CONOR LAMB, 33, DEMOCRAT, GEN Y, 2018 SPECIAL ELECTION WINNER (PA)

CONOR LAMB, 33, DEMOCRAT, GEN Y, 2018 SPECIAL ELECTION WINNER (PA):

CONOR’S CAMPAIGN PLAYBOOK WAS BORROWED FROM JFK, OBAMA & TRUMP.

LEADERS LIKE CONOR CAN USHER IN EFFECTIVE LANDMARK GUN CONTROL & UPHOLD THE 2nd AMENDNENT.

CONOR ATTRACTED VOTERS FROM BOTH SIDES OF THE POLITICAL AISLE.

CONOR’S WIN PROVES DEMOCRAT VOTERS ARE SICK & TIRED OF LYING, COMPLACENT, GREEDY, CAREER POLITICIANS IN CONGRESS WHO ARE SELL OUTS.

CONGRESS NEEDS NEW BLOOD & ACTION.

CONOR IS THE BEGINNING OF THAT MOVEMENT.

CONGRATS TO CONOR ON HIS WIN.


Sources: NBC News, NY Times, Youtube


****** Who Is Conor Lamb, Winner in a Special House Race in Pennsylvania?


For the Democratic Party, Conor Lamb seemed like a candidate generated from reams of election data mined and analyzed to produce an ideal fit for his Southwestern Pennsylvania congressional district.

A former Marine who favored gun rights, he was culturally conservative enough to appeal to rural voters. He was pro labor and pro tariff in an area that still has thousands of steelworkers union members. As a federal prosecutor, he cracked down on drug dealers but also offered empathy about the tragedy of opioid addiction. And his Ivy League polish and earnest manner played well with college-educated suburban voters.

And now, with his victory in a district so Republican that Democrats did not even field a candidate in the last two elections, Mr. Lamb, 33, has offered a template that will be studied in congressional races where Democratic candidates need to win over voters who supported President Trump.

“He is like the type of Democrat that won in ruby-red districts in 2006, who breaks the mold and is much more of a nontraditional, outside-the-mainstream, everyday American law enforcement type,” said John Lapp, a Democratic strategist who was executive director of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in 2006, when the party wrested control of the House from Republicans.

Mr. Lamb had to navigate a district that President Trump had won by nearly 20 percentage points in 2016. The president labeled him “Lamb the sham” in a campaign appearance in Pennsylvania last Saturday, and the administration deployed Vice President Mike Pence, Kellyanne Conway, counselor to the president, and Donald Trump Jr. to defeat him.

In turn, he showed restraint and discipline in talking about the president and was quick to support Mr. Trump’s proposed tariffs on steel and aluminum imports. He did not respond to the president’s mockery, and on Wednesday morning, refused to engage when he was asked on CNN to comment about Mr. Trump’s remarks.

“You call it a red district,” Mr. Lamb said on CNN. “I call it western Pennsylvania. We worked extremely hard to get out and campaign in person over every square inch of this district. And I think just through talking to people, looking them in the eye, figuring out what the issues are for them and trying to come out with solutions, we seemed to have reached a lot of people. We saw huge turnout on both sides which is great. People around here are engaged.”

Mr. Lamb also said he thought voters were weary of pettiness and name calling.

“There was a lot of foolishness in this election and cartoonish campaigning,” he said. “By the time of the president’s visit last weekend, people were tired of that entire approach. I had people, especially elderly people, come up to me and say, I hate those ads against you. It’s not right. It’s not worthy of us. I think there is a little bit of burnout on that type of campaign before the president ever got here.”

Mr. Lamb built his coalition from many disparate parts. He bridged the divide between labor union leaders and their members. “He married the union leaders and rank-and-file for the first time in two decades,” said G. Terry Madonna, a professor at Franklin and Marshall College who has conducted polls in Pennsylvania for more than three decades.

He also focused heavily on local issues and mostly avoided getting into a fight with his Republican opponent, Rick Saccone, over Mr. Trump.

