"Today it's bus drivers, tomorrow,...people who deliver the newspaper"

[dajoki]

NYT
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/19/national/nationalspecial3/19bus.html?ex=1298005200&en=b7e488b3327940b3&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

Enlisting School Bus Drivers to Keep an Eye Out for Terrorists

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: February 19, 2006

NORFOLK, Va., Feb. 18 (AP) — Jeffrey Beatty, a security expert, paints a picture of a deadly plot: terrorists monitor a punctual school bus driver for weeks, then hijack his bus and load it with enough explosives to take down a building. But an alert driver could foil that plan, Mr. Beatty told a class of 250 drivers in Norfolk. After all, bus drivers cover millions of miles of roads. They know the towns, the children, the parents.

School bus drivers around the country are being trained to watch for potential terrorists, in a program financed by the Homeland Security Department. Designers of the program, called School Bus Watch, want to turn 600,000 drivers into an army of observers.

"The terrorist is not going to be able to do some of their casing and rehearsal activity without being detected by one of you," Mr. Beatty, a former antiterrorism officer, told the drivers in his class. The more people watching, he said, the safer the community would be.

Such a training program demands strong oversight, said John Rollins, a former senior Homeland Security intelligence official now with the Congressional Research Service. Otherwise, he said, some bus drivers could think of themselves as undercover agents.

"Today it's bus drivers, tomorrow it could be postal officials, and the next day, it could be, 'Why don't we have this program in place for the people who deliver the newspaper to the door?' " Mr. Rollins said. "We could quickly get into a society where we're all spying on each other. It may be well intentioned, but there is a concern of going a bit too far."

[acmavm]

1. Want to watch terrorists? Put cameras on the White House.

.

[DeadManInc]

2. You got that right lol!!

[FrannyD]

15. look in the mirror

for sure!

[Rabrrrrrr]

3. The republicans sure do get their orgasms from fear-mongering, don't they?

I couldn't believe it when I read this in the paper last weekend.

Well, actually, yes I could believe it, but the part of me that goes ballistic when something truly stupid and immmoral gets done couldn't believe it.

This has nothing to do with stopping terrorists, and has EVERYTHING to do with hyping propaganda THAT EVEN YOUR CHILDREN ARE AT RISK ON THEIR SCHOOL BUSSES!!! AHHHHHHH! FEAR FEAR TERROR!!!!!! AHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!! SO GIVE UP A FEW MORE OF YOUR RIGHTS, BECAUSE THEY'LL USE YOUR BUSSES NEXT!!!!!!!! AHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

Assholes.

[Scurrilous]

8. This has nothing to do with terrorism...

...and has everything to do with snagging Homeland Security pork and enriching whomever runs the School Bus Watch program.

[darkmaestro019]

16. Bingo. My first thought reading this was, Wow, Mr. Beatty--

I bet you make six figures a year to run around warning of trolls under bridges and selling your "How to Avoid Being Eaten By Trolls" speaking engagements......

[waiting for hope]

4. May not be a bad idea...

:sarcasm: I remember my elementary school bus driver very clearly, she scared the hell out of me and I now have a phobia about being on time...I think she'd scare the poop outa OBL. Go Get Um Buck Tooth! Get that old nasty terrorist! Whew, flashbacks to the past hurt....:scared:

[uppityperson]

17. No way is anyone going to hijack any of the bus drivers I know...

"sit down and behave yourselves!" Stupid idea. How about we get out of Iraq, quit pissing off people just to prove that USA USA USA is the Biggest Baddest Controllingest country in all the world instead?

[proud2BlibKansan]

5. This reminds me of the attempts to turn school employees into

border patrol agents. Every couple years, there is a movement somewhere to restrict free public education to only kids who are US citizens. I am adamantly opposed to this for several reasons:

1. It would make the schools take on a law enforcement roll. We are educators, not cops or immigration agents.
2. Equal opportunity is basic to our American system of education. Public schools accept any kid who walks in the door, no questions asked. This is how it should be.
3. Denying their kids an education won't keep illegal immigrants out of the US. They come here for jobs, not the schools.

[henslee]

6. Hey, baby, I ain't a bus driver, I'm an undercover government agent.

[dajoki]

13. still making minimum wage n/t

[Webster Green]

7. And the cable guy...

Wasn't it right after 9/11, when ChimpCo Inc. floated the trial balloon about the cable guy and the mailman keeping an eye on us?

Didn't go over too good, as I recall.:eyes:

[dajoki]

10. yes, i remember that one...

how 'bout the rolls of plastic and duct tape?

[NYC]

14. Wasn't that Total Information Awareness?

DARPA?

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Total_Information_Awareness

[madrchsod]

9. god are these people dumb

[dajoki]

11. YES!!

hopefully they won't be armed.

[DBoon]

12. And we could hire some real experts from the former DDR for this

I mean, there are thousands of former STASI looking for opportunties to ply their trade.

[Art_from_Ark]

18. Please don't give them any ideas

They're already hatching enough hare-brained schemes as it is :banghead:

[OneBlueSky]

19. soon it will be neighbors spying on neighbors and . . .

family members spying on family members . . . kinda like Germany in the 1930s . . .