UNC’s ‘Literature Of 9/11’ Course Sympathizes With Terrorists, Paints U.S. As Imperialistic

None of the assigned readings view attacks from perspective of Sept. 11 victims’ families

An English class offered at UNC Chapel Hill this fall called “Literature of 9/11” explores the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks from the perspective of radical Islamists and those who view America as an imperialist nation.

The reading assignments for the class, which includes poems, memoirs and graphic novels, present terrorists in a sympathetic light and American political leaders as greedy, war hungry and corrupt, according to a review by The College Fix.

The readings mostly focus on justifying the actions of terrorists – painting them as fighting against an American regime, or mistaken idealists, or good people just trying to do what they deem right. None of the readings assigned in the freshman seminar present the Sept. 11 attacks from the perspective of those who died or from American families who lost loved ones.

Via: The College Fix

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Lindsey Graham: ‘Perfect storm’ brewing vs. U.S.

The United States faces the greatest risk of terrorist activity since 9/11 and national security will be a defining issue of the 2016 election, presidential hopeful Lindsey Graham told New Hampshire residents at a Town Hall-style gathering yesterday in Manchester.

The South Carolina senator — with Sen. John McCain by his side — gave a bleak assessment of the country’s security status, and said the expanding reach of terrorist groups, defense cuts and the Iran nuclear deal create a recipe for domestic disaster.

“This deal is a bad deal for us and for Israel and everyone else,” he said. “There is a perfect storm brewing for us to get hit. Here. Hard.”

A roomful of voters encircled Graham and McCain, who both slammed President Obama for a soft approach to foreign policy.

The meeting gave Granite State voters a glimpse of what’s to come at a Voters First Forum tomorrow, where residents will get to vet GOP candidates.

As president, Graham said, he would pour more money into the military and send soldiers back to Iraq.

Via: Boston Herald

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NY judge rules NSA phone surveillance is legal

NEW YORK — A federal judge on Friday found that the National Security Agency’s bulk collection of millions of Americans’ telephone records is legal and a valuable part of the nation’s arsenal to counter the threat of terrorism.

U.S. District Judge William Pauley said in a written opinion that the program “represents the government’s counter-punch” to eliminate al-Qaida’s terror network by connecting fragmented and fleeting communications.

In ruling, the judge noted the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and how the phone data-collection system could have helped investigators connect the dots before the attacks occurred.

“The government learned from its mistake and adapted to confront a new enemy: a terror network capable of orchestrating attacks across the world. It launched a number of counter-measures, including a bulk telephony metadata collection program — a wide net that could find and isolate gossamer contacts among suspected terrorists in an ocean of seemingly disconnected data,” he said.

Pauley’s decision contrasts with a ruling earlier this month by U.S. District Court Judge Richard Leon, who granted a preliminary injunction against the collecting of phone records of two men who had challenged the program. The Washington jurist said the program likely violates the U.S. Constitution’s ban on unreasonable search.

Pauley dismissed a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union. The ACLU did not immediately respond to a message for comment.

Via: Chicago Sun-Times

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Post-9/11 airport security measures didn't prevent LAX shooting

LOS ANGELES — Despite a $1.6-billion investment in new security measures at Los Angeles International Airport since 9/11, Friday's shooting by a gunman who made his way deep into a passenger terminal demonstrates that the airport remains vulnerable to attacks that appear costly and difficult to defend against.

Lobbies, ticketing counters, baggage claim areas and sidewalks of the nine terminals at Los Angeles International Airport, the nation's third-busiest, are easily accessible to attackers intent on bringing firearms or bombs into the airport's public areas.

Creating a fail-safe security perimeter for the terminal area, however, would be extremely costly and might shift attacks by those seeking to do harm to other public gathering places, said Brian Jenkins, an authority on terrorism and aviation security at Rand Corp., the Santa Monica-based think tank.

"It would be very hard to do," Jenkins said. "There would be very little net security benefit. Terrorists could go somewhere else, like attack a shopping mall in Nairobi or a theater in Aurora, Colo., or Times Square. What do we really gain?"

In Friday morning's attack, a gunman identified by police as Paul Anthony Ciancia, 23, carried an assault-style rifle through the lobby of Terminal 3 and began shooting as he passed through a Transportation Security Administration checkpoint.

Via: McClatchy

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Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/11/04/207351/post-911-airport-security-measures.html#storylink=cpy

Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/11/04/207351/post-911-airport-security-measures.html#storylink=cpy

LAX REMOVED ARMED POLICE FROM SECURITY CHECKPOINTS MONTHS AGO

Just a few months before the shootings at LAX on Friday, LAX administration removed armed police from their stations at TSA checkpoints, according to the Los Angeles Times. After 9/11, LAPD officers and airport police were armed and placed at checkpoints; months ago, they were moved to “roving patrols.”

According to airport police officer and president of the Los Angeles Airport Peace Officers Association Marshall McClain, staffing concerns led to the change. McClain said officers would respond within one or two minutes to crises, and added that while armed officers were in Terminal 3 during the shooting incident, they were not at checkpoints.

