Cavalier attitude about security costs us.

http://tinyurl.com/yztasxk
Key security agencies lack permanent leaders
By EILEEN SULLIVAN, Associated Press****Of course, a permanent appointment like the clueless Napolitano is even worse!****
WASHINGTON – Two federal agencies charged with keeping potential terrorists off airplanes and out of the country have been without their top leaders for nearly a year. It took the Obama administration more than eight months to nominate anyone to lead the Transportation Security Administration and the Customs and Border Protection agency.
President Barack Obama has ordered a review of U.S. security policies following the failed Christmas Day attack on a Detroit-bound flight from Amsterdam. He vowed Monday to "do everything that we can to keep America safe."
The acting heads of the TSA and CBP — both created in response to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks — will be at the forefront of these efforts.
Bogged down with health care reform, the Senate has yet to set a date to hold hearings for the Customs position. And Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., has placed a hold on the president's choice to head the TSA over the senator's concern that the new leader would let TSA screeners join a labor union. This has some Democrats blaming politics for the vacancy.****Letting screeners join a labor union???? Insanity!!!****...able to sneak an explosive device aboard his flight from Amsterdam to Detroit, only to be thwarted by the device's apparent failure to work as designed, and aggressive action by other passengers. Abdulmutallab was not on the government's terrorist watch list — though he was on a less sensitive and broader database. He was able to maintain a valid U.S. visa despite warnings about him to U.S. embassy officials in Nigeria from his father.****What the hell is wrong with the U.S. State Department? The U.K. denied this guy a re-entry visa to return to Britain although he had an expensive apartment in the West End of London.**** ...officials have begun to assemble information related to watch list procedures....
"Running a security agency with a revolving door is a recipe for failure," said Rep. John Mica, R-Fla. Abdulmutallab,..., is being held at the federal prison in Milan, Mich. A court hearing that had been scheduled for Monday to determine whether the government can get DNA from him was postponed until Jan. 8.****Why is this guy treated as a criminal and "lawyered up" with a public defender and not subjected to interrogation as a terrorist and enemy combatant? Even w/o "enhanced interrogation" much information about his ties and associates could have been obtained in the hours right after his arrest.****
U.S. officials had warning signs that Abdulmutallab might be a threat.
The embassy visit in which Abdulmutallab's father said he was concerned about his son's radicalization triggered a Nov. 20 State Department cable from Nigeria to all U.S. diplomatic missions and department headquarters in Washington. It was also shared with the interagency National Counter Terrorism Center,...landed Abdulmutallab among the about 550,000 names in the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment database, known as TIDE, which is maintained by the NCTC. Other, smaller lists trigger additional airport screening or other restrictions, but intelligence officials said there wasn't enough information to move Abdulmutallab into those categories.****"wasn't enough info?" Enough negative points might be an argument but the mere absence of information might lead one to conclude that the benefit of the doubt should NOT be given to a potential terrorist. What is merely inconvenience for an individual has to be balanced with possible death for many others.****
The NCTC, which has responsibility if any visas are to be pulled over terrorism concerns, then reviewed the information and found it was "insufficient to determine whether his visa should be revoked," Kelly said....Abdulmutallab had spent a year in (Yemen) from 2004-2005...also was in Yemen from August until early December of this year. Yemen, the ancestral home of Osama bin Laden's family, has been an al-Qaida haven...A Yemen-based group, Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, has claimed responsibility for Abdulmutallab's actions...