Bush administration has missed dozens of deadlines after Sept. 11 attacks

[dajoki]

link
http://famulus.msnbc.com/famulusgen/ap10-30-093659.asp?t=apnew&vts=103020051006


Government misses dozens of security deadlines since Sept. 11 attacks

By LESLIE MILLER
ASSOCIATED PRESS


WASHINGTON, Oct. 30 — The Bush administration has missed dozens of deadlines set by Congress after the the Sept. 11 attacks for developing ways to protect airplanes, ships and railways from terrorists.

A plan to defend ships and ports from attack is six months overdue. Rules to protect air cargo from infiltration by terrorists are two months late. A study on the cost of giving anti-terrorism training to federal law enforcement officers who fly commercially was supposed to be done more than three years ago.

''The incompetence that we recently saw with FEMA's leadership appears to exist throughout the Homeland Security Department,'' said Mississippi Rep. Bennie G. Thompson, top Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee. ''Our nation is still vulnerable.''

Congress must share the blame for the department's sluggishness in protecting commerce and travel from terrorists, according to other observers. Lawmakers piled on deadline after deadline for reports, plans and regulations while the department, created after the 2001 attacks, had to integrate 22 agencies with 170,000 workers and cope with terrorist threats and hurricanes.

Those deadlines, sometimes for minor projects, distract the department from putting in place the most important security measures, experts say. The Transportation Security Administration, for example, scrambled to try to meet a Feb. 15 deadline to ban butane lighters from airplanes, a precaution that does little to protect airliners, they said.

[Roland99]

1. Nooo! I don't believe it!!!

BTW, what happened to the regular reports due about the war in Iraq?

And where's that 2nd phase of the Senate Investigative Committee to find out what happened to the intel in the run-up before the invasion?

[dajoki]

2. don't know n/t