“Our officers performed valiantly,” McClain stated, adding that the shooter carried an AR-15 in a bag through the ticketing area before pulling it out to muscle his way through security checkpoints.

Via: Breitbart

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Hayden: Obama 'Rebalance' of US Intel Could Harm National Security

The National Security Agency (NSA) is being relentlessly pilloried by resentful detractors abroad — and strident critics on the left and right at home — which could force the Obama administration to weaken the intelligence community's ability to protect critical U.S. interests, former CIA head Michael Hayden wrote Thursday in a Wall Street Journal op-ed.
 

Hayden, who was CIA director from 2006 to 2009, cautioned that the White House "needs to be careful not to overachieve."

It is not the place of an American president to invite other countries to tell him "what aspects of our espionage make them uncomfortable," Hayden wrote.

In the 1990s, criticism of the CIA's human-intelligence operations led to reforms that held back the agency's ability to collect information from "bad" people.

"If we tell signals-intelligence collectors in the NSA that they cannot listen to any 'good' people' similar damage is in store," Hayden warned. The agency only recovered from the order not to talk to "bad people" after 9/11.

Hayden insisted that "a formal framework for national intelligence priorities" is regularly agreed upon at the National Security Council level. So when U.S. policy makers confirm they want to better understand the strategy of a friendly, but headstrong ally, "What is it they think they are asking the intelligence community to do?"

Even if European leaders are pandering — theatrically — to their outraged constituencies, and notwithstanding that some concerns about privacy are legitimate, the end result could be "reduced cooperation with the U.S. on a variety of issues," he cautioned.

America's allies ought to appreciate that, "It is bad politics and bad policy for good friends to put their partners in politically impossible situations, and recent reports of aggressive American espionage have done just that."

Espionage may well not be compatible with a "political culture that every day demands more transparency and more public accountability," Hayden wrote. A balance is needed that preserves the confidence Americans have in what their spy agencies are doing with the ability of the intelligence community to get the job done.

Morale is also a factor. Hayden warned that the men and women of the intelligence community — whose work is being branded "excessive" "unconstrained" and "out of control" — could lose heart.

Via: Newsmax

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Rand Paul shames media for ignoring ‘worldwide war on Christianity’

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul spent Friday morning telling stories to conservatives about the persecution of Christians across the world.

“Today I want to tell you about a war the mainstream media is ignoring,” the Republican lawmaker said Friday during the Values Voter Summit in Washington. “From Boston to Zanzibar, there is a worldwide war on Christianity.”

“You won’t hear much about it on the evening news because the answer is not convenient and does not fit the narrative we have been told about radical Islam,” Paul added.

Paul also said President Obama”tries to gloss over who is attacking and killing Christians.”

“But the truth is, there is a worldwide war on Christians by a fanatical element of Islam,” Paul said.

“Ever since 9/11, commentators have tried to avoid pointing fingers at Islam,” he said. “While it is fair to point out that most Muslims are not committed to violence against Christians, this is not the whole truth and we should not let political correctness stand in the way of the truth.”

Examples referenced by Paul:

• Referencing an incident in Syria, Paul spoke of Islamic rebels storming into town and demanding everyone convert to Islam or die. “Sarkis el Zakhm stood up and answered them, ‘I am a Christian and if you want to kill me because I am a Christian, do it.’ Those were Sarkis last words.”
• “Elsewhere in Syria, Islamic rebels have filmed beheadings of their captives and celebrated by eating the heart of an enemy soldier,” Paul said. “Two Christian bishops have been kidnapped and one priest recently killed.”
• “In Zanzibar, a priest was shot in the head on his way to church by two Muslim youths,” Paul said. :A message by the Muslim Renewal said, ‘We thank our young men, trained in Somalia, for killing an infidel. Many more will die. We will burn homes and churches. We have not finished: at Easter, be prepared for disaster.’”
• Said Paul: “In Kenya, motorcycle assailants hurled bombs into a Christian church injuring 15 people including the pastor who had both of his legs broken.”
• “In Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim nation, three girls were beheaded on their way to their Christian school,” Paul said.

Via: Daily Caller

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Boston school recites Muslim poem instead of Pledge of Allegiance on 9/11 anniversary

A school in Boston reportedly had a Muslim poem recital over the intercom instead of the Pledge of Allegiance on the 12th anniversary of 9/11.

The principal of Concord Carlisle High School, Peter Badalament issued an apology and said that a 'small number' of people were outraged at the poem, which was meant to promote 'cross-cultural understanding'.

According to the Washington Times, the Pledge of Allegiance was not read because of some confusion and the principal said that the school was unaware that their student pledge reader was unavailable that day.

The report said that Mohja Kahf's 'My Grandmother Washes Her Feet in the Sink of the Bathroom at Sears' was recited in which a granddaughter's account of watching her grandmother adhere to the religious Muslim custom of washing her feet five times a day, is described.

Badalament said that the district will integrate the feedback that has been offered into their future work with students, the report added.

Via: Business Standard

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