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Banned
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by willravel
It probably won't happen. Bush doesn't have the popularity left to maintain the "I'll save you" place in people's hearts. If it does happen, it'll be interesting to see millions of people storm the White House. I'll be there.
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They seem wayyyyy too politically partisan at DHS and in the pentagon, and exhibit a HYPER concern about the coming presidential transition....
<h2>....SOoooo, why the eff shouldn't we, as well?</h2>
Quote:
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/05/...tion.security/
Homeland Security trains for presidential transition
* Story Highlights
* This presidential transition is a first for department, formed after 9/11
* Agencies get together for drills with mock hijackers and drug runners
* Homeland Security says it knows of no specific threat related to the transition
* Member of think tank skeptical: "It looks more like showmanship"
From Jeanne Meserve and Mike M. Ahlers
CNN
GLYNCO, Georgia (CNN) -- Federal agents sped after phantom drug runners and fired at mock hijackers in coastal Georgia this week as senior officials from various agencies watched and sometimes participated.
The Department of Homeland Security brought the top officials together to prepare for the transition that will follow this fall's presidential election.
The department says it knows of no threat related to the transition. In other countries, however, terrorists have struck shortly before or after government changes.
In an effort to ensure a smooth transition, the Department of Homeland Security brought more than 100 top career employees -- nonpolitical employees who are expected to stay in their jobs -- to build their knowledge about the department's 22 agencies.
The idea is to prepare them to manage other agencies on an interim basis, as one round of political appointees gives way to a new president's picks.
The senior officials watched as agents pursued a "drug runner" around a closed course at speeds of up to 90 mph, culminating in a fake but realistic shootout. VideoWatch simulated shootout, real explosion »
After briefings from agents, they shot simulated bullets at mock hijackers. They watched incidents involving deranged gunmen, suicide bombers and others intent on causing mayhem.
Department officials say the exercises are particularly important because this presidential transition is a first for the department, which was formed after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Yet the elaborate exercises, held at the sprawling Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Glynco, Georgia, are not without skeptics.
"It's late in the game," said P.J. Crowley of the Center for American Progress, a Washington think tank. "I mean, developing a career civil service within the Department of Homeland Security should have been a priority five years ago when the department first stood up.
"I think it looks more like showmanship than real team building, but I'll wait and see."
Department officials say they hope the incoming president will designate a new secretary and other top officials before January 20, Inauguration Day, to ensure continuity.
Nancy Ward, a career employee who could temporarily head the Federal Emergency Management Agency during the transition, says the experience is valuable.
"I have really been able to see what [other DHS agencies] do on a day-to-day basis and understand how they do it," she said.
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Quote:
http://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_s...ls-mullen.html
Admiral's Mullen's attitude
"Offering an unusual insight into how senior military leaders are anticipating the transition to a new president, Mullen said he is continually thinking about how military decisions taken today will play out under a new administration.
"There are very few either briefings or meetings that I'm in that I'm not thinking about 'How does what we're talking about right now transition to next spring?' " Mullen said. He said U.S. commanders in regions overseas, as well as chiefs of the different services, are having similar discussions.
The transition is unlikely to be smooth, predicted Mullen, who assumed his position seven months ago for a two-year term. He said he hopes to offer a stabilizing influence as a military leader who will bridge two administrations.
"We will be tested. . . . I'm preparing that this country will be tested, and I have a role in that regard, certainly providing advice to whoever the new president's going to be," he said. He said his current priority is to develop military strategies for the Middle East and the globe to "tee up" for a new president.
Specifically, Mullen said he hopes that the change in politically appointed leaders will unfold at a wartime pace, rather than at a "peacetime" one. "I think it's important for us to get as many principals in positions as rapidly as possible in a time of war," he said. " Tyson
---------------------------------------------------------------
Perhaps Tyson is trying to stimulate discomfort with the idea of the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff talking about getting "as many principals in positions as rapidly as possible." If that is so, then she has succeeded with me. Mullen is talking about politically appointed civilians in that last sentence, civilians nominated by the president for confirmation by the senate of the United States.
What business is that of his?
We have come a long way in the development of civil-military relations in the US since the time in which George Marshall gave up his promised position as commander of the European Theater of war merely because FDR suggested that he could not cope with the Washington scene in Marshall's absence. A small sacrifice? He would have been Eisenhower in the "Crusade in Europe" with all that would have flowed from that.
