You know that idiotic, color-coded terror alert system?

The Department of Homeland Security has thus far spent $90 million on it. I know, I know, that would barely purchase the stationary necessary to print the documents to buy out a single failing bank.

But still: $90 million bucks.

Oh, yeah. The Office of Management and Budget has determined it doesn't work, and that DHS should stop spending money on it until its effectiveness can be proven. The White House (wonder of wonders!) agrees. The Congress agrees. The General Accounting Office agrees. Even the DHS Advisory Committee agrees.

So what's going to happen?

DHS has announced it's moving ahead with the program.

Somewhere in the bizarro world this makes sense: the people to whom we have entrusted our national security have a system that doesn't work and nobody wants, but they're not going to drop it.

And, apparently, nobody is going to do anything about it.

[h/t Michaelbrownblog]

Comments

Brian Shields said…

It was really only used when Bush was running for reelection. It has served it's purpose, and will be dismantled.

October 30, 2008 at 8:24 PM

a most peculiar nature said…

What a travesty. Those odd colors just never made any sense to me.

I think there should be a three tiered system to keep the public aware:

1. Everythings groovy, so chill.
2. Some funky sh-t goin' on, but doesn't seem to be nothin, folks.
3. We're f--ked !

So much simpler, and everyone would understand it (once it is translated into all of the appropriate languages).

October 31, 2008 at 2:22 PM

Comment Rescue (?) and child-related gun violence in Delaware

In my post about the idiotic over-reaction to a New Jersey 10-year-old posing with his new squirrel rifle , Dana Garrett left me this response: One waits, apparently in vain, for you to post the annual rates of children who either shoot themselves or someone else with a gun. But then you Libertarians are notoriously ambivalent to and silent about data and facts and would rather talk abstract principles and fear monger (like the government will confiscate your guns). It doesn't require any degree of subtlety to see why you are data and fact adverse. The facts indicate we have a crisis with gun violence and accidents in the USA, and Libertarians offer nothing credible to address it. Lives, even the lives of children, get sacrificed to the fetishism of liberty. That's intellectual cowardice. OK, Dana, let's talk facts. According to the Children's Defense Fund , which is itself only querying the CDCP data base, fewer than 10 children/teens were killed per year in Delaw

The Obligatory Libertarian Tax Day Post

The most disturbing factoid that I learned on Tax Day was that the average American must now spend a full twenty-four hours filling out tax forms. That's three work days. Or, think of it this way: if you had to put in two hours per night after dinner to finish your taxes, that's two weeks (with Sundays off). I saw a talking head economics professor on some Philly TV channel pontificating about how Americans procrastinate. He was laughing. The IRS guy they interviewed actually said, "Tick, tick, tick." You have to wonder if Governor Ruth Ann Minner and her cohorts put in twenty-four hours pondering whether or not to give Kraft Foods $708,000 of our State taxes while demanding that school districts return $8-10 million each?

New Warfare: I started my posts with a discussion.....

.....on Unrestricted warfare . The US Air force Institute for National Security Studies have developed a reasonable systems approach to deter non-state violent actors who they label as NSVA's. It is an exceptionally important report if we want to deter violent extremism and other potential violent actors that could threaten this nation and its security. It is THE report our political officials should be listening to to shape policy so that we do not become excessive in using force against those who do not agree with policy and dispute it with reason and normal non-violent civil disobedience. This report, should be carefully read by everyone really concerned with protecting civil liberties while deterring violent terrorism and I recommend if you are a professional you send your recommendations via e-mail at the link above so that either 1.) additional safeguards to civil liberties are included, or 2.) additional viable strategies can be used. Finally, one can only hope that politici

Search This Blog