Homeland Insecurity

House Dems have compiled a report charging the Department of Homeland Security with some significant security failures. This will undoubtedly be cast by the GOP as a partisan maneuver, but the list of gaps isn’t exactly nitpicky.

The Homeland Security Department officially opened its doors in March 2003. It was created in response to the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks to bolster protections of potential domestic targets.

Since then, according to the report, the department has failed to:

_Compile a single, comprehensive list prioritizing protections for the nation's most critical and potentially vulnerable buildings, transportation systems and other infrastructure.

_Install monitors at borders and every international seaport and airport to screen for radiation material entering the country.

_Install surveillance cameras at all high-risk chemical plants.

_Create one effective network to share quickly security-related intelligence and alerts with state, local and private industry officials.

_Track international visitors through a computerized system that takes their fingerprints and photographs as they enter and exit the country.

So the administration prioritized monitoring radiation levels at Muslim sites over screening for radiation entering the country, and engaged in vast, untargeted data mining operations in the hopes of catching something, while easily identifiable high-risk targets, like, say, a bunker at a chemical engineering firm from which 400 pounds of explosives and 2,500 detonators can be stolen with nothing but a blowtorch, go unprotected. Smashing.