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| Obama administration says Emirates Airlines Dropped the Ball; 9/11 | |
| 2010-05-05 | |
"It takes a few hours for the airlines system to catch up," a senior administration official tells ABC news. Another senior administration official adds that Emirates refreshes their system to update with US intelligence information periodically -- but not frequently. In any case, the first official says that airlines were "within minutes" of Shahzad being put on the no-fly list told to "look at a web-board" and manually check its passenger manifest against the news on the web board. "That appears to not have happened" the official says. "For whatever reason there was a breakdown at the Emirates level." Emirates Airlines provided its locked-in passenger manifest to the Customs and Border Protection agency. The plane at that point can leave. But a CBP official caught Shahzad's name on the manifest and the plane never left the gate. "That redundancy is built in," the official says. "It's not luck it's design. It was good work by CBP." Former 9/11 Commission vice chair and Democratic congressman Lee Hamilton seems less impressed. Hamilton reminds ABC News that "the 9/11 commission recommended that you had to have biometric evidence, documentarian evidence of people coming in and exiting" the country. "We've done a pretty good job on the first part of it people entering the country. But with regard to those exiting the country we simply have not been able to set up a system to deal with that and it showed in this case." Hamilton says "we need to have in this country a system of checking people leaving the country so that we can protect against the very sort of thing that happened here -- or at least almost happened here." | |
| Posted by:tipper |
| #10 Bambi gotta let his homies know when the too get out of dodge besoeker |
| Posted by: chris 2010-05-05 23:03 |
| #9 Not the least of which is he was arrested on a 'complaint' and information was immediately released that he is "cooperating." Why on earth would we tell ANYBODY he is cooperating? |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2010-05-05 22:16 |
| #8 Statistically, what are the odds that a counter-intelligence operation was permitted to 'go the distance' as a result of this guy being sold 'non-volatile' fertilizer by undercover intel? Seriously, they're calling this failure a 'success due to layers of security', while simultaneously admitting that they 'lost him' at his own house and only picked him up when he used his cel phone to order the tickets...where would he be today had he purchased an additional disposable phone? Depends on the NSA, but this capture seems to be pure luck among a band of monkeys being spun by carnival barkers. I respect our intel guys, but someone running the show really screwed the pooch. This, following all the failures leading up to Mr. Crotch Bomber. Too much is being leaked. He should have been renditioned to a faraway place to reveal his background so we could go take care of his trainers. Running this op on our soil to build a criminal case, endangering civilian lives and possibly exposing intel techniques and the breadth of 'cover' is just plain asinine & irresponsible. Dead Americans will be this President's legacy, I fear. There's no honor in being sacrificed at the hands of an incompetent & his minions... |
| Posted by: logi_cal 2010-05-05 22:11 |
| #7 we're fucked , we can't even impeach this POS since it didn't even work on Clinton and the RACE card would be played too all extremes in this case. I would have rather had Al Sharpton as the 1 st black president than this idiot |
| Posted by: chris 2010-05-05 21:14 |
| #6 Regime blames Airline? The FBI JTTF and Homeland security have been following this guy since at lease 2004, (per New York Times article 4 May) But can't seem to get him on a no-fly list? This is beginning to have a rather distinctive oder. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2010-05-05 19:20 |
| #5 John: It depends on whether you believe the entire blame game the administration is playing. |
| Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain 2010-05-05 17:24 |
| #4 The national security of the United States is in the hands of an airline owned by the United Arab Emirates? |
| Posted by: john frum 2010-05-05 17:11 |
| #3 How did I know that the Obama administration would say it was someone else's fault? It appears that we really are on our own and should look to protect ourselves. |
| Posted by: whatadeal 2010-05-05 17:03 |
| #2 So, as I've posted elsewhere: Is Emirates Airlines now banned from flight in US airspace until they can prove compliance? If not, can we all recall the media circus over the speculation over Saudi Arabia being allowed to fly its citizens out of the country after 9/11? Bama is BP's biggest $$ recipient for 20 years (Link)...is he also coddling the Arabs? Where's the outrage? (snark) |
| Posted by: logi_cal 2010-05-05 15:13 |
| #1 "It takes a few hours for the airlines system to catch up," a senior administration official tells ABC news. I guess that's the best we can do. Right? |
| Posted by: gorb 2010-05-05 14:15 |