GovernmentExecutive.com

Have no fear, race fans -- well, at least not an inordinate amount of fear. The Indianapolis 500 may present an attractive target to terrorists, but there's no specific, credible threat to this year's race, the FBI and the Homeland Security Department say. Nevertheless, law enforcement and DHS officials, at the behest of Congress, are studying up on how to deal with potential threats to mass gatherings.

Federal employees are rarely represented on prime-time TV, but Tina Fey’s sitcom 30 Rock, normally devoted to the backstage lives of the cast and crew of a sketch comedy show, ended its second season Thursday with two executives played by Matthew Broderick and series star Alec Baldwin desperately trying to find a way out of political appointments with the Bush administration.

Baldwin’s character, exiled GE Executive Jack Donaghy, the newly minted "Homeland Security Director of Crisis and Weather Management," brightens up Broderick’s drab existence when he convinces the House Appropriations Committee to provide the department pens with actual caps. "I haven't felt this energized at work since the two weeks when they tried to teach us Farsi," Broderick enthuses.

But their enthusiasm is short-lived. Broderick explains sadly to Baldwin -- who is desperate to flee back to New York -- that "my boss wouldn't let you resign. They don't want people leaving here any more." So the two concoct a scheme of Lurita Doan-esque proportions to get themselves fired. FedBlog doesn’t post spoilers, but needless to say, the end result is a doozy. Check out the full episode on Hulu or the show’s site on NBC.com.

By the way, if you think this is a farfteched plot, consider this: Yesterday President Bush announced he would nominate Thomas D. Cairns to be the new chief human capital officer at Homeland Security. Cairns' previous position? Senior vice president with NBC Universal, responsible for human resources and labor relations. --Alyssa Rosenberg

A lot, in the comic book and feature film universe. In the new movie Iron Man, the titular character, Tony Stark, is contacted by a representative of a shadowy government organization that has great interest in his newfound capabilities to take down baddies. It's name? The Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division.

Interestingly, according to Wikipedia, in previous incarnations of Iron Man in the world of comics, the organization was known as Supreme Headquarters, International Espionage, Law-Enforcement Division and, later, Strategic Hazard Intervention, Espionage Logistics Directorate.

The varying names highlight the shift in national attention away from Communist cold warriors to the terrorists of the new millennium. But they all add up to the same apt acronym: SHIELD.

Ordinary citizens aren't the only ones who have been prevented from boarding flights because their names are similar to those on the government's no-fly list: It routinely happens to federal air marshals, the Washington Times reports. One air marshal called it a "major problem." In fact, earlier this month, the Federal Air Marshals Service had to issue a security directive to airline customer service representatives addressing the situation.

(Hat tip: BoingBoing)

Federal officials still working on the Gulf Coast recovery effort may be in for a kick in the pants. On Friday, President Bush named retired Marine Maj. Gen. Douglas V. O’Dell Jr., to be the new coordinator of the effort, replacing Donald E. Powell, who stepped down last month.

O'Dell immediately told the New York Times that his main concern was freeing up the $44 billion of the $120.7 billion authorized by Congress for reconstruction that hasn't been spent yet.

“The challenge for me is to get it out of the clutches of the bureaucracy,” he said. “I’m a muddy-boots marine. I’m about getting things done.”

Many times, information security problems aren't with the systems, but the people -- be they federal employees, contractors, or the managers who are supposed to monitor their work and keep higher-ups informed about potentially embarrassing incidents.

Such is the case the the news that three contract employees at the State Department poked through Barack Obama's passport files. Two of them were fired, and the other was disciplined, but didn't get canned.

The department's official position so far, expressed in a late-night conference call with reporters by spokesman Sean McCormack, is that this was merely a case of "imprudent curiosity." The department's inspector general will look into whether that's actually the case.

Obama's camp was quick to place blame on the Bush administration. "This is an outrageous breach of security and privacy, even from an administration that has shown little regard for either over the last eight years," said campaign spokesman Bill Burton.

The incidents took place on Jan. 9, Feb. 21, and March 14. But McCormack said senior State Department leaders only became aware of them yesterday. Which begs the question: Contract employees were fired for improperly accessing sensitive records on a high-profile presidential candidate, and no one thought of reporting it to the top brass for, in one case, more than two months?

"I will fully acknowledge that this information should have been passed up the line," said Patrick F. Kennedy, State's undersecretary for management, at last night's briefing. "It was dealt with at the office level where the incidents occurred by the office-level supervisors, who took immediate steps when they saw this. ... We have a very, very sophisticated computer tracking system that looks out for and looks out over the use of the computer, and when it sees anything that is potentially inappropriate, the computer calls it to the attention of the working-level supervisor. The system worked; it was called to their attention. They acted and -- but I will admit, they failed to pass the information up the chain to a sufficiently high level."