“He decided early on he would not turn this into a national election,” Mr. Madonna said. “It was a local election. Number two, he did events, but more important, he knocked on the door, put the yard sign up, emphasizing his personal connection with people, something Saccone did not do.”

He added, “And also, he was like, ‘Donald who? Who’s that guy?’”

Though the race was Mr. Lamb’s first attempt at public office, politics is part of his family pedigree. His grandfather, Thomas Lamb, was the Democratic leader of the State Senate in the 1970s and served in the administration of Gov. Robert P. Casey.

Michael Lamb, his uncle, is the controller for the city of Pittsburgh and an avid supporter. His younger brother, Coleman Lamb, is helping out as well, on loan from his day job as press secretary for a New York congresswoman.

Mr. Lamb leaned hard on his military background — he served as a prosecutor in the Marine Corps and was stationed in Okinawa while on active duty — and his support for gun rights, beginning with his first commercial.

That same ad also featured a picture of him at a gun range, noting that he “still loves to shoot.” These were acts of political inoculation: Mr. Lamb was sending a message to the district’s conservative-leaning voters that he was his own person.

He also effectively neutralized Republican attempts to label him a liberal in the mold of the House Democratic leader, Representative Nancy Pelosi, by saying that he would not vote for her in a leadership election. Republicans, who poured in millions of dollars in ads against Mr. Lamb, tried to paint him as a slavish follower of the California Democrat. He countered with a commercial noting that his opposition to her had been reported on the front page of a local newspaper.

Mr. Lamb had another résumé-enhancing line to offer voters: federal prosecutor. After clerking for a federal judge in New York, he did a stint as an assistant United States attorney in Pittsburgh, prosecuting a range of cases that gave him a law-and-order credential.

But his time in the Justice Department during the Obama administration also provided Republicans with some fodder. In one ad, the National Republican Congressional Committee noted that Mr. Lamb had reached a plea bargain with a drug kingpin, a potentially damaging line of attack in a region ravaged by opioids.

Like the other attacks Republicans hurled at him, it ultimately proved ineffective.

Barack Obama Is "The People's President!" Decision 2012

Let Me Be Clear People!

Just Because I Didn't Agree With ALL Of Pres. Obama's Policies & Decisions During His First 2 Years In Office Doesn't Mean He Lost My Vote.

I Supported Barack Obama In 2008 & Likewise For 2012.

Its Ok To Disagree & Apply Pressure To Our ELECTED Officials.

That's What Defines REAL Democracy.

(If Both Of Us Always Agree Then One Of Us Isn't Necessary!)

But When The Dust Clears Who I Endorse & Stand By Defines ME!

He's The Person Best Suited To Continue Leading This Country & I Stand With Pres. Obama In 2012.

I Realize My Decision To Support Pres. Obama Has Made A Lot Of People Very Angry, But At The End Of The Day I Have To ONLY Live With Myself & Answer To God.

Thus What Others Think Of Me Doesn't Matter Because They Too Are Accountable To God!

Much Like His 2008 Campaign Strategy, Pres. Obama's 2012 Campaign Strategy Will Also Be About Building Relationships With People From All Walks Of Life & Promoting A Grassroots Movement.

Like His Predecessors JFK & Bill Clinton, Barack Obama Is Truly "The People's President!"

Most GOP Leaders & Candidates Stand ONLY For Billionaires, Millionaires & Corporate Titans.

While Pres. Obama, MOST Democrats, Progressives & Independents Stand For ALL American Citizens!

The NEW America!

The America Which Welcomes ALL & Loves ALL!

This Includes Extremely Wealthy People, Senior Citizens, Veterans, Middle Class, Lower Income & Young Voters, Regardless Of Ethnicity Or Culture.

NOT Just Wealthy Citizens But Everyone Who Resides Within America's Borders.

