crossposted from unbossed

The National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) website is an interesting one to check in on to see what is going on in government. NTEU represents about 150,000 federal employees working in 31 federal agencies and departments.  The NTEU has also been an aggressive opponent of privatization.

Here is a the NTEU take on the battle over privatizing Homeland Security's Human Resource work. The lucky Privateer is Lockheed-Martin.

According to the Washington Times, a senior DHS official has expressed interest in a "safety braclet" that could:

• take the place of an airline boarding pass

• contain personal information about the traveler

• be able to monitor the whereabouts of each passenger and his/her luggage

• shock the wearer on command, completely immobilizing him/her for several minutes

Video is available hereat the bottom right.

More after the flip.

On Monday the Washington Times carried an article about an exchange of letters between the Department of Homeland Security and a company called Lamperd Less Lethal.  The purpose was to investigate the viability of disposing of airport check in passes in favour of something entirely more sinister.  RFID chipped bracelets for all passengers.  While that in itself is worrying, the bracelets have a capability that is downright scary: On command they can administer a taser shock of up to 200,000 volts.

So is the DHS interested in making every man, woman and child wear their own shock collar just in case they are a terrorist?

Apparently the answer is yes.

While we have all been worrying about the Telecom Immunity and the other changes to the FISA Laws Rep. Obey has quietly made sure the FBI doesn't have the money to do more harm. Obey and his Appropriations Comm. voted down a big 11 Million Dollar expansion of the FBI's datamining.

Earlier today, a House appropriators voted to pull $11 million to expand a controversial FBI data-mining project, after the Bureau repeatedly stiff-armed Congressmen and their gumshoes in the Government Accountability Office.

"By refusing to answer even the most basic questions about this program, the Department of Justice has given us little choice.  In fact, we’re only doing what they told us to do," said Congressman Brad Miller in a statement. "The Department of Justice... said that if Congress didn’t like what they were doing, we could pull their funding.  Well, that’s what we’ve done... Until an agency can provide reasonable explanations, and assurances that our citizens’ privacy won’t be violated, it would be irresponsible to give the Department of Justice this large increase in funds. " http://blog.wired.com/...

As I discussed almost 6 months ago, there's a big potential upside to Mister Bush's new power to spy on Americans.

Do you realize that the possibility now exists to virtually eliminate income tax cheating? Just think: some well-placed government data monitoring, and a few high-profile prosecutions, could literally scare up a big chunk of the $350 billion (2001 figure) that the IRS says Americans bilk it out of every year.

This is huge, folks! For perspective, the entire budget of the Dept. of Homeland Security is only around $50 billion. Why, we could pay for 2 or 3 DHS's and still give the rich another big tax cut if we just cracked down on the chiselers. (And never forget: if you've done nothing wrong, you have nothing to fear.)

Oh, wait. The rich are the main tax chiselers. And Republicans exist to serve them. Never mind.

.
AND WHY DOESN'T ANYBODY KNOW?

SHIT HAPPENS. DID IT HAPPEN ON OUR TOMATOES?

The Real Question Is, How Can FOUR U.S. Gov't. Agcy's STILL Not Know, After Almost A Week? The Politics Of Food Safety:

CDC
Division of Foodborne, Bacterial and Mycotic Diseases
Salmonellosis
"Salmonella live in the intestinal tracts of humans and other animals, including birds. Salmonella are usually transmitted to humans by eating foods contaminated with animal feces. "

We all know that big business and their lackeys in the Republican Administration don't give a shit about public health. These are the people who mass-marketed you tobacco, alcohol, sugar-water, fast food, polyunsaturated fats, and even baby food with no food in it at all, just chemicals. And babies were their business, their only business.

[more after the jump]
.

Many of us have heard about this story in Salon by Shaun McCanna,

I diaried about this a while back.

And here.

http://www.salon.com/...
"It's easy for soldiers to score heroin in Afghanistan" - Aug 2007

http://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/...
"Britain is protecting the biggest heroin crop of all time" - July 2007

http://www.indymedia.org.uk/...
"US/NATO military shipping heroin out of Afghanistan" - Feb 2008

(I will admit this article may be a bit hyperbolic to an extent, but the charges .. just seems too close to home to ignore.)

When the FBI raided the offices of the Office of Special Counsel, one of the investigations left uncompleted was an investigation into a report that defective pumps had been installed at three gated enclosures protecting the city of New Orleans from flooding, writes the Disaster Accountability Project. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates reportedly has not responded to the Special Counsel's September 2007 letter ordering an investigation based on the OSC's finding that the allegation was likely credible.

DAP Director Ben Smilowitz comments, "There doesn't seem to be much urgency attached to this investigation."

Unknown to many Americans, a tempest has been raging between FEMA and the FCC over FEMA's refusal to take responsibility for  a proposed national emergency alerting system. In a fiery public rebuke of the FCC, FEMA protested that it lacked legal authorities to carry out the mission proposed for it by an FCC-led advisory committee. Then, last Friday, under pressure from multiple sources, including the Disaster Accountability Project, FEMA published a startling confession: it had the necessary authorities all along.

Below, cross-posted with permission from DAP Director Ben Smilowitz is my story of the CMAS debacle, published today on the DAP website.

On this edition of The Celsias Show:

My interview with Mark Kastel, Senior Farm Policy Analyst from Cornucopia Institute, one of the truly effective watchdogs of the organic industry...