Will a former federal employee become the next American Idol? Chikezie Eze, who's among the finalists in this season's competition, is a former Transportation Security Administration screener at Los Angeles International Airport.

TSA reports that Raul Matute, Chikezie's former boss, says he was "a fun guy to have on staff." TSA notes that "during breaks or on his way to work in the bus, Chikezie would sing along with his iPod for everyone to enjoy."

Really? People "enjoyed" a guy -- even a guy of Chikezie's talent -- singing along with his iPod?

You can make up your own mind about Chikezie's ability -- and federal experience. Here he is talking about his work at TSA and putting his own spin on the Lennon/McCartney classic, "She's a Woman":

Emilio T. Gonzalez, director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Sevices, thinks his agency can pick up the pace on processing citizenship applications. He announced Friday that USCIS was lowering its projections for how long it would take to complete applications filed last summer from 16-18 months to 14-16 months. That would mean hundreds of thousands of applicants could be naturalized in time for next fall's elections.

The agency experienced a surge of applications last summer just before it implemented a big fee increase. Overall, USCIS received 1.4 million naturalization applications in fiscal 2007. Applications in June and July alone were nearly 350 percent higher than the year before. As a result, the agency has a huge backlog of paperwork to move through the pipeline.

Meeting the new target for processing times won't be easy, the New York Times reported Saturday. Of the more than 1 million applications the agency is currently processing, 75 percent are still in the early, less labor-intensive phases.

There have been plenty of TV shows about the FBI and the CIA. Heck, even the Naval Criminal Investigative Service has its own show. So I guess it's about time that the Drug Enforcement Administration has its turn in the limelight.

Spike TV announced today that next month it will debut DEA, offering a behind-the-scenes look at the agency.

This is no made-up drama, either. "Television viewers will get the same unprecedented access to the inner workings of the DEA as our camera crews -- the raids, the risk and the danger," said Al Roker, weatherman at NBC's Today show and DEA's executive producer. "This series is the real deal, exposing elements of illegal drug trade that you could not imagine. When you watch 'DEA,' you will feel like you have gone undercover."

The stars of the show are a group of special agents and task force officers in DEA's Detroit field office.

From DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff's roundtable with bloggers Sunday:

Question: What else would you propose that Congress do, just to make the functionality of the department work better?

Chertoff: I think consolidating us; I think funding our budget requests for the not-particularly-glamorous-but-indispensable things having to do with management, acquisition capability, IT capability. You know, this is stuff which -- you know, when they're trying to make the budget at the end, and often, in order to have more money for grants, they cut that stuff. And the problem is when you cut that stuff, invariably what happens is, six months later, we get a criticism for, we're not managing our acquisitions well. Well, you can't manage your acquisitions well if you can't hire people to do it.

Apparently, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff thinks security measures at airports are a bit much. He has told Transportation Security Administration to take 30 to 45 days to "take a look at the whole system of screening at the airport," USA Today reported yesterday. The idea is to "maybe make a couple of significant changes to remove some of the burden" on travelers, Chertoff said.

It seems the agency has already started by trying to get companies to design a better laptop case so that travelers don't have to take their computers out of their bags to go through checkpoints.

The Transportation Security Administration is still trying to figure out why so many of its employees leave its workforce every year -- about 20 percent, USA Today reports, compared to a governmentwide average of about 8 percent.

One possible reason, according to TSA Deputy Administrator Gale Rossides: The job involves hard work. "It is frequently not the job they expected," she says of recruits. For many people the job's requirements, from lifting luggage to spending hours studying X-ray images of bags is "more physically demanding than they expected," Rossides says. But Rossides doesn't seem too concerned. TSA's attrition rate, she says, is in line with other private-sector transportation jobs.

I had hoped that this maybe was a joke, even though it appeared in the New York Times. Because it's very hard for me to believe, first, that there's actually going to be a sequel to the 2004 stoner flick Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle. But there is, and it -- I swear I'm not making this up -- is called Harold and Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay.

