Creating jobs is a big issue in today’s economy. With high unemployment levels in many places across the country, it might seem that any job is a good job. Yet, there is a high turnover rate among employees of all levels at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Why is that? Here is Part 1 of a piece I wrote exploring why DHS is a tough place to earn a living.
When looking at the developments of the last year and a half in the Middle East, it seems quite clear that the media was too quick to coin the term “Arab Spring” to describe the popular unrest and overthrow of regimes in significant parts of the Arab World. It would be more appropriate to refer to what is happening in the region as the “Islamist Spring” because it is creating unprecedented opportunities for Islamist political movements to finally grasp the reins of power, such as with the elections in Egypt. All of this, of course, has implications for the region and the United States.
A recent Twitter exchange between the Taliban and the U.S. military shows how social media is evolving and how its current stage of development involves the use of Twitter to wage war on an ideological level. Over the past several years, social networking sites have become a catalyst for users to achieve political objectives. The U.S. Government and its security forces need to be constantly aware of how the enemy’s use of social media is evolving and proactively plan for ways to win the social networking battle.
Protesting – an activity long-dismissed as something belonging to (to quote some of the less complementary phrases) “the tree-hugging, sandal wearing hippy types” – is enjoying a resurgence in popularity, and with that resurgence is a dramatic increase in effectiveness. Protesting is cool again. Direct actions are not only cool, they’re seen by many young people as something that is not only legitimate, it’s required. Taken together, the conclusion can only be that there is likely to be an increase in direct action this summer.
By Rob Strayer
Two hundred years ago today, the United States declared war against Great Britain, beginning the War of 1812. At that time, the British Navy was the aggressor, boarding U.S. commercial vessels. Today, the United States faces a digital threat to its national security and commercial interests. Like their nineteenth century counterparts conducting flagrant piracy on the high seas, cyber attackers openly and notoriously exploit U.S. commercial networks. How does the United States develop a national cyber security policy that is tailored to the problems that private sector companies face (avoiding the mistakes of 1812)?
I’ve been writing about the use Predator UAVs and their exorbitant cost for some time. It would seem there are many far better (and far cheaper) ways to patrol U.S. borders and other areas from above. The Center for Investigative Reporting has taken note and recently cited one of my posts in their article, “At U.S. border, expensive drones generate lots of buzz, few results.”
In 2007, Congress passed a mandate to screen all cargo on passenger planes. It was an enormous demand of industry and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), one that shows a clear lack of understanding for real-world issues like business models and a functioning supply chain. Five years later, TSA and industry are still working to meet an unrealistic mandate. Put bluntly, 100 percent screening was a stupid idea that has not made America more secure.
Events of the past decade—including 9/11, the anthrax attacks, Hurricane Katrina, and the 2009 H1N1 pandemic—have shown that public health and emergency management efforts are interconnected and often overlap in time of crisis. In a report just released by our Preparedness, Response, and Resilience Task Force, we believe that the legacy missions of public health and emergency management must be synchronized for disaster preparedness and response efforts to be effective.
The House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Transportation Security held a hearing today: “TSA’s Efforts to Fix Its Poor Customer Service Reputation and Become a Leaner, Smarter Agency.” The sole witness was TSA Administrator John Pistole. Subcommittee Chairman Rogers lectured Administrator Pistole – yes, lectured him – about TSA’s terrible public image. Since when does Congress have the temerity to lecture anyone, much less an agency that Congress itself created on how to improve its poor reputation?
People talk. That’s a fact. Whether at the water cooler, the fence post or on Facebook, people talk about almost anything and everything. Eventually though we all reach a point where what we really should do is just shut up. We’ve long crossed that point when it comes to intelligence and national security operations in this country. Lately there have been a truly disturbing number of very public examples that bring these conditions to light.
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