Thursday, October 2, 2008

Post Office Bioterror, Russia, DHS, US Tent Cities


Russia's strategic bombers to drill with full combat payloads
http://en.rian.ru/russia/20081002/117389135.html

MOSCOW, October 2 (RIA Novosti) - Russian strategic bombers will conduct training flights with full combat payloads and live fire all cruise missiles on board for the first time in over two decades, an Air Force spokesman said.
The live firing exercises in Russia's northern latitudes on October 6-12 are part of the Stability-2008 strategic maneuvers in various regions of Russia and Belarus with the goal of practicing strategic deployment of the Armed Forces, including the nuclear triad, to counter potential threats near the Russian border.
"During these exercises, for the first time in many years, the crews of Tu-160 Blackjack and Tu-95MS Bear-H strategic bombers will fly missions carrying the maximum combat payload and fire all the cruise missiles on board," Lt. Col. Vladimir Drik said.
See also:Russia sees in credit crisis end of U.S. domination

If Bioterrorists Strike, Letter Carriers Might Deliver Antibiotics
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/story/2008/10/01/ST2008100102936.html

"Neither snow, nor rain, nor heat, nor gloom of night, nor bioterrorism attack stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds -- especially if they are delivering antibiotics to protect people from anthrax."
That may someday become the unofficial motto of the U.S. Postal Service.
Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt yesterday proposed a solution to one of the bigger challenges in responding to an anthrax bioterrorism attack -- how to deliver protective antibiotics to tens of thousands of people overnight. The tentative answer: have the mailman (and -woman) do the job.
As an incentive to the letter carriers -- who would be volunteers -- the government would issue them in advance an antibiotic supply large enough to treat themselves and their families. They would also be accompanied by police officers on their rounds.
"We have found letter carriers to be the federal government's quickest and surest way of getting pills to whole communities," Leavitt said.
The strategy has the full support of the Postal Service and its unions, spokesmen said.

Rethink spending on anti-terrorism, report says

Emergency personnel in Nebraska learn to work decontamination trailers bought with Department of Homeland Security funds. A major police organization questions the amount of federal spending on projects like this.
The government doles out too much anti-terrorism money to towns and cities for emergency equipment that rarely gets used while cash-strapped police struggle with crime, according to a growing number of mayors, police chiefs and security experts.
Seven years after 9/11, some are asking the government to re-examine spending hundreds of millions of dollars on bomb robots, chem-bio suits and equipment that often gathers dust in warehouses.
"The simple truth is that average Americans are much more likely to find themselves victims of crime than of terrorist attack," the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) says in a new report that calls on the next president to shift money back to crime fighting.
Since 2003, when the Homeland Security Department was created, the government has given states and cities $22.7 billion for emergency preparedness. How that money is doled out has been controversial from the start. Big cities complained that too much was sent to remote towns; police complained that they couldn't use it for overtime...

Increasing number of Americans living in tent cities

The economic bailout plan being debated in Washington is coming too late for one small, but growing population of America.
In the shadows of Reno's high-rise casinos, one community lives with almost nothing. dwelling in tents.
Nevada's unemployment rate is at a 23-year high. In Reno, the number of jobless jumped 60 percent in the last year.
Now for 170 people, their home is nothing more than a tent.
"I know that god is going to take care of me," one resident said. "But some days, it's very scary."
Whether it is the blaring train or the blazing sun, life is not easy for the mix of chronically homeless, and those newly so.
Just last Christmas, Michael Moore and Marian Schamp lived in a rented house in Portland. After Mr Moore lost the job he had had for three years at a gas station, the pair moved to Reno in search of jobs. However, they never found any.
Across the US, tent cities have either popped up or expanded in places like Seattle, Portland and Columbus.
The problem got so bad in Reno that officials decided to organise the tent city and run it themselves.
They put up fencing, brought in security and fresh running water until they can move the people into housing or shelters


"While JADOCS was initially developed for the battlefield, its inherentcapabilities make it an ideal tool for civil command and control applications," said Jack Harrington, vice president, Raytheon Network CentricSystems' Command and Control Systems.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

What scares me is the Power the Postmaster General And Treasure Secretary have in an National Emergency. There's some Executive Orders about it.