(Hat tip: BoingBoing)

Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Thad Allen took the unusual step of sharing a highly-critical assessment of a key Coast Guard modernization program with an audience at the National Press Club Friday:

Let me share with you a detailed report that would trouble any senior leader regarding a high-profile shipbuilding program. The report states the initial construction costs of the new fleet of cutters will be much higher than projected; delivery will almost certainly be delayed; and the cutters will not carry out all the functions they were originally designed to carry out… An early attempt to reconfigure the vessel was so poorly done we were forced to remove it from service without obtaining any value for the taxpayer money invested… During machinery trials, the captain reported: "never has a vessel left a port so badly qualified to encounter seas."

As Allen said, “Change is hard.”

--Katherine McIntire Peters

As only The Onion can do it: "Dept. Of Homeland Security: 'Has Anybody Seen A Blue Folder?' "

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement isn't just about busting people at the border. Sometimes officials there get to do other stuff, like return an ancient marble sculpture of the head of Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius to the Algerian government. ICE had seized the three-foot-high, 200-pound marble sculpture from Christie's auction house in New York, where it was up for sale. INTERPOL had alerted ICE that the artifact might have been stolen in a 1996 museum robbery.

ICE says it has agents in 50 locations around the world to work with host countries, the State Department and U.S. Customs and Border protection to identify stolen antiquities smuggled into the United States.

Federal Executive Boards across the country are getting the job done, the Office of Personnel Management says. Among the accomplishments highlighted in the FEB 2007 annual report:

• Efforts by the Minnesota FEB to coordinate federal agencies' response to the 35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis.


• Settlement of more than 565 cases through low-cost or no-cost mediation programs.


• A program to provide free or reduced cost training to more than 23,000 federal employees saved agencies more than $6 million.

So if FEBs are so effective, why don't they get more support? Alyssa Rosenberg noted in a November piece in Government Executive, "though the Office of Personnel Management oversees FEBs, their staffs consist of employees detailed from offices in the area. That lack of consistent staffing, and the fact that there is no standard for determining the jurisdiction of FEBs based on the number of federal workers in a given area, can leave directors dangerously short-handed in a crisis." Kathrene L. Hansen, executive director of the Greater Los Angeles FEB, which covers 125,000 federal employees at 230 agencies, told Rosenberg she was serving as a one-person office at the time of last fall's wildfires in southern California, because the only other employee -- her secretary -- had recently resigned.

If FEBs can really help government be more effective, maybe it's time to give them a stable source of funding and adequate staff.

The National Treasury Employees Union isn't the only labor organization that has been busy signing up Transportation Security Administration employees lately. In the wake of NTEU's announcement that it had chartered a second TSA chapter, at Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, the American Federation of Government Employees has issued a statement noting that it has recently launched four new TSA locals, in Atlanta, Houston, Florida and Puerto Rico. AFGE, which says it will stand up many more TSA locals in the months ahead, also takes pains to note that it is "the only union to represent and stand behind transportation security officers since the agency’s inception."

It looks like Marta Perez, the top personnel person at the Homeland Security Department, is out, at a time when the department is struggling to integrate its operations, overhaul its proposed personnel reforms and deal with morale problems.

Here's the press release from DHS headquarters:

STATEMENT BY HOMELAND SECURITY SECRETARY MICHAEL CHERTOFF ON THE RESIGNATION OF THE CHIEF HUMAN CAPITAL OFFICER

Chief Human Capital Officer Marta Perez has announced her departure from the department effective Jan. 6, 2008. Marta’s knowledge and experience in developing and managing personnel systems has helped to make the department a model in human capital service for the federal government.

Marta set plans in motion that will ensure the department hires and retains a talented and diverse workforce. She led the way to create a department-wide culture of performance, and established high-quality learning and development programs. Under Marta’s direction, we implemented a department-wide integrated leadership system. Although Marta will be leaving soon, she leaves in place a strong transition plan and team that will carry the department through 2009 – and beyond.

I am grateful for Marta’s service and dedication to the federal government, and thank her for her contributions to America’s security. I will miss Marta personally and professionally, and wish her well in her future endeavors.

The Transportation Security Administration is taking over the job of conducting background checks on more than 1 million aviation industry employees, USA Today reports. The Federal Aviation Administration has been conducting such checks since the 9/11 attacks. Now TSA is stepping up investigations in an effort to deal with the possibility of attacks orchestrated by people like pilots, mechanics and flight attendants who don't have to go through standard security checkpoints.

Remember the mini-flap over the CQ Homeland Security report that FBI agents in San Francisco were tracking sales of falafel and other Middle Eastern foods at local markets in the hopes that the data might lead them to Iranian secret agents? Well, FBI higher-ups have looked into the whole situation and their official response is that the story is "too ridiculous to be true."

