US Intel Incompetence Tops Al Qaeda Bumbling in The Looming Tower

How can a group of blundering, nomadic, social misfits pull off the greatest terror atrocity in history? It’s easy when the good guys stay busy defeating themselves. Such is the message of The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 by Lawrence Wright.

Mr. Wright’s thoroughly exhaustive tome moves crisply through the histories of the Al-Qaeda players, their success and failures, the valiant attempts by under-resourced FBI maverick John O’Neill, and the systemic, bureaucratic incompetence in US intel agencies that opened the door to 9/11.

Ironically, ultra-violent Al-Qaeda drew inspiration from a prim, bookish man named Sayyid Qutb. Qutb, who actually lived in the US during the 1940’s, was struck by the licentiousness, superficiality, and spiritual vacuity he experienced here:

“Qutb saw a spiritual wasteland, yet belief in God was nearly unanimous in the United States at the time. It was easy to misled by the proliferation of churches, religious books, and religious festivals, Qutb maintained: the fact remained that materialism as the real American god.”

This is a common theme through the book: young Muslims being radicalized in the West. Perhaps this insight can help answer the question lefty’s bray about all the time: “why do they hate us“: maybe it’s because our collective spiritual life is so vapid and unsatisfying. However, religious chauvinism and cultural envy might have something to do with it as well.

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What do you get for the woman who has everything? How about a used chest? No, not the kind pirates use to bury treasure. This kind:

Inventory reduction sale!

Yes, it’s for real.

Former reality TV contestant Carolina Gynning is tired of her extra large pair and has decided to auction the set off on eBay with all proceeds going to charity, Sweden’s The Local reported.

It seems the young lady was shocked to discover that being top-heavy attracted attention.

“Everybody talks about them and it feels like they hide my true identity. On January 19th I am going to consult with my plastic surgeon about removing the implants. I still think large breasts are nice but there’s got to be a limit somewhere! I currently have a double D-cup and plan to go back down to my natural level, which is a C-cup,” wrote Gynning.

Nothing tells your honey that you care like a hefty dose of superficiality and some used silicone to back it up.

The University of St. Thomas calls itself “a shining star in the heart of Houston.” Apparently that star is a beacon for criminals:

The usual calm of the campus at the University of St. Thomas is slowly being edged out by crime concerns.

In just three week’s time, there have been two violent crimes. Both were near the intersection of Mt. Vernon and West Main on the west side of campus. On the first incident in mid-December, a professor was attacked by a group of young men, hit on the head and had his wallet stolen. Last Friday a student worker was robbed at gunpoint. Students have taken notice.

Yikes. That one sounds familiar.

Sources tell us the president of the university has met with members of the Houston Police Department and has asked for an increased officer presence.

Yeah, good luck with that.

Scumbag breaks into apartment, shoots the occupant:

The man broke into an unit at the Ashford Lakes Apartments on Dairy Ashford near Briarforest.

The suspect demanded money from the resident, the resident refused and was shot.

The resident was rushed to the hospital and is listed in critical condition.

No doubt Chief Hurtt will work day and night to bring law and order to the Bayou City.

How understaffed is the Houston Police Department?

Well, let me put it this way. We don’t have enough cops to catch an old man on a bicycle with a sack full of cash:

The man rode up to the bank on the bike shortly before 3:30 p.m. Tuesday. Once inside, he approached the teller, demanded money and said he had a bomb. The robber then gave the teller a note demanding money.

The teller complied and the robber escaped on his bicycle. No one was injured during the robbery.

The robber is described as a white male, 50-55 years of age, approximately 5′8″ tall, 170-200 pounds. He had long gray hair pulled back in a pony tail and a gray beard.

During the robbery, he wore khaki colored pants, a khaki jacket and matching hat.

Meanwhile, Chief Harold Hurtt’s real estate holdings in Phoenix are nice and secure.

The Chron managed to misspell Jimi Hendrix’s first name. And last name.

With permission, he has spray painted murals on buildings throughout the Houston area, creating everything from Dizzy Gillespie, Jimmy Hendricks and Madonna on a sound studio to a 60-foot downtown skyline on a pool hall.

[Hat-tip: Slampo.]

The lovely and talented Anne Linehan (Fox News contributor) over at blogHouston kicked off an interesting discussion: What should we call Metro’s blog? Opponents of light rail came up with some fun names for MetroRail — “A Streetcar Named Disaster” was my favorite.

Laurence Simon tossed off a few suggestions for naming Mary Sit’s PR effort for Metro. Here are the best ones, as determined by a blue-ribbon panel consisting of me:

• Railing On METRO
• The Dangerblog
• Propaganza
• Stray Currents
• Piece of Sit

Now it’s your turn. Vote in the comments!

Got any money in Venezuela? Get it the hell out of there.

It seems socialist would-be dictator Hugo Chavez is consolidating his economic power with the aim of turning Venezuela into a powerhouse of international commerce. You know, just like Cuba:

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said he would nationalize utilities, including the country’s biggest phone company, and the energy ministry threatened the same for oil-production joint ventures.

