boobs in terroristland

Thanks for the Heads-Up by Frank Rich, New York Times, May 25, 2002 (registration required, but it's free).

Rich asks, "With all the talent in this country and all that's at stake, is this the best we can muster?"

Watching "our" Administration try to deal with terrorism would be as funny as watching the Keystone Kops if the consequences weren't so deadly.

A snippet of Rich's column:
"We are the richest, most can-do country in the world, but at home we're pursuing the war on terrorism with a management style that's pure Kmart. Back in October Mr. Bush declared that his new director of homeland security, Tom Ridge, in charge of coordinating some 70 federal agencies and countless local ones, would "have the full attention and complete support of the very highest levels of our government." Nine months later, Mr. Ridge has neither. What he does have is a new, less-than-high-tech headquarters, with an aboveground Washington address that can be taken out simultaneously with the White House.

"The nation's nuclear plants are vulnerable from the air. Its borders are porous to malevolent visitors and matriel (only 2 percent of incoming ship cargo is inspected). The anthrax manhunt is stalled and there has been scant progress in the supposed push to bring local hospitals up to speed in identifying and countering bioterrorism. The I.N.S.'s failure to coordinate with the Social Security Administration, The Times' Robert Pear reports, is still allowing tens of thousands of foreigners to secure illegal Social Security numbers and concoct the fake identities that proved so useful to some of the Sept. 11 hijackers.

"Remember Argenbright, the rent-a-guard company that was found to have employed convicts and illegal aliens to enforce airport security? It's still manning the fort in five major airports, from Orlando to O'Hare, where it no doubt continues to do a crack job of strip-searching little old ladies. This week USA Today reported that the new Transportation Security Administration has failed to fix the known security flaws that could allow the easy planting of bombs in the virtually unscreened cargo on passenger jets; the paper also found evidence that the same agency is cutting back on marksmanship training for the federal air marshals it is hiring to do the shooting it prohibits for pilots. As for the airport bomb-detecting machines mandated by Congress, The Wall Street Journal finds 190 in place, with a mere 1,100 still to go."

****

This was picked up while checking out the net chatter (looking for those imminent attacks):

From: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) To: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) so it's goin' pretty well, dad. Lot of Germans in the street with signs sayin' somethin' about "COWBOY" and "TOD". Don't know him, but sounds a good man. Afterwards Jacques and Gerhard and the Belgian foreign minister guy say, c'mon, let's grab a little lunch at the EU cafeteria, and I'm at the table lookin' at the menu and this big ol' French waiter dude says, "Oui, monsieur?" An' I'm thinkin', well, now's my chance to be all multilateral, so I say, "Qu'est-ce que c'est la soupe du jour?" And the Belgian foreign minister guy goes, "It means 'soup of the day', idiot." Which I thought was pretty funny for a Belgian, and I was about to say, "Hey, they should get you for Austin Powers III", but instead Jacques yells, "Mer de Crete, tiens!", which Condi's interpreter helpfully translates for me, "Sea of Crete, hey!" An' I'm thinkin', what's the deal with that? Flippin' through the ol' mental Rolodex an' comin' up blank, pop. But I tell Jacques, "Yeah, Crete. Could get messy there, Landslide. Got Colin keepin' an eye on things..."

Your can find the original at Daily Telegraph Opinion. (If this link doesn't work, go to the Daily Telegraph's site and look for the article titled "Bush makes an impact in Europe" By Mark Steyn, May 25, 2002.)

I think it might be funnier if it weren't punctuated correctly.

*****

busterspin.jpgThis logo certainly inspries confidence in the CIA. I got this image off the CIA's website. I kid you not. Does anyone actually use it? Do CIA operatives have jumpsuits with this logo emblazoned on the back? Did we pay for this logo, or is this just a doodle some bored CIA hack came up with? Is that what this so-called war on terrorism is, some kind of cartoon joke? What has the CIA done to earn its billions lately? (Or even ever.) I want to know what I'm paying for.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 05/27/02 at 04:02 PM
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