"I spoke to the counterterrorism managers, who in the story were identified as having hatched the plan, as well as everyone else who would have had any knowledge of it," says John Miller, head of the FBI's Office of Public Affairs. "Nobody did."

Fox News reported yesterday that the Homeland Security Department wants firefighters to take on a new role in the fight against terrorism. (See the video here.) DHS is training firefighters to be on the lookout for suspicious characters and stuff like bomb manuals, blueprints and night vision goggles when they find themselves in private homes. The idea here is that firefighters, unlike police officers, don't need warrants to take a look around when they're in somebody's house.

(Hat tip: Boing Boing)

The U.S. economy may be teetering on the brink of recession, but the marijuana market seems to be going strong. In just one four-day period, from last Friday to Monday, the Border Patrol in the Tucson Sector seized 9,121 pounds of weed, with an estimated street value of more than $7 million.

While GAO and the unions are saying that Customs and Border protection has some serious staffing and training issues to deal with, the agency is pushing a different message. "CBP's front-line personnel were better equipped in fiscal 2007 than any period in the nation's history," agency spokesman Michael Friel told the Washington Times. The agency has made "significant progress" this year on securing the country's borders, he added.

Can you tell a terrorist by what he eats? Apparently FBI agents thought so.
CQ Homeland Security reported last week that FBI officials combed through sales records of Middle Eastern food at San Francisco-area restaurants grocery stores in 2005 and 2006, hoping that the data, along with other information, would lead them to Iranian secret agents operating in the United States. Apparently, higher-ups put a stop to the effort before it got very far.

(Hat tip: Danger Room.)

More than 15,000 people have appealed to the Transportation Security Administration since February to get their names off the terrorist watch list, USA Today reports. With requests coming in at the rate of 2,000 a month, TSA has been unable to meet its goal of processing them within 30 days. The list now totals more than 750,000 names.

Congratulations, Prince William County, Va.: You've managed to attract your first federal agency. InsideNoVa.com reports that in less than three months, almost 300 FBI agents and other bureau personnel will move from facilities in Tysons Corner to a brand new building at a business and technology park just outside Manassas.

Did I read this story in The Hill correctly? I can't believe I did. Because it says that House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., has charged that DHS has so many vacancies in key positions that it resembles Swiss cheese. And that former DHS Deputy Secretary Michael P. Jackson actually wrote the following words to Thompson in a letter of response:

DHS’s leadership team would more fairly be compared to a fully intact wheel of the undisputed king of cheeses, Parmigiano Reggiano, carefully nurtured to maturity and ripe for superlative service. The number of unencumbered positions … is virtually nil.

With wildfires raging in southern California, U.S. Customs and Border Protection has continued to focus on its role of securing the borders and keeping traffic moving across the U.S.-Mexico border. But the agency also has taken on some new tasks, like rescuing six illegal aliens who called 911 after they became trapped by the fires in a World War II-era bunker in the mountains.

Federal Emergency Management Agency Director David Paulison says his agency has learned its lesson from Hurricane Katrina, and that when it comes to responding to wildfires in southern California, "this is a new FEMA." So far, so good, but CNN points out that this isn't exactly a comparable situation. An entire region isn't under water, and the local transportation network is still operating.

Still, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff maintains the department is putting lessons from Katrina into place in the wildfire response. For example, he said, "we have worked together and planned together with the Defense Department and with state authorities well in advance of the crisis. That's been a big help here."

With all due respect, FEMA did that kind of planning routinely in the years before it was shifted into DHS, and racked up an impressive track record in the 1990s of effectively responding not only to fires and hurricanes, but other types of disasters. So to the extent that it had to learn basic lessons like planning ahead after Katrina, that's a sad commentary on how far the agency had fallen.

The war on terror has been tough on our enemies and arduous for U.S. forces deployed overseas, but one group has benefited: The deer at Fort Detrick, Md. The Associated Press reports that after the Army suspended archery hunts at Fort Detrick for security reasons in 2002 and 2003, the number of white-tailed deer on the installation's grounds increased dramatically.

Last year, the Agriculture Department recommended culling the herd, so sharpshooters killed 100 deer at the fort on Feb. 28 and March 1. Such an effort may be undertaken again, because biologists say the herd's still growing, even though bow-hunting has resumed.

The Washington Post reported this weekend on how the plans for the proposed $3 billion, 14,000 4.5 million-square foot new headquarters for the Homeland Security Department are about to get their first serious review.

I was struck by the final paragraph in the story:

[GSA spokesman Michael McGill] said Homeland Security doesn't want to build a smaller headquarters, because it needs many employees at the site in the event of a national emergency. And the four-year-old agency wants to "achieve a critical mass of people to establish a common culture," he said.