“All those sectors that are so strategic, such as electric power, everything that was privatized will be nationalized,” Chavez said today in a televised speech in Caracas. “We will recover the strategic means of production. Cantv, let’s nationalize it.”

Got any family in Venezuela? Get ‘em the hell out of there. Chavez is also working to expand his political power by similar unnerving means:

Chavez has said he will ask the National Assembly, solidly dominated by his allies, for special powers allowing him to enact a series of “revolutionary laws” by decree.

During the election campaign, Chavez said he would seek constitutional reforms including scrapping presidential term limits, which bar him from running again in 2012. This week, he also called for a constitutional amendment to strip the central bank of its autonomy.

This is a really bad dude, hellbent on spreading Soviet-style misery throughout Latin America.

Is it really going to surprise anyone when he announces that the people want him to be president for life? How about when he dissolves the legislature and suspends the constitution, replacing them with the Revolution? After all, Western-style democratic principles are just a cloak for neocolonialism, he’ll say.
And we’ll let him do it.

This is the body of a letter sent to the Members of the United States Congress by Department of Homeland Security in Washington DC regarding the official statement of the incident in Arizona where the National Guard retreated in the face of 4 drug thugs coming into the United States:

The US Customs and Border Protection Office of Congressional Affairs has received several calls asking for more information regarding an incursion by armed individuals last week in Arizona. Below is a summary of the event. Please let me know if you require additional information.

On Wednesday, January 3, 2007, A National Guard Unit manning a observation post near Sasabe, AZ observed several armed men advancing on their location. The men were observed wearing ballistic vests and carrying automatic weapons. The National Guardsmen reported the situation to Border Patrol via handheld radio and satellite phone. One of the subjects approached the observation post and came within 20 yards of the site. Following standard operating procedure, the national Guardsmen slowly retreated to their vehicle and drove approximately 200 yards away from the site. A CBP air asset arrived on scene within minutes and flew over the area assessing the risk. Five Border Patrol ground Agents were on-site within 10 minutes of the initial call. The ground agents and the air asset tracked the subjects back into Mexico. The CBP air asset continued to provide an aerial platform to look for possible threats from the Mexico side of the border. The CBP air asset did not enter Mexican airspace. Nothing was disturbed or taken from the observation post. Contrary to several media reports, the National Guard members were armed at the time of the encounter

Joe Westmoreland

Office of Congressional Affairs

U.S. Customs and Border Protection

202-344-2852

Note the statement: Following standard operating procedure, the national Guardsmen slowly retreated to their vehicle and drove approximately 200 yards away from the site.The National Guard is under direct orders to NOT defend our nation - to retreat in the face of invaders and thugs.

Read this entire article, top to bottom.

It is, at its core, about two individual state senators.

• One of them wants to conduct senate business in a way that encourages openness, individual accountability, and is consistent with legislative bodies across the country. His colleagues did everything they could yesterday to try to do what (they thought would) humiliate him.
• The other spent no-one-knows how many years as an alcoholic (we are genuinely glad for his sobriety and wish him every success) and carried on a 17-year affair with an ex-stripper, who accused him of stealing from her and being physically abusive. His colleagues showered him with honors and did everything they could to discourage political challengers from running against him in 2008.

I’m not saying the Senate should have bent to Dan’s whim, just because he said so. And I’ve even got no problem with the institution doing a little rallying around a fallen (and hopefully rising) colleague.

But the contrast between the treatment of the two is a little stark, coming on the same day and packed into the same article.

Just a reminder, if you needed it, that politics, Austin, and the Senate in particular are different worlds, operating according to a logic all their own.

And so it begins:

The Texas Senate took just 15 minutes today to drop-kick freshman Sen. Dan Patrick on his first challenge of the upper chamber’s traditions.

By a 30-1 margin, the Senate rejected a proposal by Patrick, a Houston Republican, to do away with the so-called two-thirds rule that requires 21 of the 31 senators to agree before a bill can be debated.

It is rare for a freshman senator to participate in debate on the opening day of the session and even rarer for one to challenge a Senate tradition.

This is my favorite part:

Then, in a roll call vote some senators said was intended to send Patrick a message about his public challenge of the rules after earlier being told in a closed-door meeting that he would fail, the Senate adopted its rules for the legislative session — with the two-thirds rule intact.

Patrick was the lone “no.”

[Hat-tip Austin American-Statesman]

Here’s the thing–you can only “send a message” to someone if they care. A 30 to 1 defeat only stings if the 1 voter cares that they are all alone against the 30.

I don’t think Dan cares. I don’t think his supporters care. If anything, I suspect they consider this a point of pride, proof positive that he us not your “typical Austin politician.”

My advice to the Powers-That-Be is that if they want to make Dan look bad, start engineering some slim-margin 15 to 16 vote losses. If the blocker bill had been preserved by just one or two votes, it would look to the public like victory was potentially in reach, but Dan just couldn’t deliver an actual win.

Instead he comes out looking (again, remember, to his supporters) like Jimmy Stewart in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.

Not bad for the first day on the job.

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