Category Archives: DHS

Hugo the Clown is dead

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All the leftist are mourning—Sean Penn, Jimmy Cahtah, Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and Oliver Stone. Boo. Hoo. Expatriate Venezuelans, however, are celebrating. It is interesting to note that Chavez amassed an estate valued over $2 Billion.

I don’t mourn Hugo Chavez. He was nothing more than an thug, a tinpot dictator who pillaged Venezuela’s economy.

***

Hitler had his SS, SD and Gestapo. Stalin had his NKVD and KGB. Obama has his DHS.

Let’s be frank. Bush was an idiot to create that department. Something had to be done to resolve the turf wars between the multiple intelligence and investigative agencies, particularly between the CIA and the FBI but the Department of Homeland Security was not the solution.

There was a balance of power between the various competing agencies. With the DHS, that safeguard and balance of power, of “watchers watching watchers” is gone. Under Obama and the dems, the DHS and its subordinate, the TSA, has morphed—not evolved, but purposely redirected from protecting the US from outside threats to internals threats, real or fantasized. Why don’t we just call it what it is—Internal Security.

Over the last few years, we have seen growing militarization of government. Local police departments everywhere now have or have access to paramilitary assault squads. Oh, they have fancy names like SWAT but the reality is that they are assault troops with the mindset of assault troops, not police.

We are seeing more of that mindset in the federal government from the IRS issuing orders for weapons to the Department of Education who used their assault troops to invade a home for—overdue education loans! Now we see the DHS stockpiling ammunition and acquiring “surplus” armored Army vehicles—2700 armored troop carriers.

The militarization and buildup of the DHS and other governmental agencies has drawn the notice of many in the conservative media…rational journalists who are not members of the tin-foil hat brigade. The leftist poo-poo the idea. Of course. 

The Investor’s Business Daily editorial board asks this question:

Why Is Obama’s Growing DHS Army Buying Armored Vehicles?

 Posted 03/05/2013 06:26 PM ET

Security: In addition to stockpiling over a billion bullets and thousands of semiautomatic weapons the feds would deny U.S. citizens, the vehicle of choice for fighting the counterinsurgency war in Iraq is appearing on U.S. streets.

The sequestration question du jour is why the Department of Homeland Security, busy releasing hundreds, if not thousands, of deportable and detained illegal aliens due to budget constraints, is buying several thousand Mine Resistant Armored Protection (MRAP) vehicles?

And just who are they intended to be used against?

This acquisition comes on top of the recent news of the stockpiling by DHS of more than 1.6 billion (with a ‘b’) bullets of various calibers, enough by one calculation to fight the equivalent of a 24-year Iraq War, and the ordering of some 7,000 5.56x45mm NATO “personal defense weapons” (PDW) — also known as “assault weapons” when owned by civilians.

Additionally, DHS is asking for 30 round magazines that “have a capacity to hold thirty (30) 5.56x45mm NATO rounds.”

The Department of Homeland Security (through the U.S. Army Forces Command) recently retrofitted 2,717 of these MRAP vehicles for service on the streets of the U.S. They were formerly used for counterinsurgency in Iraq.

These vehicles are specifically designed to resist mines and ambush attacks. They use bulletproof windows and are designed to withstand small-arms fire, including smaller-caliber rifles such as a .223 Remington. Does DHS expect a counterinsurgency here?

After IEDs began to take a toll on U.S. military forces in Iraq, the Pentagon ordered a large supply of MRAPs.

“They’ve taken hits, many, many hits that would have killed soldiers and marines in uparmored Humvees,” Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in a recent interview.

A DHS officer, Robert Whitaker, stationed in El Paso, Texas, recently proudly described the agency’s new armored toy as “Mine-resistant … we use to deliver our team to high-risk warrant services … (with) gun ports so we can actually shoot from within the vehicle; you may think it’s pretty loud but actually it’s not too bad … we have gun ports there in the back and two on the sides as well. They are designed for .50-caliber weapons.”

This is needed to serve warrants? Perhaps it might have been useful at Waco.