Of all agencies, wouldn't Homeland Security be the one that would want not to have all of its employees in downtown Washington in the event of an emergency? Why put all of your eggs in one basket in a city that is one of the country's biggest terrorist targets, especially when modern information technology makes it less important than ever to co-locate employees?

Homeland Security officials have said that leasing space all over town isn't cheap. And with scattered locations, employees have to spend lots of time stuck in traffic trying to get to meetings. That sounds like an argument for better leases and fewer meetings.

As for culture, if the common goal of protecting the country hasn't united the employees of various DHS agencies yet, it seems unlikely that putting them in different buildings scattered around the same campus in Washington will do the trick. But maybe the employees will get to know each other better by hanging around the barber shop and gym that are slated to be built on the site.

The ongoing story about employee reaction to stepped-up background checks required under Homeland Security Presidential Directive 12 is fascinating. This week, a judge ruled that NASA's new questionnaire isn't unduly intrusive, much to the dismay of contract scientists at the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, who have challenged the investigations.

I sympathize with the scientists in their quest not to have federal investigators probe their personal lives, but I'm not sure that the following element of their argument -- as expressed by Robert Nelson, the lead plaintiff in the case -- is going to play well either in a court of law or the court of public opinion:

"Regardless of what the legal outcome is, there will be a small number of people who won't be here anymore for reasons not having to do with their scientific or technical talent," but who would rather quit than sign the background check waivers, Nelson said.

Knowing that their pasts can be investigated "breeds in people the tendency to conform," he continued. "One reason we think that JPL has been so successful is that we've been so tolerant of people with a wide range of personal idiosyncrasies."

The SANS Institute's "Internet Storm Center" reports that the Homeland Security Department ran into a little issue yesterday with its daily e-mail "Open Source Intelligence Report:"

This morning a reader replied to the list address with a request for a change and his note got re-sent to all of the list subscribers. In the next hour or so, dozens of readers have replied .... This points out an important point -- if you maintain a broadcast mailing list make sure that the address will not reflect email from sources other than the owner of the list.

Having been on the receiving end of this kind of vicious e-mail cycle, I can only say, amen. And also, there but for the grace of God go all of us in the e-newsletter business.

(Hat tip: Danger Room)

Update: The New York Times reports that the incident involved "a flood of more than 2.2 million messages nationwide that clogged the e-mail accounts of government and private experts on domestic security, including the operators of an Illinois nuclear power station."

It apparently has occurred to the Transportation Security Administration that remote-control toys could be used as bomb detonators. So, kiddies, if you stuff that radio-controlled car in your Dora the Explorer backpack and try to carry it onto a plane, you can expect to get pulled aside for a pat-down.

The General Services Administration not only wants agencies to "achieve great federal public spaces," but to make them secure as well. The agency has issued a Site Security Design Guide for security
professionals, designers, and project managers that lays out various "methods used to produce safe and productive workplaces." The guide follows security standards developed by the Interagency Security Committee.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, is not happy about a Washington Times report showing that officials at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services withheld facts about information-sharing problems related to the Interagency Border Inspection System from a report requested by Homeland Security Inspector General Richard Skinner. Now he wants a "detailed explanation" from DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff.

In case you hadn't noticed, we've got a new photo gallery on the site today, based on Editor and President Timothy B. Clark's recent tour of border control operations in southern California. If you want to see what it's like to stuff six people into the trunk of a small sedan and smuggle them across the border, visit our Multimedia section to view the gallery.

Speaking of the Social Security Administration's "no-match letters," the New York Times reports that SSA officials have pleaded with a federal judge to let them send out more than 140,000 letters the agency has already prepared informing employers about discrepancies between Social Security numbers provided by workers and the agency's own records.

The judge had ordered a halt to the mailings as part of a temporary ban on implementing new federal rules cracking down on the hiring of illegal immigrants. The judge said the agency could send the letters if references to the new rules were removed, but acting deputy SSA commissioner David A. Rust said doing so would place a huge new burden on the agency at a time when it is struggling to deal with backlogs of retirement and disability claims.

You know what makes it even more difficult than usual to catch a drug runner crossing the Texas-Mexico border with more than 1,000 pounds of marijuana in his truck? When somebody starts shooting with automatic weapons from the other side. That's what happened to U.S. Border Patrol agents and Hudspeth County, Texas, sheriff's deputies, the Washington Times reports.

