ARLINGTON, VA - SEPTEMBER 11: U.S. President ...Image by Getty Images via Daylife
d up and just started shooting."
Keevill added: "We have layers of security and it worked. He never got inside the building to hu
A gunman coolly drew a weapon from his pocket and opened fire at a security checkpoint into the Pentagon in a point-blank attack that wounded two police officers before the suspect was fatally shot.
The two officers suffered grazing wounds and were being treated in a hospital after the Thursday (Friday NZ time) shooting, said Richard Keevill, chief of Pentagon police. The shooter, identified as John Patrick Bedell, 36, of California, died hours after being admitted to a hospital in critical condition, authorities said. They had no motive for the shooting.
The shooter walked up to the checkpoint at the Pentagon's subway entrance in an apparent attempt to get inside the massively fortified Defense Department headquarters. "He just reached in his pocket, pulled out a gun and started shooting" no more than five feet away, Keevill said. "He walked up very cool. He had no real emotion on his face." The Pentagon officers returned fire with semiautomatic weapons.
Bedell's death was confirmed on Friday by Beverly Fields, chief of staff of the Washington medical examiner's office; and Leigh Fields, medical legal investigator for the office. Both said Bedell's body had arrived at the medical examiner's office.
The assault at the very threshold of the Pentagon - the US capital's ground zero on Sept. 11, 2001 - came four months after a deadly attack on the Army's Fort Hood, Texas, post allegedly by a US Army psychiatrist with radical Islamic leanings. In the immediate aftermath Thursday, investigators did not think terrorism was involved but were not ruling that out and did not discuss possible motives.
President Barack Obama was closely following the case with updates from the FBI through his homeland security and counterterrorism adviser, John Brennan," White House spokesman Nick Shapiro said.
Law enforcement officials identified the suspect as John Patrick Bedell, 36. They also said they were speaking with a second man, who might have accompanied the shooter, and were running his name through databases.
The subway station is immediately adjacent to the Pentagon building, a five-sided northern Virginia colossus across the Potomac River from Washington. Since a redesign following the 2001 terrorist attack on the Pentagon, riders can no longer disembark directly into the building. Riders take a long escalator ride to the surface from the underground station, then pass through a security check outside the doors of the building, where further security awaits.
After the attack, all Pentagon entrances were secured, then all were reopened except one from the subway, said Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman. He said the subway entrance was likely to remain closed overnight at least.
Keevill said the gunman gave no clue to the officers at the checkpoint about what he was going to do.
"There was no distress," he said. "When he reached into his pocket, they assumed he was going to get a pass and he came up with a gun."
"He wasn't pretending to be anyone. He was wearing a coat and walke
rt anyone."
source-http://www.stuff.co.nz/world/americas/3409262/Pentagon-shooting-suspect-killed
Showing posts with label Barack Obama. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Barack Obama. Show all posts
The delivery of aid to victims of Haiti's earthquake is still being slowed by bottlenecks, aid workers say.
UN and Oxfam staff are finally bringing food and water to some parts of the capital Port-au-Prince, but the airport remains clogged with loaded planes.
Many survivors of Tuesday's quake have become desperate as they wait for aid, and many are trying to leave the city.
Leaving for Haiti, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said the quake was the worst humanitarian crisis for decades.
The UN has launched an appeal for $562m (£346m) intended to help three million people for six months, while some two million people are thought to need emergency relief.
AT THE SCENE
Nick Davis
Nick Davis, BBC News, Haiti
Relief is finally getting through to some in Port-au-Prince but it's a trickle - not a flood - of the aid needed by the people here.
The US navy is using helicopters to drop supplies of bottled water using soldiers on the ground to keep control. The UN also has distribution points handing out high-energy bars to the hungry.
But demand is outstripping supply - with food and water being taken faster than they can pass it out.
Meanwhile first reports from the epicentre of the earthquake suggest the damage is even more dramatic than in the capital.
The BBC's Mark Doyle in Leogane, west of Port-au-Prince, described the scene as "apocalyptic", with thousands left homeless and almost every building destroyed.
But in a sign of hope, rescuers pulled a woman alive from rubble on Sunday. Twelve others were rescued on Saturday, the UN said.
There are also security concerns amid reports of looting.
The US Southern Command's Lt-Gen Ken Keen said that while streets were largely calm there had been an increase in violence.
"We are going to have to address the situation of security," he said, quoted by the Associated Press.
"We've had incidents of violence that impede our ability to support the government of Haiti and answer the challenges that this country faces."
AFP news agency quoted one of its photographers as saying police had opened fire on looters in a Port-au-Prince market, killing at least one of them.
Airport 'overwhelmed'
Correspondents say although the amount of supplies getting through is still small, there is a sense of movement at last.
The UN World Food Programme has been handing out aid packages containing food, while UK charity Oxfam has been distributing water.
US troops said they had set up their first foothold outside the airport to deliver aid carried in by helicopters.
But many victims are still not receiving any aid, as the airport remains a bottleneck. UN Humanitarian Coordinator Kim Bolduc says getting supplies out to them from the planes is still a major hurdle.
"The Haitian airport now is overwhelmed," said UN Assistant Secretary General for Peacekeeping Operations, Edmond Mulet.
The port is badly damaged, and many roads still blocked by corpses and debris.
David Wimhurst, a spokesman for the UN peacekeeping force in Haiti, said aid was being delivered as quickly as possible.
"Aid is going out but it's simply impossible in 24 hours to bring in enough aid to instantly feed all these people, many of whom are in places that are inaccessible," he said.
The Haitian and Dominican Republic governments are planning an alternative 130km (80 miles) humanitarian road corridor to deliver relief supplies from the southern Dominican town of Barahona, the UN reports.
The UN has warned about fuel shortages, which it says could affect humanitarian operations.
"Fuel is the key issue," Elisabeth Byrs, a spokeswoman for the UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs, told the BBC. "We need fuel to bring in supplies and carry the wounded."
'No help'
The UN says up to 80-90% of buildings in Leogane, about 19km west of Port-au-Prince, have been destroyed.
map
Satellite and close-up images of Port-au-Prince devastation
One survivor in the town said he had come to Haiti from America for his mother's funeral, only for his wife to be killed in the earthquake. He said that so far people in the area had received no help of any kind.
"We don't have any aid, nothing at all," he said. "No food, no water, no medical, no doctors."
Estimates of how many people died following the 7.0 magnitude earthquake on Tuesday have varied.
The Pan American Health Organization put the death toll at 50,000-100,000, while Haitian Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive said 100,000 "would seem a minimum".
A UN official has said aid workers are dealing with a disaster "like no other" in UN memory because the country had been "decapitated".
Three ministers and several senators are reported to have been killed.
The US has launched what President Barack Obama called "one of the largest relief efforts in its history" following the quake.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was the first senior Western official to arrive in Haiti, on Saturday.
She told Haitians that the US would be "here today, tomorrow and for the time ahead", asserting that "Haiti can come back even better and stronger in the future".
Have you or your family been affected by the earthquake? Are you taking part in the relief effort? If you have any information you wish to share with the BBC you can do so using the form below:
You can also send your pictures or videos to yourpics@bbc.co.uk, text them to +44 7725 100 100 or if you have a large file you can upload here.