You have to wonder how much Admiral Mullen's fretting is caused by the prospect of a Democratic Administration. Perhaps the new president should consider the suitability of present leadership in the Pentagon. pl
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...src=newsletter
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<h3>Some "coincidences" to Chew on:</h3>
Quote:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpag...q=cipro&st=nyt
A NATION CHALLENGED: WHITE HOUSE MEMO; Home Front Is a Minefield For President
By ELISABETH BUMILLER AND DAVID E. SANGER
Published: October 25, 2001
....In his first 72 hours back, Mr. Bush discovered that the more complex and immediately dangerous front <h>is here in what the White House calls ''the homeland.''</h> As the president said in a speech today in suburban Baltimore, ''It's something that, obviously, we're not used to in America.''.....
<h3>After this was published, one year earlier, in 2000:</h3>
[PDF]
Why Another Defense Review
File Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat - View as HTML
America must defend <h3>its homeland.</h3> During the Cold War, ...... catastrophic and catalyzing event – like a. new Pearl Harbor. Domestic politics and ...
http://www.newamericancentury.org/Re...asDefenses.pdf
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Quote:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv...201158_000.htm
White House Mail Machine Has Anthrax
By Sandra Sobieraj
Associated Press Writer
<h3>Tuesday, Oct. 23, 2001; 8:11 p.m. EDT</h3>
WASHINGTON –– President Bush said confidently Tuesday that "I don't have anthrax" after biohazard testing at the White House and the discovery of anthrax on a mail-opening machine at a screening facility six miles away.
All White House mail – more than 40,000 letters a week – is examined at military facilities across the Potomac River.
"Let me put it this way," Bush said. "I'm confident that when I come to work tomorrow, I'll be safe."
Asked if he was tested for the germ that has killed three people already this month, or if he was taking precautionary antibiotics, Bush replied simply: "I don't have anthrax."
<h3>At least some White House personnel were given Cipro six weeks ago</h3> White House officials won't discuss who might be receiving the anthrax-treating antibiotic now.
On the night of the Sept. 11 attacks, the White House Medical Office dispensed Cipro to staff accompanying Vice President Dick Cheney as he was secreted off to the safety of Camp David, and told them it was "a precaution," according to one person directly involved.
At that time, nobody could guess the dimensions of the terrorists' plot. .....
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Quote:
http://www.sptimes.com/News/101501/W...ked_to_t.shtml
Compiled from Times wires
© St. Petersburg Times,
published October 15, 2001
Confirming a clear link between the terrorists targeting America and the South Florida company hit by anthrax cases, the FBI said Sunday that the Sun tabloid editor's wife rented a Delray Beach apartment to two of the hijackers.
The Sun is part of the American Media Inc. tabloid chain, and it employed photo editor Bob Stevens, who died this month from inhalation anthrax. Two other AMI employees were exposed, and five more are being retested to confirm positive blood test results.
Sun editor Michael Irish's wife, Gloria, rented unit 1504 at the Delray Racquet Club to Marwan Alshehhi and Saeed Alghamdi this summer, said FBI spokeswoman Judy Orihuela.
Alshehhi was aboard United Airlines Flight 175, the second jet to strike the World Trade Center. Alghamdi was on United Flight 93, which crashed 80 miles southeast of Pittsburgh when passengers apparently thwarted an attempt to target another building.
"There is now a link between the editor's wife and the terrorists," Orihuela said.
But just as quickly, she said the FBI wasn't drawing immediate conclusions.
"It's just a coincidence right now," Orihuela said. "I'm sure there will be some sort of follow-up."
"We are not searching the apartment at this time," Orihuela said from outside the tabloid's Boca Raton headquarters. "We are focusing on this building."
The Delray apartment is central to a massive federal investigation into the terrorist attacks. Investigators trying to piece the puzzle together created a diagram that includes photos of the 19 hijackers who seized control of four airplanes on Sept. 11.
At the center of the diagram, which was obtained by the Miami Herald: an image of a house with the address 755 Dotterel Road. Arrows connect nine of the hijackers to the icon.
Two terrorists, Alshehhi and Alghamdi, rented the apartment in Delray Beach just north of Boca Raton, the FBI said. The other seven, including suspected ringleader Mohamed Atta, are connected because they visited the apartment or otherwise had a direct tie to the inhabitants, a federal official familiar with the investigation told the Miami Herald.
Previously, only Saeed Alghamdi and another terrorist, Ahmed Alnami, both aboard United Flight 93, had been connected to the Delray Racquet Club apartment.
It is clear that the apartment was a meeting ground for terrorists, authorities say. Now they must determine whether unit 1504 was also a hatching ground for the anthrax attacks.