The Bush administration has begun pulling National Guard troops from their deployment along the U.S. border with Mexico, the Washington Times reports today. It's the beginning of a gradual phase-out of Operation Jump Start, the administration initiative launched last year to beef up the border presence while the Border Patrol seeks to hire and train 6,000 new agents.

State officials in Arizona and New Mexico are not pleased with the move. Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano said it was "ill-timed and should be halted and re-examined" in a letter to Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff. But DHS says the Border Patrol is building up as the National Guard draws down, so there won't be any reduction in the level of intensity of enforcement at the border.

This is what's known in the news business as "burying the lead:" USA Today starts off a story today with the following:

The Homeland Security Department is aiming to arm federal agents with a light-saber-type weapon that emits a dazzling strobe capable of subduing criminals, terrorists and even unruly airline passengers.

It's not until seven paragraphs later that the story quotes Bob Lieberman, president of the company that's developing the device under a $1 million contract from the Homeland Security Department, as saying, "It's like someone shooting off a flashbulb in your face every few seconds. Because of the wavelengths and frequencies we use, there are psychophysical effects -- a real disorientation. The reaction can range through vertigo to nausea."

Danger Room, on the other hand, gets right to the point in the first sentence of its report on the same device:

Government-funded researchers are building a flashlight that makes people puke on command.

Give Transportation Security Administation chief Kip Hawley points for bravery: He recently agreed to go toe-to-toe with security expert and blogger Bruce Schneier. It's as tough an interview as you'll ever see, and Hawley holds up his end of the fight pretty well. My favorite exchange is right up front:

Bruce Schneier: By today's rules, I can carry on liquids in quantities of three ounces or less, unless they're in larger bottles. But I can carry on multiple three-ounce bottles. Or a single larger bottle with a non-prescription medicine label, like contact lens fluid. It all has to fit inside a one-quart plastic bag, except for that large bottle of contact lens fluid. And if you confiscate my liquids, you're going to toss them into a large pile right next to the screening station—which you would never do if anyone thought they were actually dangerous.

Can you please convince me there's not an Office for Annoying Air Travelers making this sort of stuff up?

Kip Hawley: Screening ideas are indeed thought up by the Office for Annoying Air Travelers and vetted through the Directorate for Confusion and Complexity, and then we review them to insure that there are sufficient unintended irritating consequences so that the blogosphere is constantly fueled. Imagine for a moment that TSA people are somewhat bright, and motivated to protect the public with the least intrusion into their lives, not to mention travel themselves. How might you engineer backwards from that premise to get to three ounces and a baggie?

(Hat tip: Danger Room)

Remember that ominous TSA bulletin a couple of weeks ago about inspections turning up blocks of cheese and clay-like substances with wires attached to them? This was supposed to be evidence of possible "dry runs" of terrorist attacks. Well, it turns out that all of the incidents in question actually were false alarms, according to sources ranging from CNN (via The Raw Story -- check out the video where the 66-year-old woman describes being interrogated about whether she knows Osama bin Laden personally) to the San Diego Union-Tribune. If TSA's goal is to make Americans take the threat of another attack involving American airliners more seriously, and to have confidence that its efforts protect the public from genuine threats, then it looks like they've succeeded in doing exactly the opposite.

Not surprisingly, several U.S. senators are less than satisfied with the federal response to the case of Andrew Speaker, the Georgia man thought to have an extremely drug-resistant strain of tuberculosis who was nevertheless able to sneak back into the United States after a trip overseas. Now, Government Executive columnist and National Journal correspondent Shane Harris reports on his blog, Sens. Joseph Lieberman, I-Conn., Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., are asking the Government Accountability Office for a detailed report on the government's handling of the situation.

"We should never again have a situation where delays and failures in communication between the federal government, other domestic public health officials and relevant commercial entities lead to needless exposure and risk," the senators wrote in a letter to GAO chief David Walker.

In an item about the indictment Thursday of a contract worker at a nuclear material cleanup site in Tennessee, the Project on Government Oversight includes a list of major security failures of the U.S. nuclear weapons complex since the Wen Ho Lee case broke in 1999. Here's a quick summary: It ain't pretty.

The Transportation Security Administration is ending its policy of confiscating cigarette lighters from airline passengers, and acknowledging that it was a waste of time. Other items, like batteries, are just as likely to be used to set off bombs, TSA chief Kip Hawley told the New York Times.

“Taking lighters away is security theater,” Hawley said. “It trivializes the security process.”

Since would-be shoe bomber Richard Reid tried to set off a bomb on a flight from Paris to Miami in 2001 (using matches, not a lighter), TSA screeners have been collecting 22,000 lighters a day, and disposing of them at a cost of $4 million a year.