Read the terms and conditions
At no time should you endanger yourself or others, take any unnecessary risks or infringe any laws.
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UN and Oxfam staff are finally bringing food and water to some parts of the capital Port-au-Prince, but the airport remains clogged with loaded planes.
Many survivors of Tuesday's quake have become desperate as they wait for aid, and many are trying to leave the city.
Leaving for Haiti, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said the quake was the worst humanitarian crisis for decades.
The UN has launched an appeal for $562m (£346m) intended to help three million people for six months, while some two million people are thought to need emergency relief.
AT THE SCENE
Nick Davis
Nick Davis, BBC News, Haiti
Relief is finally getting through to some in Port-au-Prince but it's a trickle - not a flood - of the aid needed by the people here.
The US navy is using helicopters to drop supplies of bottled water using soldiers on the ground to keep control. The UN also has distribution points handing out high-energy bars to the hungry.
But demand is outstripping supply - with food and water being taken faster than they can pass it out.
Meanwhile first reports from the epicentre of the earthquake suggest the damage is even more dramatic than in the capital.
The BBC's Mark Doyle in Leogane, west of Port-au-Prince, described the scene as "apocalyptic", with thousands left homeless and almost every building destroyed.
But in a sign of hope, rescuers pulled a woman alive from rubble on Sunday. Twelve others were rescued on Saturday, the UN said.
There are also security concerns amid reports of looting.
The US Southern Command's Lt-Gen Ken Keen said that while streets were largely calm there had been an increase in violence.
"We are going to have to address the situation of security," he said, quoted by the Associated Press.
"We've had incidents of violence that impede our ability to support the government of Haiti and answer the challenges that this country faces."
AFP news agency quoted one of its photographers as saying police had opened fire on looters in a Port-au-Prince market, killing at least one of them.
Airport 'overwhelmed'
Correspondents say although the amount of supplies getting through is still small, there is a sense of movement at last.
The UN World Food Programme has been handing out aid packages containing food, while UK charity Oxfam has been distributing water.
US troops said they had set up their first foothold outside the airport to deliver aid carried in by helicopters.
But many victims are still not receiving any aid, as the airport remains a bottleneck. UN Humanitarian Coordinator Kim Bolduc says getting supplies out to them from the planes is still a major hurdle.
"The Haitian airport now is overwhelmed," said UN Assistant Secretary General for Peacekeeping Operations, Edmond Mulet.
The port is badly damaged, and many roads still blocked by corpses and debris.
David Wimhurst, a spokesman for the UN peacekeeping force in Haiti, said aid was being delivered as quickly as possible.
"Aid is going out but it's simply impossible in 24 hours to bring in enough aid to instantly feed all these people, many of whom are in places that are inaccessible," he said.
The Haitian and Dominican Republic governments are planning an alternative 130km (80 miles) humanitarian road corridor to deliver relief supplies from the southern Dominican town of Barahona, the UN reports.
The UN has warned about fuel shortages, which it says could affect humanitarian operations.
"Fuel is the key issue," Elisabeth Byrs, a spokeswoman for the UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs, told the BBC. "We need fuel to bring in supplies and carry the wounded."
'No help'
The UN says up to 80-90% of buildings in Leogane, about 19km west of Port-au-Prince, have been destroyed.
map
Satellite and close-up images of Port-au-Prince devastation
One survivor in the town said he had come to Haiti from America for his mother's funeral, only for his wife to be killed in the earthquake. He said that so far people in the area had received no help of any kind.
"We don't have any aid, nothing at all," he said. "No food, no water, no medical, no doctors."
Estimates of how many people died following the 7.0 magnitude earthquake on Tuesday have varied.
The Pan American Health Organization put the death toll at 50,000-100,000, while Haitian Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive said 100,000 "would seem a minimum".
A UN official has said aid workers are dealing with a disaster "like no other" in UN memory because the country had been "decapitated".
Three ministers and several senators are reported to have been killed.
The US has launched what President Barack Obama called "one of the largest relief efforts in its history" following the quake.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was the first senior Western official to arrive in Haiti, on Saturday.
She told Haitians that the US would be "here today, tomorrow and for the time ahead", asserting that "Haiti can come back even better and stronger in the future".
Have you or your family been affected by the earthquake? Are you taking part in the relief effort? If you have any information you wish to share with the BBC you can do so using the form below:
You can also send your pictures or videos to yourpics@bbc.co.uk, text them to +44 7725 100 100 or if you have a large file you can upload here.
Read the terms and conditions
At no time should you endanger yourself or others, take any unnecessary risks or infringe any laws.
source-news.bbc.co.uk
WASHINGTON — US President Barack Obama defended embattled Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid once again for "inartful language" on his race and dialect during the 2008 presidential campaign.
"This is a good man who's always been on the right side of history," Obama told TV One. "For him to have used some inartful language in trying to praise me, and for people to try to make hay out of that makes absolutely no sense."
Reid created a firestorm with remarks published in the just-released book "Game Change," saying that Americans had warmed to Obama's candidacy because he was a "light-skinned" African-American with "no Negro dialect."
Obama was quick to accept Reid's apology Saturday, but Republicans have called for the Nevada Democrat to resign.
"He has apologized recognizing that he didn't use appropriate language, but there was nothing mean-spirited in what he had to say and he has always been on the right side of the issues," the president added in the TV One interview, which will be broadcast in full next Monday for the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday in honor of the civil rights leader.
The president also called the four-term senator, who is facing a tough re-election battle in Nevada, "a friend of mine" who has "been a stalwart champion of voting rights, civil rights."
A Mason-Dixon Polling and Research survey released over the weekend found that 52 percent of Nevada voters have an unfavorable opinion of Reid and only a third support him.
African-American leaders said they had forgiven Reid without qualms and urged the national debate to shift to pressing policy issues.
"He apologized for his unfortunate remarks concerning the president, and he understands the gravity of such remarks," said Representative Barbara Lee, leader of the Congressional Black Caucus, adding that Reid had phoned her over the weekend.
"There are too many issues like the economy, job creation and energy for these regrettable comments to distract us from the work that must be done on behalf of the American people," the veteran California lawmaker said, noting Reid has a history of helping poor and minority communities.
During an appearance in Nevada unveiling a new energy project, the leading Senate Democrat repeated his weekend apology.
"I've apologized to everyone in the sound of my voice that I could have used a better choice of words," he told reporters. "And I'll continue to do my work for the African-American community."
Obama was also eager to move on, with the Congress yet to pass a bill overhauling the US health care system, his top domestic priority. Reid is playing a critical role in negotiations between both chambers of Congress to craft compromise legislation to send to the president's desk.
"The fact that we spend days on this instead of talking about the unemployment rate or talking about how we deal with critical issues like energy and health care is an indication of why I think people don't understand what is happening in Washington," he said.
"I guarantee you the average person -- white or black -- right now is less concerned about what Harry Reid said in a quote in a book a couple of years ago than they are about how we are going to move the country forward. That's where we need to direct our attention."
Prominent African-American activist Al Sharpton, who also received a phone call from Reid, told Fox News television that while he was "offended" by the term "Negro dialect," it was not "anywhere near comparable" to offensive or insensitive racial remarks conservative leaders have made over the years.