So the question is what does DHS need 1.6 billion bullets, 7,000 Ar-15s and 2,700 armored vehicles for?

What are they anticipating or planning for, and why are few in the media and Congress asking about it, particularly in the light of daily apocalyptic bleats from the administration about sequestration cuts?

We have asked if this has anything to do with then-candidate Obama’s proposal for a national security force as powerful as the U.S. Army.

In a July 2, 2008, speech in Colorado Springs, Colo., candidate Obama said: “We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we’ve set. We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded.”

As Judge Andrew Napolitano, a Fox News contributor, recently opined in the Washington Times, “The historical reality of the Second Amendment’s protection of the right to keep and bear arms is not that it protects the right to shoot deer. It protects the right to shoot tyrants, and it protects the right to shoot at them effectively, with the same instruments they would use upon us.”

No, we are not scanning the sky for black helicopters.

But we are concerned about an administration pushing for ever stricter gun control and de facto gun registration in the form of allegedly universal background checks to which criminals and gangbangers won’t comply is arming itself to the teeth.

If weapons of war don’t belong on the street, Mr. President, explain these purchases.

Others are asking that same question and the run by citizens to acquire weapons and ammunition continues.

 

It’s Monday!!

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It’s the start of another week and the nation staggers on under the growing burden of socialism.

We had a prime example of the cultural changes had has happened of the last fifty years.  Last night was the first installation of The Bible miniseries created by the star of the old “Touched by an Angel” TV series, Roma Downey and her husband.

All I can say is, “What a disappointment!”

First, according to the series, the Bible starts with Noah. Then it jumps to Abraham, Moses and Joshua, skipping all the events in between. It does show Moses dealing with Egypt and the Ten Plagues, receiving the Ten Commandments but skips how the Israelites came to Egypt. It skips the Golden Calf and the forty years wandering in the desert; the next scene is Joshua before the walls of Jericho. That event drops the marching around the walls and the blowing of trumpets.

It’s Bible Lite!

Now, contrast the portions about Moses in this miniseries with Cecil B. DeMille’s epic, The Ten Commandments with Charlton Heston as Moses and Yul Brenner as the Pharaoh. DeMille’s version was an epic with all the pomp and majesty of the wondrous epic history. The Ten Commandments included actual Bible quotes from Exodus, narrated personally by DeMille. This new series played loose with Biblical text. For instance, when Abraham takes Isaac up the mountain for the sacrifice, the Bible says God provided a ram. In the movie, it’s a lamb. Minor? Yes, but if small liberties are being taken with Biblical text, what other liberties will be taken in future episodes. A scene of Lot leaving Sodom has, as labeled by the Christian Science Monitor, ninja angels!

***

Of all the issues we expect from Obamacare, the damage done to our culture is the worse. Obamacare coarsens our view and attitudes of  personal care. We have a prime example from that heart of liberalism, California.

Elderly woman dies after nurse refuses to do CPR

Updated 4:41 pm, Saturday, March 2, 2013

BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (AP) — An elderly woman being cared for at a Bakersfield retirement facility died after a nurse at the facility refused to perform CPR on the woman after she collapsed, authorities said.

When the 87-year-old resident of Glenwood Gardens collapsed at the facility around 11 a.m. Tuesday, a staff member called 911 but refused to give the woman CPR, Bakersfield television station ABC23 (http://bit.ly/YQULm3 ) reported Friday.

In refusing the 911 dispatcher’s insistence that she perform CPR, the nurse can be heard telling the dispatcher that it was against the retirement facility’s policy to perform CPR.

During the exchange between the nurse and the dispatcher, the dispatcher can be heard saying “I don’t understand why you’re not willing to help this patient.”

An ambulance arrived several minutes after the call and took the woman to a hospital, where she was later pronounced dead. She has been identified as Lorraine Bayless, a resident of the home’s independent facility, which is separate from the skilled and assisted nursing facility.