When it comes to disaster response, Texas has decided that it can't count on the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The Houston Chronicle reports that the state is implementing a plan that assumes critical supplies such as ice and water will be provided by "big box" retailers -- including Wal-Mart and Home Depot -- not FEMA.

"If FEMA shows up, good," says Jack Colley, chief of the Texas Governor's Division of Emergency Management. ''But we're not waiting."

The big retailers are being brought into the planning process on the front end, to glean their ideas about the best ways to move supplies if necessary. When disasters strike, they'll get advance notice of the state's response plans.

FEMA's reaction to the idea? That it sounds "great," according to a spokesman. Anything the state can get its hands on independently, the agency says, is one less thing FEMA has to worry about.

(Hat tip: Danger Room)

Given that Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff has developed a "gut feeling" that terrorists may launch another strike on U.S. soil, Ryan Singel of Wired's "Threat Level" blog has developed a helpful new color- and food-coded threat level system. You have to click on the link to get the full effect, but here's the gist: it runs from "Tofu Pup" to "Danger Dog."

It's rewarding to see that Bob Brewin's story on the potential for denial-of-service attacks targeting the new virtual border fence is getting a nice little run in the blogsophere. The Influence Peddler picked up on the piece yesterday, and was followed in short order by Mickey Kaus over at Slate (you have to scroll down the page a bit to see the reference) and Instapundit.

Now if we could just get any of them to name the publication in which the story originated. Oh well...

I have a feeling this news won't generate a whole lot of sympathy for people who try to enter the United States illegally, but here it is: Apparently, the phone systems used at Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facilities leave something to be desired. The systems are used to allow detained immigrants to make free phone calls to consulates of their home countries for help, but the Washington Times reports that the Government Accountability Office has found "systemic problems" with the phones at 16 of 17 facilities reviewed.

In its defense, ICE notes that the number of detainees has gone from 95,000 in 2001 to 283,000 last year, and says the vast majority of calls don't go through due to reasons beyond its control--like a detainee hanging up or a consulate never picking up the phone. Still, the agency says it's committed to fixing problems with the system.

Last month, Shane Harris reported in National Journal that the Homeland Security Department faces a tough transition to the next presidential administration because so many of its top officials are political appointees. Now the House Homeland Security Committee is set to report that many of the department's top slots are vacant. As of May 1, 138 vacancies of the top 575 positions at DHS were unfilled. DHS spokesman Russ Knocke tells the Washington Post that the second problem is a result of an effort to address the first: Homeland Security, he insists, created a bunch of top jobs and is in the process of recruiting seasoned managers to fill them.

I guess this can't exactly be characterized as shocking: Only one in five Americans think the federal government is doing enough to scrutinize people who come across the border, according to an AP-Ipsos poll, and only two out of five think the government's prepared to handle a disease outbreak of epidemic proportions. Post-Katrina, agencies and the Bush administration haven't succeeded in doing much to give people confidence that they can handle the next big bad thing.

Federal inspectors were able to slip a fake bomb -- but not a bottle of water -- pass Transportation Security Administration screeners during tests at Albany International Airport, the Albany Times-Union reports.

What really gets me about this story is the statement by a TSA spokeswoman explaining her refusal to talk about the tests: "We don't discuss the results because they tend to paint an inaccurate picture of the competency of our work force." Come again? Assuming that the picture is in fact inaccurate, how could you possibly corect it if you refuse to talk about it?

What's worse, the essence of this statement is that TSA won't talk about something if it thinks the subject makes the agency or its employees look bad. That simply isn't a legitimate reason for refusing to comment on taxpayer-funded public services to media organizations who report on the government's activities.

There may be other legitimate reasons for taking a no-comment policy in this case -- for example, not wanting to let potential terrorists in on the details of how we test our security operations. But simply trying to avoid any subject that might paint the agency in a bad light doesn't cut it.

My kids are finally old enough to demand that we avail ourselves of the opportunity presented by living just outside the nation's capital to head down to the Mall for the fireworks. A couple of quick thoughts on attending the festivities:

• The security was tight but highly efficient and downright friendly. The checkpoints moved swiftly, even though many people had to go through twice, and the evacuation of the Mall due to the threat of imminent thunderstorms appeared to go smoothly. A couple of sights that delighted me: security officials letting people hop on parked Metrobuses (which were being used to block intersections) to get out of the rain; and park rangers graciously interrupting their duties momentarily to take snapshots for visitors.
• The multiculturalism on display was downright inspiring. It was the most diverse group of races, creeds and colors that I had ever seen in my life, all gathering to celebrate the best this country has to offer.

