More Homeland Insecurity Idiocy

From the "If it weren’t so frightening, this would be so funny" department. Quoting a Yahoo Travel News article, headlined: To Stave Off Terror, Feds Issue Safety Strategy For Boaters

“As boating season approaches, the Bush administration wants to enlist the country’s 80 million recreational boaters to help reduce the chances that a small boat could deliver a nuclear or radiological bomb somewhere along the country's 95,000 miles of coastline and inland waterways.

“According to an April 23 intelligence assessment obtained by The Associated Press, ‘The use of a small boat as a weapon is likely to remain al-Qaida's weapon of choice in the maritime environment, given its ease in arming and deploying, low cost, and record of success.’

“The millions of humble dinghies, fishing boats and smaller cargo ships that ply America's waterways are not nationally regulated as they buzz around ports, oil tankers, power plants and other potential terrorist targets.”

What a sad commentary on our government – not just the Bush administration, which is so zealous in this regard, but any administration in today’s world, when no one can be perceived as being soft on terror. Witness the idiocy about flag lapel pins during the recent Democratic debate.

Any 12-year-old can tell you that airport screening is a theatrical joke – we don’t catch terrorists by wanding grandmothers at the Boise airport. And we don’t catch terrorists by having the “80 million recreational boaters” in the U.S. play cowboy on the water.

It seems like every initiative coming from the Department of Homeland Insecurity is a Wag The Dog moment. Fingerprinting foreign visitors when they leave the U.S. Harassing chicken farmers. Devising toy X-ray machines for children. George Orwell was right. There is probably no hope for us to ever return to sanity and normalcy. But maybe that’s exactly how our elected politicians want it.

Defending our coastlines