfeiture will yield fewer assets. Legalized Cannabis exposes a 68 year government propaganda campaign designed to fool the public, demonize Cannabis, and stigmatize the pot user. Legal Marijuana will provide substantial tax income while reducing payments to organized crime. Legalized Marijuana (hemp) will empower small farmers to profitably produce paper, fabrics, medicine, oil, fuel, and building materials as they reduce our consumption of oil, cotton, pesticides and trees. In short, removing an ill conceived law, involving a victimless act, will provide enduring benefits for Americans and our American way of life.