On Sunday, Republican leaders demanded that Reid step down over the flap, while Democrats described the comments as an unfortunate choice of words, brushing aside calls from their political foes.
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"This is a good man who's always been on the right side of history," Obama told TV One. "For him to have used some inartful language in trying to praise me, and for people to try to make hay out of that makes absolutely no sense."
Reid created a firestorm with remarks published in the just-released book "Game Change," saying that Americans had warmed to Obama's candidacy because he was a "light-skinned" African-American with "no Negro dialect."
Obama was quick to accept Reid's apology Saturday, but Republicans have called for the Nevada Democrat to resign.
"He has apologized recognizing that he didn't use appropriate language, but there was nothing mean-spirited in what he had to say and he has always been on the right side of the issues," the president added in the TV One interview, which will be broadcast in full next Monday for the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday in honor of the civil rights leader.
The president also called the four-term senator, who is facing a tough re-election battle in Nevada, "a friend of mine" who has "been a stalwart champion of voting rights, civil rights."
A Mason-Dixon Polling and Research survey released over the weekend found that 52 percent of Nevada voters have an unfavorable opinion of Reid and only a third support him.
African-American leaders said they had forgiven Reid without qualms and urged the national debate to shift to pressing policy issues.
"He apologized for his unfortunate remarks concerning the president, and he understands the gravity of such remarks," said Representative Barbara Lee, leader of the Congressional Black Caucus, adding that Reid had phoned her over the weekend.
"There are too many issues like the economy, job creation and energy for these regrettable comments to distract us from the work that must be done on behalf of the American people," the veteran California lawmaker said, noting Reid has a history of helping poor and minority communities.
During an appearance in Nevada unveiling a new energy project, the leading Senate Democrat repeated his weekend apology.
"I've apologized to everyone in the sound of my voice that I could have used a better choice of words," he told reporters. "And I'll continue to do my work for the African-American community."
Obama was also eager to move on, with the Congress yet to pass a bill overhauling the US health care system, his top domestic priority. Reid is playing a critical role in negotiations between both chambers of Congress to craft compromise legislation to send to the president's desk.
"The fact that we spend days on this instead of talking about the unemployment rate or talking about how we deal with critical issues like energy and health care is an indication of why I think people don't understand what is happening in Washington," he said.
"I guarantee you the average person -- white or black -- right now is less concerned about what Harry Reid said in a quote in a book a couple of years ago than they are about how we are going to move the country forward. That's where we need to direct our attention."
Prominent African-American activist Al Sharpton, who also received a phone call from Reid, told Fox News television that while he was "offended" by the term "Negro dialect," it was not "anywhere near comparable" to offensive or insensitive racial remarks conservative leaders have made over the years.
On Sunday, Republican leaders demanded that Reid step down over the flap, while Democrats described the comments as an unfortunate choice of words, brushing aside calls from their political foes.
source-google.com
The man who is accused of trying to bomb an American airliner on Christmas Day made his first appearance in court on Friday.
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab's trial will be another important test case of America's ability to try terrorist suspects in civilian courts.
It should all go well - just as the trial of Richard Reid and Zacarias Moussaoui proceeded without incident.
But the Christmas Day bomb attempt is clearly asking pointed questions of America's ability to defend itself, and the contribution made to that defence by its spies.
Scattered info
US President Barack Obama said on Thursday that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab boarded that plane at Schiphol airport in Amsterdam because of failures in America's intelligence system.
John Brennan
The intelligence fell through the cracks. This happened in more than one organisation.
John Brennan
Deputy National Security Adviser for Homeland Security
But his words strongly suggested he believes the intelligence system is not fatally flawed, rather it just needs strengthening.
"The US government had the information scattered throughout the system 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 we already had."
Indeed, information about Mr Abdulmutallab - his radical leanings, his presence in Yemen, his contacts with extremist clerics - was in numerous US intelligence system databases.
But those fragments of knowledge floated on a huge tide of intelligence that swirls through the system every day. They never came together to form a coherent picture.
Familiar ring
All this sounds rather familiar. Was it not this inability to "connect the dots" that led to 9/11? No, says John Brennan, the president's counter-terrorism adviser.
He told journalists that before 9/11, information was jealously guarded by different intelligence agencies, and never shared.
Today, information sharing is not the problem, he insisted.
Instruction sign inside a body scanner at Schiphol airport
It may be unreasonable, even unfair, to blame the president for the failure of Dutch security officers to stop an alleged would-be suicide bomber. But that is what will happen.
In fact, so much information moves through the intelligence apparatus that analysts complain of feeling swamped and the bright little shards of knowledge that could prevent a plot from materialising can get lost.
"The intelligence fell through the cracks. This happened in more than one organisation. This contributed to the larger failure to connect the fragments of intelligence that could have revealed the plot, Abdulmutallab's extremist views, AQAP's (al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula) involvement with the Nigerian, its desire to strike the US homeland."
Mr Brennan draws a fine distinction between two sorts of bureaucratic failure. And it is perhaps a distinction that many Americans will find hard to grasp.
It may also be difficult for President Obama to convince Americans that yet another series of tweaks to the intelligence bureaucracy are an adequate response to the latest attempt on US lives.
Winslow Wheeler, an analyst at the Center for Defense Information in Washington, writes that the bureaucratic approach is horribly flawed.
"You see, no-one is responsible for the mistake," he says. "It is processes that need changing, right?"
"When you want to pretend to reform something, fiddle with the organisational chart, which relieves the people who should be held accountable, earns you their praise for being oh-so-wise, and gets you to the next screw up."
Intelligence under attack
US intelligence has been bloodied in any number of ways in the last few weeks. Seven CIA officers lost their lives when an operation they were running in Afghanistan went horribly wrong and their own agent blew them up.
And then, eerily, a report appeared written weeks earlier by frustrated military officers which argued that intelligence collection and analysis in Afghanistan is grossly inadequate.
Maj-Gen Michael Flynn and Capt Matt Pottinger wrote that the US intelligence community "is only marginally relevant to strategy" in Afghanistan.
They wrote that "the vast intelligence apparatus is unable to answer fundamental questions about the environment in which US and allied forces operate and the people they seek to persuade".
The officers released the report not through their chain of command but through a private think tank, which lent it a curiously devastating impact.
So, in the course of a few months we have seen accounts of intelligence failures at the operational, analytical, and systemic level - all on garish public display.
For the Obama administration, all this is rather corrosive. It may be unreasonable, even unfair, to blame the president for the failure of Dutch security officers to stop an alleged would-be suicide bomber. But that is what will happen.
Political priority
Mr Obama is a Democrat, and Democrats seem perennially vulnerable to accusations of weakness on national security from their political opponents.
Consider this: weeks after Mr Obama announced 30,000 more troops would fight in Afghanistan, former Vice-President Dick Cheney accused him of "trying to pretend we are not at war".
The accusation, strange though it seems, continues to bounce around the internet echo chamber.
Towards the end of Mr Obama's speech on Thursday, he sought to recapture a sense of leadership and purpose in his national security policy.