The retirement facility released a statement extending its condolences to the family and said its “practice is to immediately call emergency medical personnel for assistance and to wait with the individual needing attention until such personnel arrives.”

***

There has been numerous articles over the last month about huge ammunition purchases by the Department of Homeland Security. According to some, the purchases have totaled well over a billion rounds in the last two years.  Some critics claim those figures are too large, others say the numbers are understated. 

With all that controversy comes this item in the news. DHS is buying light armored vehicles designed to be IED resistant.

IED resistant? Here in the US. Why? Are they suspecting an armed uprising? Should we rename the DHS to the Department of Internal Security?

No doubt, there will be more articles that the transfer of these “surplus” vehicles from the Army to DHS is just coincidental. On the other hand, what justification is there for these transfers?

What does DHS need with 2,700 armored vehicles?

Rick Moran, March 4, 2013.

More to the point; why isn’t anyone in Congress asking?

You see a story like this – and the one about a billion bullets bought by the government – and you wonder why no one in Congress has bothered to look into it. I am totally unconvinced there are any dark designs by DHS on American citizens or our democracy. But this seems a colossal waste of money – if true – and isn’t ferreting out waste like this what we are paying those jamokes on Capitol Hill for?

Jim Hoft:

Modern Survival Blog reported:

The Department of Homeland Security (through the U.S. Army Forces Command) recently retrofitted 2,717 of these ‘Mine Resistant Protected’ vehicles for service on the streets of the United States.

Although I’ve seen and read several online blurbs about this vehicle of late, I decided to dig slightly deeper and discover more about the vehicle itself.

The new DHS sanctioned ‘Street Sweeper’ (my own slang due to the gun ports) is built by Navistar Defense (NavistarDefense.com), a division within the Navistar organization. Under the Navistar umbrella are several other companies including International Trucks, IC Bus (they make school buses), Monaco RV (recreational vehicles), WorkHorse (they make chassis), MaxxForce (diesel engines), and Navistar Financial (the money arm of the company).

DHS even released a video on their newly purchased MRAPs.
Via Pat Dollard:
Put down the tin foil hat and pick up your green eyeshades. Ask your congressmen to find out first and foremost if this is true, and secondly, to ask DHS what the hell they need 2700 armored cars for.

And they better have a damn good reason to spend that kind of money when budgets are so tight.

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Airports Opting Out of TSA

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It’s a headline from the Orlando Sanford International Airport. I think Orlando’s decision is the first of many. Security should, rightfully, be the responsibility of the airlines, not government. It’s time to go back to that concept since governmental tyranny by the TSA does not work.

It wasn’t all that many years ago when the airlines were responsible for screening passengers.  It worked well here in the US for a couple of decades.  

Of course, at that time airlines served in-flight meals that were very good.  I still remember the Monterrey Jack and Sausage Omelet served on the early morning flight from KC to Minneapolis by Northwest Airlines. That breakfast included hash browned potatoes, fruit and various juices. Customer Service was a prime factor in flying then and passengers were viewed in a different light than today when passengers are just so much cargo to haul from point A to point B.

You could smoke and no one cared if you had a lock-blade knife in your pocket—which I did and still do today. I also carry a bit more ironmongery today than I did in those days when the 2nd Amendment was held in disdain by so many pols and bureaucrats. 

Frankly, I see no need for the new move of “rape by scanner” and federal sexual molestation. I can agree with explosive sniffing dogs and scanners to check for bombs in luggage or carried on the person.  Since I reload, I expect I’d trigger some alarm at some point. But I can understand that.

What I suggest is to allow those folks with CCW and similar permits, military folks on active duty, LEOs from various levels of government carry their weapons on the flight.  The airlines responsibility would be to check for the validity of the permits and to provide frangible ammo as a temporary substitute while on-board. (Kudos to L. Neil Smith.) If a passenger has to use his/her weapon while on board to prevent or to subdue a hijacker, the airline should pay a “good citizen” reward.  I think $20,000 per hijacker head would be appropriate.