While Most GOP Leaders & Candidates Appear To Only Be Interested In Dirty,
Racially - Divisive, "Southern Strategy" Politics, Pres. Obama's Camp Is Fighting Hard To Heal & Restore Our Nation's Integrity.

Fighting Hard To Bring Back American Jobs From Overseas.

Fighting To Help Small Businesses Create Jobs In Every Community By Revamping The SBA Process.

Fighting To Keep Our Country Safe. (Remember Obama Got Osama!)

Fighting Hard To Ensure Our Financial System Is NEVER Raped Again With "War On Terror", Fake Wall Street Hedge Funds & Subprime Mortgage Schemes.

Fighting To Help Revise Our Nation's Corrupt, Horribly Unfair Tax Code & Fix The IRS System.

NO Corrupt Flat Tax Rate Please!!

(Everyone Should Pay Their Fair Share Of Taxes Even Billionaires & Millionaires!)

Fighting To Stop Abuse & Fraud Within The Medicare, Medicaid & Social Security Systems, Yet Preserving Those Same Systems. (Remember Kathy Hocul's NY-26 Win Last Tuesday?)

Fighting To Stop Childhood Obesity The Leading Cause Of Juvenile Diabetes.

Fighting To Stop Food Stamp Abuse By Making It Illegal For States To Allow Recipients With Young Children To Consistently Purchase & Feed Their Children Candy, Snacks, Sweet Drinks Versus REAL Food (Fresh Vegetables, Fruits, Whole Grain Breads, etc.,).

Fighting To Stop Many Single Mothers (Black & White) From INTENTIONALLY Making Their Children SICK Just To Get Disability Checks.

Fighting To Stop Age & Racial Discrimination As It Relates To Unfair Hiring Practices.

Fighting To Stop The Destruction Of Collective Bargaining Rights For Labor Unions.

Fighting To Stop Private & For-Profit Schools From Ripping Off Students By Giving Them Fake Degrees Or Degrees With Little Value In Exchange For Student Loans. (i.e., Most Cosmetology Schools. Most NOT All!)

Fighting To Stop Consumer Abuse At The Hands Of BIG Banks (Too Big To Fail!) & Our Nation's 3 Largest Credit Reporting Agencies (Equifax, Experian, Trans Union).

Fighting To Stop ILLEGAL Foreclosures. Especially Among Active Duty U.S. Military Service Members & Veterans.

Fighting To Stop Health Insurance Companies From Taking Money From Members Then ILLEGALLY Denying Them Coverage.

Fighting To Stop Governors From Privatizing Prisons For Revenue Which Encourages Wrongful Convictions & Long Term Imprisonment Of Black & Hispanic Men.

Even Black & Hispanic Men Who Are First Time Offenders Or Those Who Have Committed Non-Drug-Related, Non-Homicidal Crimes.

Fighting To Stop Police Brutality & Taser Gun Abuse.

Fighting To Stop Governors From Allowing Black & Hispanic Children To Remain In Foster Care Until They Age Out (NORTH & SOUTH CAROLINA) Versus Being Adopted By GOOD Foster Parents (NOT Criminals), Just For The Purpose Of Getting More Federal Funding Only To Later Be Wasted On Political Wish Lists.

Fighting To Stop Federal Funding For Public Schools From Being Used To Segregate White Students From Minority Students.

Fighting To Preserve Funding For Early Childhood Programs Like Head Start Which Leads To Higher Academic Success For Low Income Black & Hispanic Children.

Fighting To Help Upgrade American Schools, Including Those In Urban Areas To Better Prepare American Students To Compete In The Global Workforce.

Fighting To Upgrade America's Infrastructure (Bridges, Roads, Highways, High Speed Rail, Internet Access).

Fighting To Protect Veterans From Being Taken Advantage Of By Fake Veterans Advocacy Agencies & Greedy Property Management Companies That Overcharge Veterans For Rental Properties.