"We will strengthen our defences but we will not succumb to a siege mentality that sacrifices the open society and liberties and values that we cherish as Americans," he said.
Bombings and intelligence failures have rammed national security back to the heart of America's political debate as we enter this election year.
Treacherous times for America's spies and the leaders who are accountable for their actions and their failures
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Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab's trial will be another important test case of America's ability to try terrorist suspects in civilian courts.
It should all go well - just as the trial of Richard Reid and Zacarias Moussaoui proceeded without incident.
But the Christmas Day bomb attempt is clearly asking pointed questions of America's ability to defend itself, and the contribution made to that defence by its spies.
Scattered info
US President Barack Obama said on Thursday that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab boarded that plane at Schiphol airport in Amsterdam because of failures in America's intelligence system.
John Brennan
The intelligence fell through the cracks. This happened in more than one organisation.
John Brennan
Deputy National Security Adviser for Homeland Security
But his words strongly suggested he believes the intelligence system is not fatally flawed, rather it just needs strengthening.
"The US government had the information scattered throughout the system 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 we already had."
Indeed, information about Mr Abdulmutallab - his radical leanings, his presence in Yemen, his contacts with extremist clerics - was in numerous US intelligence system databases.
But those fragments of knowledge floated on a huge tide of intelligence that swirls through the system every day. They never came together to form a coherent picture.
Familiar ring
All this sounds rather familiar. Was it not this inability to "connect the dots" that led to 9/11? No, says John Brennan, the president's counter-terrorism adviser.
He told journalists that before 9/11, information was jealously guarded by different intelligence agencies, and never shared.
Today, information sharing is not the problem, he insisted.
Instruction sign inside a body scanner at Schiphol airport
It may be unreasonable, even unfair, to blame the president for the failure of Dutch security officers to stop an alleged would-be suicide bomber. But that is what will happen.
In fact, so much information moves through the intelligence apparatus that analysts complain of feeling swamped and the bright little shards of knowledge that could prevent a plot from materialising can get lost.
"The intelligence fell through the cracks. This happened in more than one organisation. This contributed to the larger failure to connect the fragments of intelligence that could have revealed the plot, Abdulmutallab's extremist views, AQAP's (al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula) involvement with the Nigerian, its desire to strike the US homeland."
Mr Brennan draws a fine distinction between two sorts of bureaucratic failure. And it is perhaps a distinction that many Americans will find hard to grasp.
It may also be difficult for President Obama to convince Americans that yet another series of tweaks to the intelligence bureaucracy are an adequate response to the latest attempt on US lives.
Winslow Wheeler, an analyst at the Center for Defense Information in Washington, writes that the bureaucratic approach is horribly flawed.
"You see, no-one is responsible for the mistake," he says. "It is processes that need changing, right?"
"When you want to pretend to reform something, fiddle with the organisational chart, which relieves the people who should be held accountable, earns you their praise for being oh-so-wise, and gets you to the next screw up."
Intelligence under attack
US intelligence has been bloodied in any number of ways in the last few weeks. Seven CIA officers lost their lives when an operation they were running in Afghanistan went horribly wrong and their own agent blew them up.
And then, eerily, a report appeared written weeks earlier by frustrated military officers which argued that intelligence collection and analysis in Afghanistan is grossly inadequate.
Maj-Gen Michael Flynn and Capt Matt Pottinger wrote that the US intelligence community "is only marginally relevant to strategy" in Afghanistan.
They wrote that "the vast intelligence apparatus is unable to answer fundamental questions about the environment in which US and allied forces operate and the people they seek to persuade".
The officers released the report not through their chain of command but through a private think tank, which lent it a curiously devastating impact.
So, in the course of a few months we have seen accounts of intelligence failures at the operational, analytical, and systemic level - all on garish public display.
For the Obama administration, all this is rather corrosive. It may be unreasonable, even unfair, to blame the president for the failure of Dutch security officers to stop an alleged would-be suicide bomber. But that is what will happen.
Political priority
Mr Obama is a Democrat, and Democrats seem perennially vulnerable to accusations of weakness on national security from their political opponents.
Consider this: weeks after Mr Obama announced 30,000 more troops would fight in Afghanistan, former Vice-President Dick Cheney accused him of "trying to pretend we are not at war".
The accusation, strange though it seems, continues to bounce around the internet echo chamber.
Towards the end of Mr Obama's speech on Thursday, he sought to recapture a sense of leadership and purpose in his national security policy.
"We will strengthen our defences but we will not succumb to a siege mentality that sacrifices the open society and liberties and values that we cherish as Americans," he said.
Bombings and intelligence failures have rammed national security back to the heart of America's political debate as we enter this election year.
Treacherous times for America's spies and the leaders who are accountable for their actions and their failures
source-http://news.bbc.co.uk
President Obama thought he had problems in 2009. But 2010 could be tougher.
One reason is that an issue that had seemed dormant—terrorism—suddenly erupted again when Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab allegedly tried to blow up an airplane over Detroit on Christmas Day. The attempt failed, but the incident showed that the terrorist threat remains real and that airline security can be shockingly weak. Obama, vacationing in Hawaii, told reporters that his administration had begun "a full investigation" and urged Americans to be both "confident" and "vigilant." He declared, "We will continue to use every element of our national power to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat the violent extremists who threaten us." Later, he conceded that the incident represented "systemic failure" and promised that his administration would do better.
All this represented an attempt by Obama to show that he was engaged and ready to protect the homeland. He knows that the image of being weak on defense has been a Democratic vulnerability and that the incident could raise new doubts.
More broadly, the attempted bombing placed still another urgent issue on Obama's already enormous agenda. First, he hopes to get healthcare legislation through Congress quickly, but the House and Senate must reconcile different approaches to the issue. And even if they do, as expected, Republicans plan to make it a campaign issue in November. GOP strategists plan to assault Democrats and Obama as advocates of higher taxes, too much government activism, and crippling deficits. Clearly, healthcare has deepened the partisan schism. The Senate bill passed 60 to 39 without a single Republican vote on Christmas Eve. Earlier, the House passed its version with only one GOP supporter. So far, the public sides with the GOP: A Quinnipiac University poll in late December found that 53 percent of voters disapproved of the Congress's direction on healthcare and only 36 percent supported it.
White House strategists say the healthcare overhaul bill will find favor with voters once the president and congressional Democrats explain it more clearly. Obama argues that his proposals will make healthcare more affordable, limit unpopular insurance company practices such as refusing coverage for those with pre-existing conditions, and cover millions who are now uninsured. "This is somebody who believed that for a long time we hadn't addressed the problems that our society was facing, and to do that we were going to have to make some tough decisions," says White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs.
Adds another White House official: "The president has done a series of very difficult things" during his first year, including healthcare and "bringing the economy back from the brink" with the $787 billion stimulus bill and bailouts of the financial and auto industries. In foreign policy, he is phasing out U.S. participation in Iraq but also escalating the war in Afghanistan by sending in an additional 30,000 troops while announcing planned withdrawals there.
Obama also intends to ask Congress to revamp energy laws to limit climate change and promote a "green," more energy-efficient economy, and he will again face a wall of GOP opposition.