The bottom line is that we don’t need the TSA.  In fact, if the responsible governmental intelligence and law enforcement agencies weren’t so busy fighting turf and power battles, we needn’t the DHS either.

The DHS was a good temporary solution for an immediate crisis. It’s time has passed.  It’s time for both the TSA and the DHS to go—and never come back.         

Random Items for a Saturday

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As a followup to Thursday’s post, from Michael Ramirez…


Just some highlights dredged from The Heritage Foundation…

QUICK HITS (from the Heritage Foundation)

The Bureau of Labor and Statistics reports today that the economy shed 85,000 net jobs in December, keeping the nation’s unemployment rate at 10%.
New revelations that the Timothy Geithner-led New York Fed told AIG to withhold information from the public about details of its government bailout have securities lawyers wondering if federal securities laws were broken.
President Obama’s decision to suspend sending any detainees being held in the Guantánamo Bay detention facility back to Yemen raises new questions about whether the facility will be shuttered at all.
A day after California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger called Obamacare “health care to nowhere” the White House tried to secure the support of the Democratic Governors Association, but instead Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen (D) told Time: “It is a huge load on the states at a time when we are still climbing out of the recession.”
Due to pressure from the Civil Rights Division of the Obama Justice Department, the Chicago Police Department is seriously considering scrapping their police entrance exam.

“Systemic failure—in the White House.” The Heritage Foundation reports where the actual “systemic failure” actually occurred.

The First Step Is Admitting You Have A Problem

It may have taken President Barack Obama two weeks to deliver a speech on the failed Flight 253 bomb attack without blaming President Bush, but he should still be commended for finally owning up for the massive intelligence failure. President Obama told the American people yesterday: “The U.S. government had the information . . . to potentially uncover this plot and disrupt the attack. Rather than a failure to collect or share intelligence, this was a failure to connect and understand the intelligence that we already had. … Ultimately, the buck stops with me . . . and when the system fails, it is my responsibility.”

But while the President is right to admit the system failed and that it is his fault that it did, he is still clueless about why. The President promised he would direct “our intelligence community immediately begin assigning specific responsibility for investigating all leads on high-priority threats so that these leads are pursued and acted upon aggressively — not just most of the time, but all of the time.” And he added: “In addition to the corrective efforts that I’ve ordered, I’ve directed agency heads to establish internal accountability reviews, and directed my national security staff to monitor their efforts.”

But this failure of our intelligence system was not just about lack of accountability. It was about empowerment – or more specifically the lack thereof. The system simply moved too slowly because there was a lack of urgency about the war on terror. Intelligence personnel were not empowered to employ their ingenuity and resourcefulness to connect the dots. Adding layers of “internal accountability reviews” will only make the bureaucratic stupor worse. It is people’s resourcefulness and initiative that will stop the next terrorist attack, not a bureaucratic process.

And from the day he stepped into office, President Obama’s actions have done nothing but kill the initiative and morale of our intelligence employees. From day one, he made it clear that he believes the war on terror is a civilian criminal justice problem to be managed, and not a war to be won. That is why he took the responsibility for interrogating detainees from the CIA and gave it to the FBI. That is why he has failed to seek the renewal of key investigatory authorities authorized under the USA Patriot Act, instead settling for a six-month extension tacked on to the Defense appropriations bill. It is why instead of promising victory in Afghanistan, he sent fewer troops than were required and gave al Qaeda a set date for our withdrawal. It is why he has failed to approach Congress with legislation establishing a legal framework for handling terrorism detainees. It is why he is pushing for Khalid Sheik Mohammed to be prosecuted in civilian court despite his previous guilty plea in a military tribunal. And most demoralizing of all, President Obama has allowed Attorney General Eric Holder to re-investigate nearly a dozen CIA interrogators and contractors for their past efforts in the war on terror.<

This is an issue of leadership. The President of the United States sets the tone and then the message filters down. Our intelligence personnel failed to follow-up on the leads that could have prevented Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab from even boarding the plane because their leader had sent the message that fighting the war on terror was not a high priority. Finally, it now seems that the President is ready to start acting like protecting the American people is not just a duty: it is his first duty.