Here's a cell phone picture that doesn't begin to do the event justice:

Have fun on the Fourth of July, but not with M-80s, M-1000s, Silver Salutes, Quarter Sticks, Quarter Pounders, and Cherry Bombs. That's the advice of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, anyway. Those fireworks are banned by the federal government because they "have almost instantaneous fuses and are designed to detonate other explosives in close proximity." If you must buy fireworks, ATF says, make sure they're legal in your neck of the woods and that you buy them only through licensed dealers.

The good news, the New York Times reports, is that Boeing is about to debut Project 28, the first phase of the Secure Border Initiative. It involves a network of high-definition cameras, radar and other equipment that lets the Border Patrol see exactly what's happening along a 28-mile stretch of the Arizona-Mexico border.

The bad news? Project 28 was supposed to launch June 13.

The expansion of private security screening forces at airports continues apace, with the announcement Friday that Trinity Technology Group, Inc., of Fairfax, Va., would take over screening at Charles M. Schulz-Sonoma County (Calif.) Airport under the Transportation Security Administration's Screening Partnership Program. The program has been in place since late 2004, after TSA completed a pilot program to test private screening at five airports: San Francisco International; Kansas City International; Greater Rochester International; Jackson Hole, Wyo.; and Tupelo (Miss.) Regional. All five of those airports opted to continue using private screeners at the end of the pilot phase. Since then, Joe Foss Field in Sioux Falls, S.D., Key West International Airport, and the Florida Keys Marathon Airport also have chosen to go the private sector route.

TSA is now using a streamlined acquisition process under which any interested vendor can apply to an airport's request for proposals for screening services. Previously, companies had to be pre-certified to participate in the program.

Here's another thing you don't want private security contractors who guard federal buildings to do: Use security cameras to peep on adjacent buildings.

The Washington Post weighs in today with a story about plans to cut personnel at the Federal Protective Service and rely more heavily on contract guards to protect federal facilities. I say, welcome to the party. We've been writing about budget and staffing issues at the agency for almost a year now. (And those links are just the tip of the iceberg of our coverage.) The agency says it's all part of an effort to beef up oversight of the 15,000 contract security guards FPS employs. Which is good, because you don't want private security guards doing stuff like shooting each other.

This just in: Airport baggage screeners do a better job when they're not sleep-deprived.

The Transportation Security Administration wants $219 million from various airlines in unpaid security fees, Bloomberg News reports. The agency and the airlines have been embroiled in an 18-month dispute over exactly how much of the cost of screening passengers and bags the carriers should have to cover. And the battle's not over yet. A Southwest Airlines spokeswoman says the airlines now will head to court to challenge the fees.

Why exactly was an Atlanta lawyer with extremely drug-resistant tuberculosis allowed to fly back and forth across the Atlantic and enter the country by car, despite warnings from public health agencies about his condition? It boils down to "bureaucratic turf fights, legal concerns over applying counterterrorism tools to public health cases, and technological problems," the Washington Post reports today.

Brian Conant made a curious discovery while training in the National Guard, reports Laura Castellano of Columbia News Service: He could pass gas in his chemical weapons protective suit and nobody would notice the smell. That led to his new invention: the Flatulence Deodorizer.

(Hat tip: Danger Room.)

The Haskell Library occupies a unique position: It straddles the border between Canada and the United States. For years, that meant that patrons could park their cars in Quebec and stroll around and enter the library's front doors in Vermont. But now, the Associated Press reports, Border Patrol officials want to change all that, forcing visitors to detour through one of two official ports of entry before entering the library. Smugglers, they say, are taking advantage of unguarded side streets near the library.

President Bush wants better training for civil servants in national security positions. Yesterday, he issued an executive order requiring the development of a "National Strategy for the Development of Security Professionals" within 60 days. That strategy, Bush said, "shall set forth a framework that will provide to security professionals access to integrated education, training, and professional experience opportunities for the purpose of enhancing their mission-related knowledge, skills, and experience and thereby improve their capability to safeguard the security of the nation." After the strategy is approved, a steering committee headed by Office of Personnel Management Director Linda Springer and including the heads of several Cabinet departments and independent agencies is supposed to implement the plan.

Forget what the American people think: FEMA says it's ready for this hurricane season. "You're not going to see the same kind of response" as in Katrina, FEMA chief David Paulison told House lawmakers yesterday, according to a USA Today report. "You're going to see a federal government that is very proactive."