...and Jill Richardson (who you know as OrangeClouds115) joins me to discuss the latest developments in Cornucopia’s ongoing effort to convince the Inspector General at the USDA to investigate appearances of favoritism at the agency that has benefited Dean Foods, the company behind Horizon Organics. We also take a look at the Department of Homeland Security’s plan to relocate the Plum Island disease facility to the mainland — a plan which appears to have been based on a flawed study.

Click here to listen.

With hurricane season beginning on June 1, the Disaster Accountability Project will be reporting this week and next on inadequacies in government preparedness. This is the first report of the series, published on the DAP Blog (author: Claire Trimble) and cross-posted here with permission.

The Sierra Club recently tested five "Katrina cottages" being used in Mississippi and found all to contain higher levels of formaldehyde than is recommended for long-term exposure by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry.

Normal levels of indoor formaldehyde run between 10-20 parts per billion but three of the five cottages contained over 100 parts per billion. This level is even higher than the 77 parts per billion average tested in the 516 trailers this year by the CDC.

Tonight on the Celsias Show, I'll be interviewing Mark Kastel, Senior Farm Policy Analyst from the Cornucopia Institute, one of the truly effective watchdogs of the organic industry. Immediately after the interview, Jill Richardson (who you know as OrangeClouds115) will join me in a discussion that will include the latest developments in Cornucopia's ongoing effort to convince the Inspector General at the USDA to investigate appearances of favoritism at the agency that has benefitted Dean Foods, the company behind Horizon Organic.

You're invited to listen and call in.

crossposted from unbossed

Suppose there was a virulent disease that recently had swept through another country's livestock, forcing it to kill and burn them in the tens of thousands. And suppose that this disease was so contagious that German officials confiscated uneaten food from passengers who arrived on flights from this country, along with any items made from parts of the animals. And suppose just this past year there was another outbreak in that country, with more embargoes and slaughtered livestock. And suppose that this is "the most highly infectious animal disease that is known. Nearly 100 percent of exposed animals become infected." And now suppose that you were a government agency in the US that was doing live virus research on this virulent and dreaded disease and you were making a decision about where to place the laboratory. Would you choose to site it on the mainland US?

And, one more piece of information. Assume that you are the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

They want our children to fight their unholy wars and they're willing to promise anything; do anything -- including breaking U.S. and international law -- to have them.  

Unwilling to suffer the consequences of reinstating the selective service, the Bush administration has stooped to a new level in order to continue prosecuting their perpetual state of imperialist war. If you recall, they're already lowering standards to meet recruitment goals. The U.S. military has regularly circumvented the traditional minimum requirements for all enlistees, including having a high school diploma and a clean criminal record. But that's not enough. They need more warm bodies. Now, they’ve resorted to an even more usurious modus operandi to maintain recruitment goals.

Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell (center) is almost done with significant (but unnecessary) revisions for the US Intelligence Community

In an attempt to complete the total overhaul of the US Intelligence Community (IC) prescribed by the 9/11 Commission, Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell is putting the finishing touches on a revamped Reagan-era executive order that incorporates his position within that system and gives that office (the ODNI) the 'power of the purse' in determining the strategic priorities of the community's members.   Executive Order 12333,  entitled United States Intelligence Activities,  was originally adopted in 1981 to further delineate the relationships among the various intelligence agencies and organizations that had evolved since the creation of the Central Intelligence Agency back in 1947.  

The fact that seven years after the attacks on the WTC and Pentagon, and some six years after the formation of the Department of Homeland Security, the department designed to protect us, is just now finalizing a so-called rapid response plan for a terrorist-driven catastrophe, to me, is disturbing. However, the fact that the aforementioned plan will be in place just in time for the 2008 presidential election, is downright ominous.

No, I’m not putting forth a conspiracy theory here but if you really think about it, it’s not much of a stretch to admit that the timing is dubious to say the least. After billions upon billions of our taxpayer dollars have been spent hand over fist at the federal, state and local levels for years, are they telling us that that they don’t even have an effective plan in place for another national disaster right now? How can that be?

Folks, if there was ever a time in which to question your government’s motives as far as supposedly protecting us... this is it.

Back in October 2006, Keith Olbermann did a segment on his Countdown show that highlighted the loss of Habeas Corpus and many of our rights included in the Bill of Rights through the use of executive orders, presidential directives and signing statements written by George W. Bush.

KO nailed it; as usual, in his own unique [poignant] but humorous way. I’ll never forget how he talked about each individual right and how if you take even one of those rights away the others seem to fall by the wayside as well. It was heartbreaking to watch him crossing off each right on a chart until only one right was left. (at the moment, I forget which one it was) He then scribbled out the ‘s’ in "Rights."

Well, this time it’s [the cadaverous one] DHS Sec. Michael Chertoff who’s working hard to decimate our cherished Fourth Amendment.

Yesterday DHS CIS (Citizenship and Immigration Services) issued a Final Interim Rule to extend F-1 foreign student OPT time limits to 29 months without public comment and without Congressional review.  Public comment was requested, after enactment, as a slap in the face. CIS has grown accustomed to re-writing immigration law without due process - last year an additional 20,000 H-1B visas were handed out in this manner.

Here is my comment in the Federal Register.