Gloria Irish, the wife of tabloid editor Michael Irish, was approached by reporters Sunday afternoon while walking her black Labrador retriever outside her Delray Beach home.
"I can't believe you people," said Irish, who works for Pelican Properties. "We are not making any comments."
Mike Irish, who, records show, is a licensed airplane pilot, several years ago was a member of the Civil Air Patrol based at a small-plane airport in Lantana, just north of Delray Beach, an official there told the Washington Post. One of the hijackers, Atta, reportedly rented a plane at that airport to practice flying for three days in August. Stevens, the Sun photo editor who died of anthrax Oct. 5, also lives in Lantana. But there is no indication whether Irish or Stevens ever crossed paths with Atta.
In other developments Sunday, a police officer and two lab technicians involved in the NBC anthrax investigation have tested positive for the bacteria, Mayor Rudolph Giuliani said. Nevada officials said four people who may have come into contact with a contaminated letter at a Microsoft office tested negative while results weren't known for two others.
The police officer had the bacteria in his nose, as did one lab technician. Another technician had a spore on her face. Both work for the city health department, which conducted the tests.
Exposure to the spores does not mean infection.
In Washington, meanwhile, Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson said he considered the anthrax cases in New York, Nevada and Florida to be instances of bioterrorism. "It certainly is an act of terrorism to send anthrax through the mail," he said on Fox News Sunday.
And Attorney General John Ashcroft said it was "premature at this time to decide whether there is a direct link" to Osama bin Laden's terrorist network, but "we should consider this potential."
The new New York cases brought to 12 the number of people around the nation who either have anthrax or have been exposed to it. That does not include a second NBC employee who is taking antibiotics after displaying possible symptoms of the disease.
Health investigators have tested more than 300 people at American Media and have found some people with "elevated levels" of antibodies, which the body produces to fight off disease, said Tim O'Connor, spokesman for the Palm Beach County Health Department.
Though O'Connor said investigators don't know for sure whether those antibodies were produced to fight off anthrax or other diseases, such as HIV or hepatitis, he acknowledged that "there's an inkling it's for anthrax."
Still, only the results of a second test will show that for sure. Those tests probably will occur Wednesday or Thursday, and results should be available by Saturday, O'Connor said.
O'Connor said if other workers show an elevated antibody level for anthrax, chances are they came in contact with the disease at American Media, and not anywhere else.
All employees are taking antibiotics, and none is considered likely to become ill or die, O'Connor said.
News of the exposures has caused jitters around the world, with a number of false or pending cases reported over the weekend. Among them:
* In Hawaii, hazardous-materials teams were called to Lihue Airport after passengers on a flight from Los Angeles discovered a white powder on their luggage after they arrived. Tests were being conducted on the powder.
* In Uniontown, Pa., a 49-year-old woman was given Cipro, an antibiotic for anthrax, and was tested for exposure after receiving an envelope containing a powdery substance. She was later released from a hospital.
* In England, several hundred people were evacuated from Canterbury Cathedral after a worker said he saw a man dropping a white powder in one of the chapels. Workers in wearing chemical protection suits cleared up the powder and took samples for analysis.
-- Information from the Miami Herald, Associated Press and Times staff writer Chris Tisch was used in this report.
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Quote:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpag...pagewanted=all
A NATION CHALLENGED: THE DETAINED; Arrested Men's Shaved Bodies Drew Suspicion of the F.B.I.
By CHRISTOPHER DREW AND RALPH BLUMENTHAL
Published: October 26, 2001
When two Indian men
.....The F.B.I. also recently tested the Jersey City apartment for signs of anthrax, and its agents have looked into a tip that Mr. Azmath may have been seen in 1993, around the time of the van-bombing of the World Trade Center, in an apartment with a man who was later convicted in the assault. But officials said they doubted that Mr. Azmath had any connection to that attack.
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Quote:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpag...pagewanted=all
A NATION CHALLENGED: BIOTERRORISM; Report Linking Anthrax and Hijackers Is Investigated
By WILLIAM J. BROAD AND DAVID JOHNSTON
Published: March 23, 2002
The two men identified themselves as pilots when they came to the emergency room of Holy Cross Hospital in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., last June. One had an ugly, dark lesion on his leg that he said he developed after bumping into a suitcase two months earlier. Dr. Christos Tsonas thought the injury was curious, but he cleaned it, prescribed an antibiotic for infection and sent the men away with hardly another thought.