Probably the biggest challenge will be lowering the unemployment rate, now hovering at 10 percent nationally with higher rates in many cities and states. Aides say Obama will make job creation his first priority once healthcare is resolved, and he hopes to focus on joblessness as the principal theme of his State of the Union address. Among the ideas under consideration are more federal assistance to small businesses, additional billions of dollars for infrastructure, and more aid to homeowners to make their homes more energy efficient.
As political analyst Rhodes Cook points out, Obama's approval rating has dropped further than that of any other newly elected president, at least since Gallup began tracking such things in the late 1930s. It dropped 21 points, from 68 percent approval in January to 47 percent in early December. No other president's ratings have declined more than 10 points in his first year.
Republican pollster Ed Goeas says the new year may reflect " 'voter remorse' following the election of a president who made promises too big and had too little executive experience or the 'know-how' to make decisions to get the economy back on track." That remains to be seen. But certainly, 2010 could mark a rebuff of what Obama used to call "change you can believe in."
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One reason is that an issue that had seemed dormant—terrorism—suddenly erupted again when Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab allegedly tried to blow up an airplane over Detroit on Christmas Day. The attempt failed, but the incident showed that the terrorist threat remains real and that airline security can be shockingly weak. Obama, vacationing in Hawaii, told reporters that his administration had begun "a full investigation" and urged Americans to be both "confident" and "vigilant." He declared, "We will continue to use every element of our national power to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat the violent extremists who threaten us." Later, he conceded that the incident represented "systemic failure" and promised that his administration would do better.
All this represented an attempt by Obama to show that he was engaged and ready to protect the homeland. He knows that the image of being weak on defense has been a Democratic vulnerability and that the incident could raise new doubts.
More broadly, the attempted bombing placed still another urgent issue on Obama's already enormous agenda. First, he hopes to get healthcare legislation through Congress quickly, but the House and Senate must reconcile different approaches to the issue. And even if they do, as expected, Republicans plan to make it a campaign issue in November. GOP strategists plan to assault Democrats and Obama as advocates of higher taxes, too much government activism, and crippling deficits. Clearly, healthcare has deepened the partisan schism. The Senate bill passed 60 to 39 without a single Republican vote on Christmas Eve. Earlier, the House passed its version with only one GOP supporter. So far, the public sides with the GOP: A Quinnipiac University poll in late December found that 53 percent of voters disapproved of the Congress's direction on healthcare and only 36 percent supported it.
White House strategists say the healthcare overhaul bill will find favor with voters once the president and congressional Democrats explain it more clearly. Obama argues that his proposals will make healthcare more affordable, limit unpopular insurance company practices such as refusing coverage for those with pre-existing conditions, and cover millions who are now uninsured. "This is somebody who believed that for a long time we hadn't addressed the problems that our society was facing, and to do that we were going to have to make some tough decisions," says White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs.
Adds another White House official: "The president has done a series of very difficult things" during his first year, including healthcare and "bringing the economy back from the brink" with the $787 billion stimulus bill and bailouts of the financial and auto industries. In foreign policy, he is phasing out U.S. participation in Iraq but also escalating the war in Afghanistan by sending in an additional 30,000 troops while announcing planned withdrawals there.
Obama also intends to ask Congress to revamp energy laws to limit climate change and promote a "green," more energy-efficient economy, and he will again face a wall of GOP opposition.
Probably the biggest challenge will be lowering the unemployment rate, now hovering at 10 percent nationally with higher rates in many cities and states. Aides say Obama will make job creation his first priority once healthcare is resolved, and he hopes to focus on joblessness as the principal theme of his State of the Union address. Among the ideas under consideration are more federal assistance to small businesses, additional billions of dollars for infrastructure, and more aid to homeowners to make their homes more energy efficient.
As political analyst Rhodes Cook points out, Obama's approval rating has dropped further than that of any other newly elected president, at least since Gallup began tracking such things in the late 1930s. It dropped 21 points, from 68 percent approval in January to 47 percent in early December. No other president's ratings have declined more than 10 points in his first year.
Republican pollster Ed Goeas says the new year may reflect " 'voter remorse' following the election of a president who made promises too big and had too little executive experience or the 'know-how' to make decisions to get the economy back on track." That remains to be seen. But certainly, 2010 could mark a rebuff of what Obama used to call "change you can believe in."
source-http://www.usnews.com
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Christmas Day attempt to blow up a U.S. airliner embarrassed President Barack Obama and put him on the defensive, but there may be a silver lining for U.S. authorities, it may provide new intelligence on al Qaeda.
A Nigerian charged in the incident, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, spent months in Yemen and told investigators he had trained with al Qaeda militants who took refuge there to plot attacks against Americans.
The White House says he is already providing useful information. "Abdulmutallab spent a number of hours with FBI investigators in which we gleaned usable actionable intelligence," spokesman Robert Gibbs said on Tuesday.
Potentially facing decades in prison, the 23-year-old Abdulmutallab could try to cut a plea deal with prosecutors in exchange for information he has about other plots, where he trained in Yemen and details about al Qaeda members he met.
That could be valuable in light of reports that Abdulmutallab, who attempted to blow up a transatlantic airliner as it approached Detroit, told investigators after he was captured that more attackers like him were on the way.
"We are continuing to look at ways that we can extract that information from him," Obama's top counterterrorism adviser John Brennan said on Sunday. "I think we have to assume that there are others out there."
However, Obama's Republican opponents -- led by former Vice President Dick Cheney -- have strongly opposed the idea of trying Abdulmutallab in a criminal court rather than a military tribunal, where looser interrogation rules apply.
They also have harshly criticized the idea of a plea deal.
"The administration's treatment could afford a murderous terrorist the opportunity to negotiate a plea bargain and a lesser punishment -- and that is not acceptable," said Rep. Eric Cantor, a top Republican in the House of Representatives.
Even with a plea deal, that would not necessarily mean that Abdulmutallab would get a lighter sentence. Convicted shoe bomber Richard Reid pleaded guilty and will be incarcerated for the rest of his life in a U.S. prison.
"Individuals in the past have, in fact, given us very valuable information as they've gone through the plea agreement process," Brennan said.
WHAT DOES HE REALLY KNOW?
Abdulmutallab was quick to tell investigators that he had trained in Yemen with al Qaeda operatives and they had given him the bomb and instructions on how to detonate it aboard the Detroit-bound jumbo jet, U.S. officials said.
Now he has a court-appointed lawyer who can help him navigate the U.S. legal system and potentially bargain for any other information he possesses, if indeed he has any.
One former counterterrorism official expressed some skepticism about what the young man can tell investigators about al Qaeda in Yemen because he was a foot soldier rather than a leader and al Qaeda is made up of many separate cells.
Also he could offer old information or details designed to misdirect U.S. authorities.
"They're going to do everything they can to glean information," said Rick Nelson, director at the Center for Strategic and International Studies Homeland Security Program. "I just don't see this guy helping us that much."
"The best this guy might be able to do is lead U.S. intelligence and law enforcement to the people he dealt with directly, but it's not going to lead up the chain of command to a long line of senior al Qaeda leaders," he said.
While Republicans have criticized the Obama administration's decision to pursue charges against Abdulmutallab in a U.S. criminal court rather than a military tribunal, that route has seen some recent success.
