“If I had to give [Homeland security] a grade, I'd give them a D just to be charitable.”
— Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.), contending that the Department of Homeland Security has doled out too much money to the American Trucking Association to train truckers on how to report suspicious persons on their route. He says it is one of the many ways Homeland security is “wasting taxpayer dollars when New York needs security cash.”
SOURCE: New York Daily News
These things are what we see as the No. 1 threat today.”
— GALE ROSSIDES, deputy administrator of the Transportation Security Administration, on the threat of a terrorist bringing small components onto a plane that can be assembled into improvised explosive devices, or airborne IEDs. Rossides says the agency has trained more than 40,000 airport screeners to identify small bomb parts.
SOURCE: The Canadian Press
I think small boats are a potential threat. I think general aviation coming from overseas is a potential threat. To be perfectly honest, if you had a nuclear bomb, it might make more sense to bring it in with a private airplane than to stick it into a container.”
— Department of Homeland Security Secretary MICHAEL CHERTOFF, on the idea that the media treats containers as the only threat to areas such as Baltimore, which because of its proximity to the nation's capital is particularly vulnerable to terrorist activity.
SOURCE: The Baltimore Sun
7 out of 24 How much the TSA falls short in completing critical performance benchmarks the agency set for itself. Among them, the strength of cockpits; a lack of Federal Flight Deck Officer program growth, which provides training and authorization for pilots to be armed; the number of screening failures; and questionable rules, including 25 TSA-issued versions of screening procedures over the years and shifting policies on bringing liquids and gels onboard.
SOURCE: USA Today and Consumer Reports
$100 MILLION Despite a financial effort in this amount to improve salaries and work duties, a USA Today analysis of federal data shows that airport security screeners have one of the worst job turnover rates of federal workers.
SOURCE: USA Today
$360,000 The cost of the Advanced Spectroscopic Portal radiation monitor, which will screen cargo, cars and trucks that come through ports. The machines, which the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) plans to spend about $350 million to develop and deploy, are intended to address concerns that a nuclear bomb, hidden in a cargo container, could detonate in an American port. The DHS's goal is to purchase about 800 of these next generation monitors.
SOURCE: The Associated Press
90%The decrease seen in the number of username/password helpdesk calls the Pentagon receives since installing biometric technology on its 2,000 computers.
SOURCE: Air Force Communications Agency
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