And finally, a cartoon to round off the week.


Random Items for a Saturday

Posted on by

As a followup to Thursday’s post, from Michael Ramirez…


Just some highlights dredged from The Heritage Foundation…

QUICK HITS (from the Heritage Foundation)

The Bureau of Labor and Statistics reports today that the economy shed 85,000 net jobs in December, keeping the nation’s unemployment rate at 10%.
New revelations that the Timothy Geithner-led New York Fed told AIG to withhold information from the public about details of its government bailout have securities lawyers wondering if federal securities laws were broken.
President Obama’s decision to suspend sending any detainees being held in the Guantánamo Bay detention facility back to Yemen raises new questions about whether the facility will be shuttered at all.
A day after California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger called Obamacare “health care to nowhere” the White House tried to secure the support of the Democratic Governors Association, but instead Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen (D) told Time: “It is a huge load on the states at a time when we are still climbing out of the recession.”
Due to pressure from the Civil Rights Division of the Obama Justice Department, the Chicago Police Department is seriously considering scrapping their police entrance exam.

“Systemic failure—in the White House.” The Heritage Foundation reports where the actual “systemic failure” actually occurred.

The First Step Is Admitting You Have A Problem

It may have taken President Barack Obama two weeks to deliver a speech on the failed Flight 253 bomb attack without blaming President Bush, but he should still be commended for finally owning up for the massive intelligence failure. President Obama told the American people yesterday: “The U.S. government had the information . . . to potentially uncover this plot and disrupt the attack. Rather than a failure to collect or share intelligence, this was a failure to connect and understand the intelligence that we already had. … Ultimately, the buck stops with me . . . and when the system fails, it is my responsibility.”

But while the President is right to admit the system failed and that it is his fault that it did, he is still clueless about why. The President promised he would direct “our intelligence community immediately begin assigning specific responsibility for investigating all leads on high-priority threats so that these leads are pursued and acted upon aggressively — not just most of the time, but all of the time.” And he added: “In addition to the corrective efforts that I’ve ordered, I’ve directed agency heads to establish internal accountability reviews, and directed my national security staff to monitor their efforts.”

But this failure of our intelligence system was not just about lack of accountability. It was about empowerment – or more specifically the lack thereof. The system simply moved too slowly because there was a lack of urgency about the war on terror. Intelligence personnel were not empowered to employ their ingenuity and resourcefulness to connect the dots. Adding layers of “internal accountability reviews” will only make the bureaucratic stupor worse. It is people’s resourcefulness and initiative that will stop the next terrorist attack, not a bureaucratic process.

And from the day he stepped into office, President Obama’s actions have done nothing but kill the initiative and morale of our intelligence employees. From day one, he made it clear that he believes the war on terror is a civilian criminal justice problem to be managed, and not a war to be won. That is why he took the responsibility for interrogating detainees from the CIA and gave it to the FBI. That is why he has failed to seek the renewal of key investigatory authorities authorized under the USA Patriot Act, instead settling for a six-month extension tacked on to the Defense appropriations bill. It is why instead of promising victory in Afghanistan, he sent fewer troops than were required and gave al Qaeda a set date for our withdrawal. It is why he has failed to approach Congress with legislation establishing a legal framework for handling terrorism detainees. It is why he is pushing for Khalid Sheik Mohammed to be prosecuted in civilian court despite his previous guilty plea in a military tribunal. And most demoralizing of all, President Obama has allowed Attorney General Eric Holder to re-investigate nearly a dozen CIA interrogators and contractors for their past efforts in the war on terror.<

This is an issue of leadership. The President of the United States sets the tone and then the message filters down. Our intelligence personnel failed to follow-up on the leads that could have prevented Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab from even boarding the plane because their leader had sent the message that fighting the war on terror was not a high priority. Finally, it now seems that the President is ready to start acting like protecting the American people is not just a duty: it is his first duty.


And finally, a cartoon to round off the week.


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