Joseph & Susan TRENTO on Book TV yesterday

[UTUSN]

Unsafe at any Altitude: Failed Terrorism Investigations, Scapegoating 9/11, and the Shocking Truth about Aviation Security Today by Susan B. Trento and Joseph J. Trento.

He spoke COMMON SENSE about the SECURITY issue. This is what is lacking in all the blowhards, rabble-rousers, and other forms of a-holes in D.C. He said that the previous airport screeners, pre-9/11, were actually doing well at a much lower cost than the (TSA?) new screeners, who have less than a 40% rate of catching junk, that this new system is John McCAIN's baby, that when the video of the 9-11 hijackers passing through screening was first checked and re-checked (after the attacks) on 9-11 and 9-12, there was NOTHING lacking in the screening process. But when the FBI reviewed the tapes, they picked out the dudes, BECAUSE THEY ALREADY KNEW THEM, meaning they KNEW them on 9-TEN, or any number of months before. It wasn't a matter of screening, it was a matter of their choosing WHEN to pick them up, that failed.

He said that two of the hijackers were supposedly Saudi covert agents who had been given a pass because the Saudis reassured the U.S. government that these dudes were supposedly the key to Bin Laden. That's why Shrub and the rest of the govt weren't INCENSED at the Saudi role OR about the multiple warnings HE GOT before 9-11.

He displayed the 40,000-names print-out of the no-fly list, the list being WRONG in both the names it has and the ones it doesn't have, that the eleven government agencies compete and block one another out same as always, that the airlines are in the position of being the last line of catching terrorists without being trusted by the agencies with some of the real names (photos, fingerprints), that the government should be the last line, that the screening profiles are only good for catching weirdos and loonies, not terrorists who would be slick in studying how to get past.

He talked about some dude Condo RICE is buddying-up with, who was a double agent in both hijacking a plane then "rescuing" the occupants, giving himself CRED with the U.S. govt. On and on. The jackassed blunders our American lack of a KNACK in reading OTHER CULTURES has led-us-to over and over. He said that airline security is, and always has been, driven by the ECONOMICS of the airlines. He says what I know, that "homeland security" and all the border security b.s. is a RATHOLE of financial waste.

Meanwhile the TANCREDOs and the Tex SENSENBRENNERs rule.

[H2O Man]

1. Joseph Trento's

2001 book "The Secret History of the CIA" is an important read. The first Carroll & Graf edition (2005) has a valuable new introduction by the author. I strongly recommend this book.

[UTUSN]

2. Thanks. Will do. Why isn't THIS guy running things? n/t

[H2O Man]

3. He has a great

deal of information on how the US armed both Iraq and Iran that I think is particularly important. I'm glad that he appears on Book TV, but I think that it would be great to see him on some of the other talk shows -- such as Hardball and Countdown -- as we move closer to the Bush administration's latest "surge" in Iraq.