In October, American David Headley was initially charged in a federal criminal court for plotting and scouting targets for an attack on a Danish newspaper that published cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad in 2005, which offended many Muslims.
After he was arrested at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport, he began cooperating with investigators and revealed that he had also helped scout targets in the 2008 Mumbai attacks for the Pakistani militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba -- the first American to be connected to that attack.
His cooperation led U.S. authorities to charge him for his alleged role in that attack, in which six Americans died, as well as providing new details about how an American was recruited, potentially helping deal with a new fear: the radicalization of Americans sympathetic to such causes.
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A Nigerian charged in the incident, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, spent months in Yemen and told investigators he had trained with al Qaeda militants who took refuge there to plot attacks against Americans.
The White House says he is already providing useful information. "Abdulmutallab spent a number of hours with FBI investigators in which we gleaned usable actionable intelligence," spokesman Robert Gibbs said on Tuesday.
Potentially facing decades in prison, the 23-year-old Abdulmutallab could try to cut a plea deal with prosecutors in exchange for information he has about other plots, where he trained in Yemen and details about al Qaeda members he met.
That could be valuable in light of reports that Abdulmutallab, who attempted to blow up a transatlantic airliner as it approached Detroit, told investigators after he was captured that more attackers like him were on the way.
"We are continuing to look at ways that we can extract that information from him," Obama's top counterterrorism adviser John Brennan said on Sunday. "I think we have to assume that there are others out there."
However, Obama's Republican opponents -- led by former Vice President Dick Cheney -- have strongly opposed the idea of trying Abdulmutallab in a criminal court rather than a military tribunal, where looser interrogation rules apply.
They also have harshly criticized the idea of a plea deal.
"The administration's treatment could afford a murderous terrorist the opportunity to negotiate a plea bargain and a lesser punishment -- and that is not acceptable," said Rep. Eric Cantor, a top Republican in the House of Representatives.
Even with a plea deal, that would not necessarily mean that Abdulmutallab would get a lighter sentence. Convicted shoe bomber Richard Reid pleaded guilty and will be incarcerated for the rest of his life in a U.S. prison.
"Individuals in the past have, in fact, given us very valuable information as they've gone through the plea agreement process," Brennan said.
WHAT DOES HE REALLY KNOW?
Abdulmutallab was quick to tell investigators that he had trained in Yemen with al Qaeda operatives and they had given him the bomb and instructions on how to detonate it aboard the Detroit-bound jumbo jet, U.S. officials said.
Now he has a court-appointed lawyer who can help him navigate the U.S. legal system and potentially bargain for any other information he possesses, if indeed he has any.
One former counterterrorism official expressed some skepticism about what the young man can tell investigators about al Qaeda in Yemen because he was a foot soldier rather than a leader and al Qaeda is made up of many separate cells.
Also he could offer old information or details designed to misdirect U.S. authorities.
"They're going to do everything they can to glean information," said Rick Nelson, director at the Center for Strategic and International Studies Homeland Security Program. "I just don't see this guy helping us that much."
"The best this guy might be able to do is lead U.S. intelligence and law enforcement to the people he dealt with directly, but it's not going to lead up the chain of command to a long line of senior al Qaeda leaders," he said.
While Republicans have criticized the Obama administration's decision to pursue charges against Abdulmutallab in a U.S. criminal court rather than a military tribunal, that route has seen some recent success.
In October, American David Headley was initially charged in a federal criminal court for plotting and scouting targets for an attack on a Danish newspaper that published cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad in 2005, which offended many Muslims.
After he was arrested at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport, he began cooperating with investigators and revealed that he had also helped scout targets in the 2008 Mumbai attacks for the Pakistani militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba -- the first American to be connected to that attack.
His cooperation led U.S. authorities to charge him for his alleged role in that attack, in which six Americans died, as well as providing new details about how an American was recruited, potentially helping deal with a new fear: the radicalization of Americans sympathetic to such causes.
SOURCE-http://www.reuters.com
* Al Qaeda group in Yemen says it gave Nigerian the bomb
* It says device failed on plane due to technical fault
* Obama faces political pressure over security threats (Adds U.S. TV report on images of bomb, paragraphs 8-9)
By Jeff Mason
KAILUA, Hawaii, Dec 28 (Reuters) - A wing of al Qaeda claimed responsibility on Monday for a failed Christmas Day attack on a U.S.-bound passenger plane, and President Barack Obama vowed to bring "every element" of U.S. power against those who threaten Americans' safety.
In a statement posted on Islamist websites, the group Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula said the attempt was to avenge U.S. attacks on its members in Yemen.
The group said it had provided the Nigerian suspect in the failed airliner bombing with a "technically advanced device" but that it did not detonate because of a technical fault.
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, is charged with smuggling explosives on board and attempting to blow up a Northwest Airlines flight as it approached Detroit from Amsterdam on Dec. 25 with almost 300 people on board.
Speaking during a vacation in Hawaii, Obama said, "We will not rest until we find all who were involved and hold them accountable."
"We will continue to use every element of our national power to disrupt, to dismantle and defeat the violent extremists who threaten us, whether they are from Afghanistan or Pakistan, Yemen or Somalia, or anywhere where they are plotting attacks against the U.S. homeland," Obama added.
Abdulmutallab, who had a valid U.S. visa issued before he was placed on a broad U.S. list of possible security threats, has told investigators that al Qaeda operatives in Yemen gave him an explosive device and taught him how to detonate it, officials said over the weekend.
ABC News broadcast what it described as U.S. government photos of the bomb Abdulmutallab is accused of smuggling aboard the flight in his underwear.
The images showed the slightly burned underwear with a packet of the high-explosive chemical PETN sewn into the crotch and a plastic syringe detonator, ABC said.
AL QAEDA IN YEMEN
The incident has put a spotlight on the growing prominence of al Qaeda in Yemen, which the United States and Saudi Arabia fear will exploit instability in Yemen to stage attacks in the Saudi kingdom, the world's largest oil exporter, and beyond.
The United States quietly has been supplying military equipment, intelligence and training to Yemeni forces, who have raided suspected al Qaeda hide-outs this month, U.S. defense and counterterrorism officials said. [ID:nN28154817]
In a worrisome development for U.S. security, officials have discovered that Abdulmutallab's father warned them of his son's growing radicalism, but the information failed to prevent his traveling to the United States on a two-year visa issued June 16, 2008.
Obama said that as a result of this oversight, he had ordered a thorough review of the screening process.
"We need to determine just how the suspect was able to bring dangerous explosives aboard an aircraft and what additional steps we can take to thwart future attacks," Obama said.
Obama is under pressure from opposition Republicans who have been critical of his response to the Christmas Day scare and have questioned whether his administration is doing enough to contain security threats.
His administration admitted on Monday that the incident represented a failure of air security.
'FAILED MISERABLY'
Asked on NBC's "Today" show if the security system "failed miserably," U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano replied, "It did."
On Sunday, Napolitano said the system to protect air travel worked, but in appearances on news shows on Monday she said she had meant that the response to alert other flights and airports and impose immediate new safety procedures had been effective.