But after Sept. 11, when federal investigators found the medicine among the possessions of one of the hijackers, Ahmed Alhaznawi, Dr. Tsonas reviewed the case and arrived at a new diagnosis. The lesion, he said in an interview this week, ''was consistent with cutaneous anthrax.''
Dr. Tsonas's assertion, first made to the F.B.I. in October but never disclosed, has added another layer of mystery to the investigation of last fall's deadly anthrax attacks, which has yet to focus on a specific suspect.
The possibility of a connection between the Sept. 11 attacks and the subsequent anthrax-laced letters has been explored by officials since the first anthrax cases emerged in October. But a recent memorandum, prepared by experts at the Johns Hopkins Center for Civilian Biodefense Strategies, and circulated among top government officials, has renewed a debate about the evidence.
The group, which interviewed Dr. Tsonas, concluded that the diagnosis of cutaneous anthrax, which causes skin lesions, was ''the most probable and coherent interpretation of the data available.'' The memorandum added, ''Such a conclusion of course raises the possibility that the hijackers were handling anthrax and were the perpetrators of the anthrax letter attacks.''
A senior intelligence official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that George J. Tenet, the director of central intelligence, had recently read the Hopkins memorandum and that the issue has been examined by both the C.I.A. and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
''No one is dismissing this,'' the official said. ''We received the memo and are working with the bureau to insure that it continues to be pursued.''
In their public comments, federal officials have said they are focusing largely on the possibility that the anthrax attacks were the work of a domestic perpetrator. They have hunted for suspects among scientists and others who work at laboratories that handle germs.
The disclosure about Mr. Alhaznawi, who died on United Airlines Flight 93, which crashed in Pennsylvania, sheds light on another front in the investigation. Senior law enforcement officials said that in addition to interviewing Dr. Tsonas in October and again in November, they thoroughly explored any connection between the hijackers and anthrax. They said the F.B.I. scoured the cars, apartments and personal effects of the hijackers for evidence of the germ, but found none.
Dr. Tsonas's comments add to a tantalizing array of circumstantial evidence. Some of the hijackers, including Mr. Alhaznawi, lived and attended flight school near American Media Inc. in Boca Raton, Fla., where the first victim of the anthrax attacks worked. Some of the hijackers also rented apartments from a real estate agent who was the wife of an editor of The Sun, a publication of American Media.
In addition, in October, a pharmacist in Delray Beach, Fla., said he had told the F.B.I. that two of the hijackers, Mohamad Atta and Marwan al-Shehhi, came into the pharmacy looking for something to treat irritations on Mr. Atta's hands.
If the hijackers did have anthrax, they would probably have needed an accomplice to mail the tainted letters, bioterrorism experts knowledgeable about the case said. The four recovered anthrax letters were postmarked on Sept. 18 and Oct. 9 in Trenton. It is also possible, experts added, that if the hijackers had come into contact with anthrax, it was entirely separate from the supply used by the letter sender.
For his part, Dr. Tsonas said he believed that the hijackers probably did have anthrax.
''What were they doing looking at crop-dusters?'' he asked, echoing experts' fears that the hijackers may have wanted to spread lethal germs. ''There are too many coincidences.''
In recent interviews, Dr. Tsonas, an emergency room doctor, said Mr. Alhaznawi came into the hospital one evening in June 2001, along with a man who federal investigators believe was another hijacker, Ziad al-Jarrah, believed to have taken over the controls of United Flight 93.
They used their own names, he added, not aliases.
''They were well-dressed foreigners,'' he said. ''I assumed they were tourists.''
The men explained that Mr. Alhaznawi had developed the ulcer after hitting his leg on a suitcase two months earlier. Dr. Tsonas recalled that Mr. Alhaznawi appeared to be in good health, and that he denied having an illness like diabetes that might predispose him to such lesions. The wound, he recalled, was a little less than an inch wide and blackish, its edges raised and red.
Dr. Tsonas said he removed the dry scab over the wound, cleansed it and prescribed Keflex, an antibiotic that is widely used to combat bacterial infections but is not specifically recommended for anthrax.
The encounter lasted perhaps 10 minutes, Dr. Tsonas said.
He took no cultures and had no thoughts of anthrax, a disease at that time was extremely rare in the United States and was unfamiliar even to most doctors.
In October, amid news reports about the first anthrax victims, Dr. Tsonas, like other doctors, threw himself into learning more about the disease. An incentive was that his hospital is relatively near American Media, so victims there might come to Holy Cross for treatment.
