Friday, December 17, 2010
Transportation Security?
This story virtually screams that the much-maligned TSA screening process at our airports is, as many have maintained, more theater than actual security.
Assuming that the Department of Homeland Security is actually interested in protecting Americans, as opposed to merely keeping up appearances and growing a bureaucracy filled with mindless robots, it also suggests that Secretary Napolitano should immediately either begin work on developing an effective (and hopefully more focused) screening process or resign so that the President can appoint someone up to the job. (Whether Mr. Obama would actually do that is another question.)
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Assuming that the Department of Homeland Security is actually interested in protecting Americans, as opposed to merely keeping up appearances and growing a bureaucracy filled with mindless robots, it also suggests that Secretary Napolitano should immediately either begin work on developing an effective (and hopefully more focused) screening process or resign so that the President can appoint someone up to the job. (Whether Mr. Obama would actually do that is another question.)
Labels: Airlines, Homeland Security, Law Enforcement, Napolitano, Obama, TSA
Wednesday, September 08, 2010
Basic Math
There are somewhere around 1.6 billion Muslims worldwide. It is unknown how many of them are radicalized. That fraction has been estimated by the Gallup organization to be seven percent. If only one percent of them are radical Islamists, that means there are 16 million people our there who want to destroy western civilization and replace it with a worldwide Caliphate. This number is roughly equivalent to the population of the Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana metropolitan area.
China's People's Liberation Army is the largest military force in the world, with approximately 3 million members. The armed forces of the United States (Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard) comprise approximately 1.42 million members. That said, numbers don't mean much because the radical Islamists, however many there are, do not engage in conventional warfare. I'm only giving those statistics to provide comparisons so that readers can get their heads around the concept of 16 million people in some concrete way, and give some idea of how big organizations that most would describe as "mighty" are.
Now we have Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf (of Ground Zero Mosque fame) saying on CNN that if said mosque is not built at the proposed site, national security could be at risk due to an explosion of anger in the Muslim world. That sounds like a veiled threat to me.
According to the CIA Factbook, the Muslim population of the United States in 2009 was approximately 1,843,ooo. Assuming the one percent is an accurate estimate of the fraction of Muslims that are radicalized and assuming further that the radicalized element is evenly distributed throughout the Muslim community (the latter assumption admittedly being pretty iffy), the number of radicalized Muslims in the United States would therefore be in the vicinity of 18,440 persons. By comparison, it is estimated that there are 8,000 to 10,000 members of the notorious MS13 gang in the United States (presumably including those incarcerated). If even ten percent of the estimated radicalized Islamists in the US are "sleepers" who are waiting for orders from elsewhere to commit acts of terrorism, that means there are approximately 2,000 individuals ready, willing and able to wreak vengeance on the US for any real or imagined slight of Islam, whether it takes the form of Koran burning or blocking the construction of the Ground Zero Mosque.
I hope the FBI and other law enforcement organizations are on their toes, as I fear they'll be busy in the near future.
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China's People's Liberation Army is the largest military force in the world, with approximately 3 million members. The armed forces of the United States (Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard) comprise approximately 1.42 million members. That said, numbers don't mean much because the radical Islamists, however many there are, do not engage in conventional warfare. I'm only giving those statistics to provide comparisons so that readers can get their heads around the concept of 16 million people in some concrete way, and give some idea of how big organizations that most would describe as "mighty" are.
Now we have Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf (of Ground Zero Mosque fame) saying on CNN that if said mosque is not built at the proposed site, national security could be at risk due to an explosion of anger in the Muslim world. That sounds like a veiled threat to me.
According to the CIA Factbook, the Muslim population of the United States in 2009 was approximately 1,843,ooo. Assuming the one percent is an accurate estimate of the fraction of Muslims that are radicalized and assuming further that the radicalized element is evenly distributed throughout the Muslim community (the latter assumption admittedly being pretty iffy), the number of radicalized Muslims in the United States would therefore be in the vicinity of 18,440 persons. By comparison, it is estimated that there are 8,000 to 10,000 members of the notorious MS13 gang in the United States (presumably including those incarcerated). If even ten percent of the estimated radicalized Islamists in the US are "sleepers" who are waiting for orders from elsewhere to commit acts of terrorism, that means there are approximately 2,000 individuals ready, willing and able to wreak vengeance on the US for any real or imagined slight of Islam, whether it takes the form of Koran burning or blocking the construction of the Ground Zero Mosque.
I hope the FBI and other law enforcement organizations are on their toes, as I fear they'll be busy in the near future.
Labels: Ground Zero, Islam, Law Enforcement, Radical Islamists, Terrorisim
Thursday, July 29, 2010
The Arizona Injunction
OK, I admit that I haven't read Judge Bolton's opinion, but I have read the thoughts of people who a lot more knowledgeable about federal preemption law than I am. I agree with them that it appears that Judge Bolton bent over backward, ignoring the established rules for interpreting statutes, to find a reason to enjoin enforcement of the parts of Arizona's statute that would have the most effect on persons who are in the United States illegally.
I'm thankful that Gov. Brewer will be continuing the fight. The issue needs to be settled as soon as possible.
I'm hopeful that the 9th Circuit and eventually the Supreme Court will find in favor of States' rights to defend themselves when the Feds default on their legal obligation to do so.
I'm concerned that more decisions like Judge Bolton's will give rise to vigilantism that involves a lot more than just watching the border and reporting what appears to be illegal activity to the Border Patrol.
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I'm thankful that Gov. Brewer will be continuing the fight. The issue needs to be settled as soon as possible.
I'm hopeful that the 9th Circuit and eventually the Supreme Court will find in favor of States' rights to defend themselves when the Feds default on their legal obligation to do so.
I'm concerned that more decisions like Judge Bolton's will give rise to vigilantism that involves a lot more than just watching the border and reporting what appears to be illegal activity to the Border Patrol.
Labels: Arizona, Border Enforcement, Law Enforcement
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Lindsay Lohan Coverage
I realize that some people might actually care, and that the news networks need to fill airtime, but geez!
For the record, I think Ms. Lohan ought to be treated no better and no worse than Flo Schmo who works at Wal-Mart if she had behaved like Ms. Lohan. Except for the bit about segregation from the general jail population for her own safety.
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For the record, I think Ms. Lohan ought to be treated no better and no worse than Flo Schmo who works at Wal-Mart if she had behaved like Ms. Lohan. Except for the bit about segregation from the general jail population for her own safety.
Labels: Celebrities, Law Enforcement, Media inanity
