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From the Los Angeles Times

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9/11...A Day To Remember

Get smarter on security

Ten years after 9/11, U.S. policymakers have been remarkably disinclined to learn from their mistakes.

September 11, 2011

In the 10 years since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, U.S. policymakers have done some things right and many things wrong. Yet they have been remarkably disinclined to learn from their mistakes.

To mark the anniversary, many media reports have assessed the impacts of the federal spending and policy changes that resulted from the attacks. In The Times, for example, staff writer Ken Dilanian examined the effects of laws making it possible for federal investigators to collect, analyze and store digital data and other communications from Americans, with little or no judicial or congressional oversight. The extent of this eavesdropping is kept secret, but a handful of high-profile cases have shown that even the once-privileged communications between a defendant and his lawyer are no longer off-limits, and that the ability to obtain a warrant without probable cause is leading to snafus such as the investigation of Oregon lawyer Brandon Mayfield, mistakenly considered a suspect in the 2004 Madrid train bombings. That doesn't appear to bother Congress, which in May overwhelmingly approved a four-year extension of the Patriot Act.

Meanwhile, the House in May approved a defense spending bill giving the president the authority to use military force against "Al Qaeda, the Taliban and associated forces" whether they have any connection to the 9/11 attacks or not. That goes well beyond the powers handed to President Bush after the attacks and is in essence an authorization for endless war, against enemies of the commander in chief's choosing. It comes amid military-led nation-building exercises in two countries that have largely failed to create their own democratic institutions despite vast expenditures of American blood and treasure.

The aforementioned wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have cost an estimated $4 trillion, and the U.S. now spends about $75 billion a year on domestic security. As Times staff writer Kim Murphy reported, a good portion of that homeland security money has been spread around for projects of highly dubious value, such as on cattle prods in Nebraska lest terrorists launch biological warfare against cows, and on an armored vehicle for the Glendale police. Yet even as Congress reassesses spending priorities in other federal departments in its zeal to reduce the deficit, there has been scant effort to examine the effectiveness of these programs or to trim the Department of Homeland Security's bloated budget.

As the Transportation Security Administration approves increasingly intrusive methods of screening passengers at airports, it's growing ever more questionable whether the safety benefits are worth the cost. To prevent terrorists from boarding a plane with plastic explosives concealed inside their clothing, security officials are now using airport scanners to view naked images of passengers. If terrorists adjust to the new regime by hiding explosives in their body cavities, which current scanners can't penetrate, it's reasonable to wonder what new types of probes fliers will be subjected to.

In the arena of foreign policy, meanwhile, the United States has focused extensively and successfully on securing the cooperation of foreign countries in the war against terror. But while doing so, it has ignored other priorities, such as expanding trade or combating climate change, that would have a far bigger effect on future prosperity and thus, arguably, on domestic security.

To be sure, not all of the nation's efforts since 9/11 have been wasted. Al Qaeda's ability to wage attacks overseas has been severely degraded, Osama bin Laden is no more, and untold numbers of dangerous enemies of the United States are dead or detained. There has not been a major terrorist attack on U.S. soil since that terrible day, which is either a tribute to the effectiveness of our security operations or an indicator of the incompetence of our enemies. Protecting Americans is and should remain a top priority of the federal government. But what rankles is that decision-making on terrorism and security still seems to be dominated by the same sense of panic that took hold in the immediate aftermath of 9/11. After 10 years we have learned quite a bit about what works and what doesn't, yet there has been far too little attempt to change the policies that don't.

As the nation looks back today, and rightly honors those who lost their lives, we'd urge Americans — and especially lawmakers — to put a little thought into looking forward too. Today, the number of people killed annually by Muslim terrorists outside war zones is roughly equal to the number who die in bathtub accidents, according to Ohio State University professor John Mueller, who has written extensively on terrorism risks and expenditures. That doesn't mean fighting terrorism should no longer be a priority, but it does mean we need to be sure that we balance it rationally with other priorities that are equally important.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/opinionla/la-ed-911-20110911,0,3353851,print.story

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A legacy of resilience and fear

The attacks of Sept. 11 awakened Americans to a dangerous world. Ten years later, we still worry, but we also refuse to give in to terrorism.

September 9, 2011

In the first days after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Americans emerged with a deeper, painful sense of community. Mourning begot a frenzy of patriotism. Miniature flags adorned jacket lapels and flapped from car windows, at least for a few months. People tended to the grieving, made heroes of firefighters and vowed to band together on airplanes to take down any further in-flight threats. And they did. Passengers and flight attendants on a trans-Atlantic flight successfully tackled Richard Reid three months later as he attempted to detonate a bomb in his shoe. Terrorists could break our skyscrapers but not our spirit. Instead, it was a reckless banking industry that set off an economic catastrophe in 2008 that shook Americans' faith in the future.