Dr. Tsonas said he forgot entirely about the two men until federal agents in October showed him pictures of Mr. Alhaznawi and Mr. Jarrah, and he made positive identifications.
Then, agents gave Dr. Tsonas a copy of his own notes from the emergency room visit and he read them. ''I said, 'Oh, my God, my written description is consistent with cutaneous anthrax,' '' Dr. Tsonas recalled. ''I was surprised.''
He discussed the disease and its symptoms with the agents, explaining what else could possibly explain the leg wound. A spider bite was unlikely, he said. As for the hijacker's explanation -- a suitcase bump -- he also judged that unlikely.
''That's a little unusual for a healthy guy, but not impossible,'' he said.
After his meetings with F.B.I., Dr. Tsonas was contacted early this year by a senior federal medical expert, who asked him detailed questions about the tentative diagnosis.
Last month, experts at Johns Hopkins also called Dr. Tsonas, saying they, too, were studying the evidence. The Hopkins analysis was done by Dr. Thomas Inglesby and Dr. Tara O'Toole, director of the center in Baltimore and an assistant secretary for health and safety at the federal Energy Department from 1993 to 1997.
In an interview, Dr. O'Toole said that after consulting with additional medical experts on the Alhaznawi case, she was ''more persuaded than ever'' that the diagnosis of cutaneous anthrax was correct.
She said the Florida mystery, as well as the entire anthrax inquiry, might benefit from a wider vetting.
''This is a unique investigation that has many highly technical aspects,'' she said. ''There's legitimate concern that the F.B.I. may not have access to the kinds of expertise that could be essential in putting all these pieces together.''
John E. Collingwood, an F.B.I. spokesman, said the possibility of a connection between the hijackers and the anthrax attacks had been deeply explored.
''This was fully investigated and widely vetted among multiple agencies several months ago,'' Mr. Collingwood said. ''Exhaustive testing did not support that anthrax was present anywhere the hijackers had been. While we always welcome new information, nothing new has in fact developed.''
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<h3>They seem much better at protecting themselves, against their fears of what we might do to interfere with their operations, than about solving this, or about protecting the health of the citizenry if it were to happen again..PRIORITIES !!</h3>
Quote:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/...n2019769.shtml
Anthrax Investigation A 'Cold Case?'
5 Years, 53,000 Leads, 5,000 Subpoenas Later, FBI Is Empty-Handed
Comments Comments3
WASHINGTON, Sept. 18, 2006
(CBS) Three years ago, FBI agents slogged through the woods to a fishing pond in suburban Maryland, where they hoped to find the hidden lab equipment used in the 2001 anthrax attacks. But, as CBS News correspondent Jim Stewart reports, they pumped the pond dry and even sifted through the mud at the bottom ... and found nothing
Five years, 53,000 leads, and 6,000 subpoenas after those attacks, they still have no arrests.
Things are so cold, law enforcement officials tell CBS News, that barring the discovery of new evidence, the anthrax investigation could be declared a "Cold Case" and put in the inactive files.
So who did it? Former Attorney General John Ashcroft once singled out Dr. Steven Hatfill, a bioweapons specialist, as a "person of interest." But there have been no charges.
Former FBI counter-terrorism executive and now CBS News consultant Mike Rolince says no case has frustrated the FBI more.
"We now know that someone, or ones, can conduct an attack like this and for least the first five years, get away with it," Rolince says.
The FBI says it remains committed to solving the crime. In a written statement, Joseph Persichini, Jr., acting assistant director of the FBI’s Washington field office said: "Today, the FBI’s commitment to solving this case is undiminished ... While no arrests have been made, the dedicated investigators who have worked tirelessly on this case, day-in and day-out, continue to go the extra mile in pursuit of every lead."
The bureau never had more than scant physical evidence, like the envelopes the anthrax was mailed in, and the terse letters inside - "Death to America" read one - and the spores themselves. But they were never able to trace the anthrax back to the attacker.
"It's true that a vast majority of the investigation early on was figuring out the science," Rolince says.
Nor did the administration ever entirely figure out what to do in case of another such attack. Despite a $5.6 billion effort to stockpile vaccines, just a small amount is available. Only the Pentagon has enough on hand for the troops.
Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff hints no one may ever be indicted.
"There are times that we may know a lot about a crime or an event that occurred, but we may not have the admissible evidence that we need to prove it in court," Chertoff says.
But the thinking among investigators is more stark: If we can't agree among ourselves who did it, they reason, how could we ever convince a jury?
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Last edited by host; 05-20-2008 at 11:18 AM..
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