Abdulmutallab was overpowered by passengers and crew on Northwest Airlines Flight 253 after setting alight an explosive device. He was treated for burns and is in federal prison awaiting trial.
Airline stocks fell on Monday as the United States tightened airline security after the incident. AMR Corp (AMR.N), the parent of American Airlines, lost 4.8 percent to $7.75. Shares of Delta (DAL.N), the parent of Northwest, were down 4.1 percent to $11.29. [ID:nN28168827]
The U.S. Transportation Security Administration did not give details of its new security measures. But air travelers described new restrictions on flights headed for the United States, including additional preflight screening, and -- an hour before landing -- a ban on movement around the cabin and on having items such as blankets on passengers' laps.
The agency has since given pilots and flight crews discretion to ease these in-flight restrictions, a source familiar with the TSA rules said on Monday.
Dutch airport authorities said they planned to make new, more sensitive passenger scanners mandatory after Abdulmutallab allegedly smuggled the explosives in his underwear through Schiphol Airport security. [ID:nLDE5BR0V2] (Additional reporting by Firouz Sedarat in Dubai, Debbie Charles, Adam Entous and Patricia Zengerle in Washington and Bernie Woodall in Detroit; Chuck Mikolajczak in New York and Camillus Eboh in Abuja; Writing by Jackie Frank, editing by Frances Kerry, Doina Chiacu and Will Dunham)
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* It says device failed on plane due to technical fault
* Obama faces political pressure over security threats (Adds U.S. TV report on images of bomb, paragraphs 8-9)
By Jeff Mason
KAILUA, Hawaii, Dec 28 (Reuters) - A wing of al Qaeda claimed responsibility on Monday for a failed Christmas Day attack on a U.S.-bound passenger plane, and President Barack Obama vowed to bring "every element" of U.S. power against those who threaten Americans' safety.
In a statement posted on Islamist websites, the group Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula said the attempt was to avenge U.S. attacks on its members in Yemen.
The group said it had provided the Nigerian suspect in the failed airliner bombing with a "technically advanced device" but that it did not detonate because of a technical fault.
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, is charged with smuggling explosives on board and attempting to blow up a Northwest Airlines flight as it approached Detroit from Amsterdam on Dec. 25 with almost 300 people on board.
Speaking during a vacation in Hawaii, Obama said, "We will not rest until we find all who were involved and hold them accountable."
"We will continue to use every element of our national power to disrupt, to dismantle and defeat the violent extremists who threaten us, whether they are from Afghanistan or Pakistan, Yemen or Somalia, or anywhere where they are plotting attacks against the U.S. homeland," Obama added.
Abdulmutallab, who had a valid U.S. visa issued before he was placed on a broad U.S. list of possible security threats, has told investigators that al Qaeda operatives in Yemen gave him an explosive device and taught him how to detonate it, officials said over the weekend.
ABC News broadcast what it described as U.S. government photos of the bomb Abdulmutallab is accused of smuggling aboard the flight in his underwear.
The images showed the slightly burned underwear with a packet of the high-explosive chemical PETN sewn into the crotch and a plastic syringe detonator, ABC said.
AL QAEDA IN YEMEN
The incident has put a spotlight on the growing prominence of al Qaeda in Yemen, which the United States and Saudi Arabia fear will exploit instability in Yemen to stage attacks in the Saudi kingdom, the world's largest oil exporter, and beyond.
The United States quietly has been supplying military equipment, intelligence and training to Yemeni forces, who have raided suspected al Qaeda hide-outs this month, U.S. defense and counterterrorism officials said. [ID:nN28154817]
In a worrisome development for U.S. security, officials have discovered that Abdulmutallab's father warned them of his son's growing radicalism, but the information failed to prevent his traveling to the United States on a two-year visa issued June 16, 2008.
Obama said that as a result of this oversight, he had ordered a thorough review of the screening process.
"We need to determine just how the suspect was able to bring dangerous explosives aboard an aircraft and what additional steps we can take to thwart future attacks," Obama said.
Obama is under pressure from opposition Republicans who have been critical of his response to the Christmas Day scare and have questioned whether his administration is doing enough to contain security threats.
His administration admitted on Monday that the incident represented a failure of air security.
'FAILED MISERABLY'
Asked on NBC's "Today" show if the security system "failed miserably," U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano replied, "It did."
On Sunday, Napolitano said the system to protect air travel worked, but in appearances on news shows on Monday she said she had meant that the response to alert other flights and airports and impose immediate new safety procedures had been effective.
Abdulmutallab was overpowered by passengers and crew on Northwest Airlines Flight 253 after setting alight an explosive device. He was treated for burns and is in federal prison awaiting trial.
Airline stocks fell on Monday as the United States tightened airline security after the incident. AMR Corp (AMR.N), the parent of American Airlines, lost 4.8 percent to $7.75. Shares of Delta (DAL.N), the parent of Northwest, were down 4.1 percent to $11.29. [ID:nN28168827]
The U.S. Transportation Security Administration did not give details of its new security measures. But air travelers described new restrictions on flights headed for the United States, including additional preflight screening, and -- an hour before landing -- a ban on movement around the cabin and on having items such as blankets on passengers' laps.
The agency has since given pilots and flight crews discretion to ease these in-flight restrictions, a source familiar with the TSA rules said on Monday.
Dutch airport authorities said they planned to make new, more sensitive passenger scanners mandatory after Abdulmutallab allegedly smuggled the explosives in his underwear through Schiphol Airport security. [ID:nLDE5BR0V2] (Additional reporting by Firouz Sedarat in Dubai, Debbie Charles, Adam Entous and Patricia Zengerle in Washington and Bernie Woodall in Detroit; Chuck Mikolajczak in New York and Camillus Eboh in Abuja; Writing by Jackie Frank, editing by Frances Kerry, Doina Chiacu and Will Dunham)
source-http://www.reuters.com
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ABC News adds, "The man said he was directed by al Qaeda to explode a small device in flight, over U.S. soil... Authorities have no corroboration of that information, and the credibility of the suspect's statements are being questioned, officials said." The AP says that the passenger was trying to set off firecrackers; also, President Obama, who is on vacation, was notified of the incident.
The plane was carrying 278 passengers. The Detroit Free-Press reports, "Syed Jafry of Holland, Mich., said people ran out of their seats to tackle the man. Jafry was sitting in the 16th row when he heard 'a pop and saw some smoke and fire.'...He said the way passengers responded made him proud to be an American."
source-http://gothamist.com/2009/12/25/us_official_plane_passenger_tried_t.php
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From NBC's Mark Murray and Domenico Montanaro
Yesterday, we listed our Top 10 political downfalls of the decade. Today, in the Christmas spirit, we look at the risers -- today's prominent politicians (many with bright futures), who we didn't know at the beginning of the decade. This was a harder list to come up with than our downfall one. Below are our thoughts. What are yours?
1. Barack Obama: Need we say more?
2. Sarah Palin: You could make an argument that she deserves to be on our downfall list instead -- given her resignation earlier this year -- but going from the mayor of Wasilla, to Alaska governor, then to the GOP's vice presidential nominee in 2008 is a quite a rise. Not to mention, she has quite the influence with activist conservatives, and did we mention she's now a millionaire? No matter if Palin never runs for the presidency, she is the nation's biggest political celebrity, other than Obama of course.