Photos: World Trade Center attack site, then and now

There are many ways to measure the effects of 9/11 on Americans, but it's surprising how fleeting some of them were. If the tragedy moved us to be more concerned neighbors, it didn't necessarily make us more accepting. Some panicked or became aggressive when they saw a Muslim, or a person they thought looked like one, on a plane. Plans for an Islamic center just a few blocks from the World Trade Center site provoked such intense protest that President Obama had to call for something elementally American: religious tolerance. As for the much-discussed sense of national unity, the George W. Bush administration's response to 9/11 ushered in a period of intense political polarization that has, if anything, worsened under Obama.

The clearest and most lasting legacy of the attacks for Americans is fear. Before 9/11, this was a country lulled into a sense of invincibility as the world's greatest military power, a country that had not seen a large-scale foreign attack on American shores since the bombing of the naval base at Pearl Harbor, or any massive, violent incursion on civilian neighborhoods since the Civil War. With the end of the 50-year-old Cold War, political scientist Francis Fukuyama triumphantly proclaimed "the end of history," and conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer trumpeted "the unipolar moment." After 9/11, however, police patrolled airports and skyscrapers, opening car trunks and demanding identification of any who entered. Fear insinuated itself into our lives in serious and silly ways. A mound of spilled sugar on a desk could bring an entire office building to a standstill while a hazmat team was called in to determine whether it was anthrax.

Today, Americans don't seem to know what to feel. We both grouse about and take comfort in the security screenings that get tweaked every year or so. We live with the fear of a terrorist attack as resignedly as Californians live with the fear of an epic earthquake. It's bound to happen one day, but who knows where or when?

In the weeks after 9/11, government officials said it wasn't a matter of if there would be another attack in this country, it was a matter of when. But in 2011, most Americans ignore that prophecy. Even warnings such as last week's "specific, credible but unconfirmed" threat cause general anxiety but are ignored in practice by many. We show up at airports, hauling our children and pets and 3-ounce bottles of shampoo, more afraid of spilling liquids in luggage than dying on planes. We push our trepidation to the backs of our minds, and board. And 10 years after two skyscrapers were destroyed and the Pentagon was struck in acts of unimagined terror, that resilience is not a bad thing to have rebuilt.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/opinionla/la-ed-fear-20110909,0,5736192.story

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From Google News

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Massachusetts

Amherst police extending outreach

Capt. Chris Pronovost said the sessions are part of a renewed emphasis on community policing that goes beyond handing out bicycle helmets and installing child safety seats.

The idea behind the program, he said, is for officers to get feedback from residents about issues that police may be able to deal with, especially as it relates to student behavior and off-campus rental properties.

"It's more accurate to hear directly from residents," Pronovost said. "There are some issues we just can't identify on our own."

Officers who patrol in specific sectors of town will be holding office hours at locations within or near where they typically work.

For instance, Officer John Chudzik, who handles the west/ central area that comprises neighborhoods between Northampton Road and Massachusetts Avenue, will next be available Saturday from 2 to 3 p.m. in the Jones Library's large meeting room, located in the basement. He will then be in the Amherst Room, on the second floor of the library, from 2 to 3 p.m. Sept. 14, 21, 28, which are all Wednesdays, and Oct. 8, 15, 22, 26, which are all Saturdays.

The six officers who patrol the northwest Amherst sector, which includes all of North Pleasant Street from Massachusetts Avenue to Sunderland Road, will hold their meetings at Townehouse Apartments or Puffton Village. Among this month's four meetings are those scheduled Sept. 15 from 7 to 8 p.m. at Puffton Village and Sept. 20 from 1 to 2 p.m. at Townehouse.

Pronovost said he believes the sessions will help the department get good information that can be used toward better protecting neighborhoods.

Some of the issues raised, though, may need to be referred to other town departments, he said, such as the health and building inspections, or to University of Massachusetts officials.

Meanwhile, even though most college students haven't even been back in Amherst for a week, the parents of five dozen students will soon receive letters explaining that their children have already had encounters with police officers.

This marks the second year in a row the police department is sending written notifications home to parents.

Pronovost said the letters, which don't explain the specific nature of the incident, ask the parents to speak to their children about their behavior. The letters also includes a copy of the municipal bylaws related to noise, nuisance houses, open containers and kegs.

The first batch of letters are going to parents and guardians of students living in houses where police made responses to noise complaints. There were 44 noise complaints at off-campus residences during Labor Day weekend.

There was mixed reaction to the letters last year, Pronovost said, with some parents praising the department for being proactive and others responding that their children are grownups and responsible for their own behavior.

http://www.gazettenet.com/2011/09/10/amherst-police-extending-outreach

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