WASHINGTON - The U.S. is at great risk for more terrorist attacks because Congress and the White House have failed to enact several strong security measures, members of the former Sept. 11 commission said Sunday.
"It's not a priority for the government right now," said the former chairman, Thomas Kean, ahead of the group's release of a report Monday assessing how well its recommendations have been followed. "More than four years after 9/11 ... people (I strongly suspect he means our elected officials here...maybe we can send in Supernanny and she can get them to work nice together.) are not paying attention," the former Republican governor of New Jersey said. "God help us if we have another attack."
Added Lee Hamilton, the former Democratic vice chairman of the commission: "We believe that another attack will occur. It's not a question of if. We are not as well-prepared as we should be." (Hello? Anyone in Washington listening?) The five Republicans and five Democrats on the commission, whose recommendations are now promoted through a privately funded group known as the 9/11 Public Discourse Project, conclude that the government deserves "more Fs than As" in responding to their 41 suggested changes. Ex-commissioners contended the government has been remiss by failing to act more quickly. Kean said the Transportation Security Administration was wrong to announce changes last week that will allow airline passengers to carry small scissors and some sharp tools. He also said the agency, by now, should have consolidated databases of passenger information into a single "terror watch list" to aid screening. (Hey, how about hiring some American IT professionals with experience who have been outsourced and are now working at Starbucks or other stores for a fraction of what they used to make? Hire my husband, and we might actually be able to avoid bankruptcy!)
Calling the country "less safe than we were 18 months ago," former Democratic commissioner Jamie Gorelick said Sunday the government's failure to move forward on the recommendations makes the U.S. more vulnerable.
She cited the failure to ensure that foreign nations are upgrading security measures to stop proliferation of nuclear, biological and chemical materials, as well as the FBI's resistance to overhauling its anti-terror programs."You remember the sense of urgency that we all felt in the summer of 2004. The interest has faded," the Washington lawyer said on ABC's "Good Morning America." "You could see that in the aftermath of Katrina. We assumed that our government would be able to do what it needed to do and it didn't do it."
One thing Katrina did was expose to the world the weakness and disorganization of the US government. Talk about giving terrorist a gift on a silver platter! I'll bet they are studying the whole mess closely. It wouldn't surprise me if the next terrorist act would involve so sort of ecological terror.
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