3. Bobby Jindal: Yes, he had a bad response to Obama’s State of the Union, but the Rhodes Scholar is just 38 years old. Chalk it up as a MINOR setback for his national ambitions. He has a reputation for being a good executive, has lots of money in the bank, and represents something that’s currently lacking in the Republican Party -- diversity.
4. Chuck Schumer: While he first got elected in the '90s (1998), there’s probably no Democrat with more skins on the wall. How many total Senate seats did he help Democrats pick up as head of the DSCC again? (The answer is 14.) There's no doubt about it: He’s the rising star of the Senate. And chew on this... If Harry Reid loses his re-election, and Dems hold their majority, Schumer vs. Durbin would be an interesting race for majority leader, no?
5. Marco Rubio: Some might say he's too high on this list -- and he still has a difficult primary to win -- but Rubio has instantly turned into a conservative star in his Senate fight against Charlie Crist. Conservatives see him as the GOP version of Barack Obama. But first, he's got to beat Crist, which won't be easy...
6. John Thune: He was a little-known South Dakota congressman at the beginning of the decade. He ran against Sen. Tim Johnson (D) and lost -- barely. Then he ran again and beat Democratic Senate leader Tom Daschle. And now he is one of the Republican Party's biggest (and most telegenic) stars. Will he run for president in 2012?
7. Eric Cantor: No current Republican congressman has risen so far, so fast. Elected just nine years ago, Cantor now serves as the No. 2 figure in the House leadership. He is just 46.
8. Tim Kaine: Kaine began the decade as a little-known mayor of Richmond and as then lieutenant governor. But his 2005 gubernatorial victory in Virginia ended up serving as a model for future Democratic campaigns in 2006 to 2008. And that win -- as well as his three-plus years as governor -- catapulted him as VP finalist last year. He's now the chairman of the Democratic National Committee. What's next?
9. Bob McDonnell: As was the case with Kaine's gubernatorial victory in Virginia in 2005, Republican Bob McDonnell -- who won this year's VA Gov contest -- has become an instant star in his party. And assuming he enjoys success as governor, McDonnell will be an automatic VP possibility (or higher?), given that Virginia is a must-win presidential battleground state for Republicans.
10. Brian Schweitzer: He started the decade narrowly losing a Senate race against GOP incumbent Conrad Burns. He then became governor of Montana in 2004. Will the bolo-tie-wearing governor run for president in 2016? He's 54.
Honorable Mentions: Paul Ryan, Jon Huntsman, Claire McCaskill, Mark Warner, Jim Webb.
source:http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2009/12/23/2159690.asx
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The internet as the Boy Who Cried Wolf.
That's what this situation reminds me of, as I see that the number one search term on Google right now is "Brittany Murphy Death Hoax." I spend a fair amount of time looking at the Trends, and I can tell you that 9 out of 10 times you see an "X-celebrity is dead" trend appear, it's a hoax. Britney Spears, Will Smith, and others have all suffered mostly web-based rumors of their untimely demises. I'm predicting a much wider freak-out the first time a fake "barack obama dead" trend jumps to the top of the list.
If this was a hoax, it would be would have uncovered by now. Or one would think so, but given our experience with "Balloon Boy," we know easily the media can be totally fooled, if only for a few days.
But this is nothing like that. I think sane celebrities know that committing a hoax like this would anger the public and media, not endearing them to anyone. And there's no reason to believe Brittany Murphy would do something like this.
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President Obama Hails Senate Health Care Bill as Ben Nelson Jumps on Board
Saturday, December 19, 2009
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How did Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson come on board for health care deal?
The Senate health care bill will reduce the deficit by $132 billion over the next 10 years and will cost $871 billion over the same time period, according to the CBO report released today. The revised health care bill would expand coverage to about 94 percent of eligible Americans under age 65, excluding illegal immigrants.
President Obama today hailed the legislation as "the largest deficit reduction plan in a decade," and praised the changes for making the health care bill stronge
source: http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/HealthCare/senator-ben-nelson-approves-health-care-bill-obama/story?id=938104
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summit and his attempts that brokered a US-BASIC political deal was hailed by Congress leaders here as "commendable".
Top Congressional leaders praised Obama for reaching a "breakthrough" agreement with China, India, Brazil and South Africa but said this is just a beginning to advance climate change objectives.
"The President's personal involvement, and the efforts of Secretary (Hillary) Clinton and her negotiating team, have been extremely focused and commendable," House Majority Leader Steny H Hoyer said.
US brokered a political deal with India and three other emerging economies over non-legally-binding emission cuts which was rejected by an overwhelming number of developing nations which called it one-sided and "suicidal".
However, Congress leaders, in their initial reactions said the "breakthrough," including transparency measures, a mitigation target of two degree Celsius and a financing
mechanism, was "an important step forward that lays a key marker both in the global fight against climate change and in US participation in such efforts".
As consensus for a deal to tackle climate change eluded the 12-day Conference of Parties (COP), Obama pushed for a pact during parleys that went down to the wire.
Terming it as a bold agreement, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said this will help secure a safer, cleaner and more prosperous future for the world.
"This Copenhagen Accord was made possible by strong US leadership and recent investments in our national energy policies. This agreement was also aided by constructive engagement with the world community - a result of President Obama's leadership," he said.
"This is a significant and historic agreement, but there is more negotiating and trust building to do before there is a treaty for the Senate to review," Reid said.
Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the US House of Representatives, said: "The agreement... could not have been reached without President Obama's active involvement and leadership".
Senator Barbara Boxer, Chairman of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, said for the first time, the world's major emitting countries, including China and India, have committed to specific actions to cut emissions.
American leadership, especially Obama's personal engagement, fundamentally changed the dynamic at the global warming talks, she said.
With Obama on his way back from Copenhagen, the American media said the deal falls short of key goals, even though it could be considered as a breakthrough by some.
"The deal falls far short of many countries' expectations for the summit and leaves a comprehensive battle plan for climate change potentially years away," said The Washington Post in its news dispatch from Copenhagen.
The Wall Street Journal
said Obama's very presence made a "significant breakthrough a political imperative, no matter how flimsy".
"The agreement addresses many of the issues that leaders came here to settle. But it has left many of the participants in the climate talks unhappy, from the Europeans, who now have the only binding carbon control regime
in the world, to the delegates from the poorest nations, who objected to being left out of the critical negotiations," The New York Times said.
The Post said, the deal, under which each country needs only to list its current domestic pledges for emissions reductions and to promise to allow monitoring of their progress, sparked a rebellion among vulnerable nations.
"No doubt under the agreement China will continue to get a free climate pass despite its role as the world's No 1 emitter," it said.
The accord, The New York Times, said provides a system for monitoring and reporting progress toward national pollution reduction goals, a compromise on an issue over which China bargained hard.
"But it was an equivocal agreement that was, to many, a disappointing conclusion to a two-year process that had the goal of producing a comprehensive and enforceable action plan for addressing dangerous changes to the global climate," it said.
Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/us/Obamas-leadership-at-Copenhagen-hailed-back-home/articleshow/5356176.s
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