Qtec
02-23-2006, 06:17 PM
[ QUOTE ]
Pentagon: Ports uproar may pose security risk
President tries to calm furor over takeover of port management
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The second in command at the Pentagon said Thursday that people who publicly oppose allowing a Middle Eastern company to take over management of some U.S. ports could be threatening national security. <font color="blue"> I thought it might! /ccboard/images/graemlins/smirk.gif </font color>
Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England told the Senate Armed Services Committee that blocking the deal could ostracize one of the United States' few Arab allies.
"The terrorists want our nation to become distrustful," England said. "They want us to become paranoid and isolationist, and my view is we cannot allow this to happen. It needs to be just the opposite."
<hr /></blockquote>
OMG! O........M.............G! /ccboard/images/graemlins/laugh.gif...meanwhile, the Govt wants to train bus drivers to watch out for terrorists!
Paranoid! Moi! /ccboard/images/graemlins/grin.gif
Q............unbeliveable..... /ccboard/images/graemlins/crazy.gif /ccboard/images/graemlins/smirk.gif
[ QUOTE ]
School Bus Drivers Trained to Watch for Terrorists
Friday, February 17, 2006
NORFOLK, Va. — The War on Terror has a new front line — the school bus line.
Financed by the Homeland Security Department, school bus drivers are being trained to watch for potential terrorists, people who may be casing their routes or plotting to blow up their buses.
Designers of the School Bus Watch program want to turn 600,000 bus drivers into an army of observers, like a counterterrorism watch on wheels. Already mindful of motorists with road rage and kids with weapons, bus drivers are now being warned of far more grisly scenarios.
Like this one: terrorists monitor a punctual driver for weeks, then hijack a bus and load the friendly yellow vehicle with enough explosives to take down a building.
An alert school bus driver could foil that plan, security expert Jeffrey Beatty recently told a class of 250 of drivers in Norfolk, Va. After all, bus drivers cover millions of miles of roads. They know the towns, the kids, the parents.
"The terrorist is not going to be able to do some of their casing and rehearsal activity without being detected by one of you," said Beatty, an anti-terrorism veteran of the CIA, FBI and the Army's Delta Force. The more people watching, he told the drivers, the safer the community will be.
With bus drivers becoming informal intelligence gatherers, the reach of homeland security is growing — not exactly what parents think of when their kids head to the bus stop.
The program demands strong oversight, said John Rollins, a former senior Homeland Security intelligence official now with Congressional Research Service.
Otherwise, he said, some bus drivers could think of themselves as undercover agents.
"Today it's bus drivers, tomorrow it could be postal officials, and the next day, it could be, 'Why don't we have this program in place for the people who deliver the newspaper to the door?"' Rollins said. "We could quickly get into a society where we're all spying on each other. It may be well intentioned, but there is a concern of going a bit too far."
Most school bus drivers do the job part-time, often to supplement other income. Many are retirees, mothers with young children, people between jobs, or school employees who also work as mechanics, janitors or classroom aides, according to government and industry officials.
<hr /></blockquote>
LOL
Pentagon: Ports uproar may pose security risk
President tries to calm furor over takeover of port management
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The second in command at the Pentagon said Thursday that people who publicly oppose allowing a Middle Eastern company to take over management of some U.S. ports could be threatening national security. <font color="blue"> I thought it might! /ccboard/images/graemlins/smirk.gif </font color>
Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England told the Senate Armed Services Committee that blocking the deal could ostracize one of the United States' few Arab allies.
"The terrorists want our nation to become distrustful," England said. "They want us to become paranoid and isolationist, and my view is we cannot allow this to happen. It needs to be just the opposite."
<hr /></blockquote>
OMG! O........M.............G! /ccboard/images/graemlins/laugh.gif...meanwhile, the Govt wants to train bus drivers to watch out for terrorists!
Paranoid! Moi! /ccboard/images/graemlins/grin.gif
Q............unbeliveable..... /ccboard/images/graemlins/crazy.gif /ccboard/images/graemlins/smirk.gif
[ QUOTE ]
School Bus Drivers Trained to Watch for Terrorists
Friday, February 17, 2006
NORFOLK, Va. — The War on Terror has a new front line — the school bus line.
Financed by the Homeland Security Department, school bus drivers are being trained to watch for potential terrorists, people who may be casing their routes or plotting to blow up their buses.
Designers of the School Bus Watch program want to turn 600,000 bus drivers into an army of observers, like a counterterrorism watch on wheels. Already mindful of motorists with road rage and kids with weapons, bus drivers are now being warned of far more grisly scenarios.
Like this one: terrorists monitor a punctual driver for weeks, then hijack a bus and load the friendly yellow vehicle with enough explosives to take down a building.
An alert school bus driver could foil that plan, security expert Jeffrey Beatty recently told a class of 250 of drivers in Norfolk, Va. After all, bus drivers cover millions of miles of roads. They know the towns, the kids, the parents.
"The terrorist is not going to be able to do some of their casing and rehearsal activity without being detected by one of you," said Beatty, an anti-terrorism veteran of the CIA, FBI and the Army's Delta Force. The more people watching, he told the drivers, the safer the community will be.
With bus drivers becoming informal intelligence gatherers, the reach of homeland security is growing — not exactly what parents think of when their kids head to the bus stop.
The program demands strong oversight, said John Rollins, a former senior Homeland Security intelligence official now with Congressional Research Service.
Otherwise, he said, some bus drivers could think of themselves as undercover agents.
"Today it's bus drivers, tomorrow it could be postal officials, and the next day, it could be, 'Why don't we have this program in place for the people who deliver the newspaper to the door?"' Rollins said. "We could quickly get into a society where we're all spying on each other. It may be well intentioned, but there is a concern of going a bit too far."
Most school bus drivers do the job part-time, often to supplement other income. Many are retirees, mothers with young children, people between jobs, or school employees who also work as mechanics, janitors or classroom aides, according to government and industry officials.
<hr /></blockquote>
LOL