Fighting To Stop VA Hospital Pharmacies (Especially In Southern States) From Issuing Pain Pills To Veterans Like Handing Candy To Children On Halloween Night.

Fighting To Stop Voting Rights From Being Violated.

Is Barack Obama God Or Jesus Christ Incarnate?

NO Of Course Not!

But I Do Thank God For Him.

No Doubt He Needs Another 4 Years Wouldn't You Agree?

So If You Haven't Already Made A Decision To Step Up & Volunteer With Pres. Obama's Re-election Organization, Please Do It TODAY!

Time Waits For NO One & 2012 Is Just Around The Corner!

Check Your Attitudes & Egos At The Door! Get Onboard!

Let's Unite, Mobilize & Re-elect Barack H. Obama For Another Term!

YES WE CAN! AGAIN!

VOTE OBAMA IN 2012!

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GOP presidential contenders drift to the right

In the first presidential election since the Tea Party's emergence, Republican candidates are drifting rightward on a range of issues, even though more centrist stands might play well in the 2012 general election.

On energy, taxes, health care and other topics, the top candidates hold positions that are more conservative than those they espoused a few years ago.

The shifts reflect the evolving views of conservative voters, who will play a major role in choosing the Republican nominee. In that sense, the candidates' repositioning seems savvy or even essential.

But the eventual nominee will face President Barack Obama in the 2012 general election, when independent voters appear likely to be decisive players once again. Those independents may be far less enamored of hard-right positions than are the GOP activists who will wield power in the Iowa caucuses, the New Hampshire primary and other nominating contests.

"The most visible shift in the political landscape" in recent years "is the emergence of a single bloc of across-the-board conservatives," says the Pew Research Center, which conducts extensive voter surveys. Many of them "take extremely conservative positions on nearly all issues," Pew reports. They largely "agree with the tea party," and "very strongly disapprove of Barack Obama's job performance."

Climate policy is a dramatic example of how GOP presidential hopefuls have shifted to the right in recent years. Former Govs. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts, Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota and Jon Huntsman of Utah, along with other likely candidates, have backed away from earlier embraces of regional "cap-and-trade" programs to reduce greenhouse gas pollution.

Such stands were unremarkable in GOP circles just a few years ago. Sen. John McCain, the 2008 presidential nominee, supported a cap and trade plan to place prices and limits on the emission of heat-trapping gasses.

'I'm sorry'
Now the position is anathema to millions of Republicans, and therefore to the party's candidates. Pawlenty is the most effusive in his backtracking. "I was wrong, it was a mistake, and I'm sorry," he says repeatedly.

The likely presidential candidates have shifted rightward on other issues as well.

Romney, who leads in most polls, has rejected his earlier stands supporting abortion rights, gun control and gay rights. He says his 2006 law requiring Massachusetts residents to obtain health insurance was right for his state at the time, but he has condemned the Obama-backed mandate that would cover all Americans.

Pawlenty campaigns as a tight-fisted conservative who would refuse to raise the nation's debt ceiling, even though many Republican leaders say economic chaos would ensue. Yet in 2006, Pawlenty told a newspaper, "the era of small government is over" and "government has to be more proactive, more aggressive."

Pawlenty says he was partly quoting another person. But in the same 2006 interview he said, "there are certain circumstances where you've got to have government put up the guardrails or bust up entrenched interests before they become too powerful."

Pawlenty has abandoned such talk in his presidential quest.

The Republican Party's rightward drift is causing headaches for the presidential hopefuls on the issue of Medicare, a potential minefield in the general election. House Republicans passed a bill that eventually would convert Medicare to a less costly, less generous program. It would help older Americans buy health insurance, but it no longer would provide benefits based mainly on a patient's needs rather than costs.

Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich touched off a firestorm by calling the plan radical. He spent the better part of a week trying to recant, change the subject and get his campaign back on track.

Pawlenty, after promising to offer his own Medicare plan, acknowledged conservatives' priorities and said he would sign the House measure if it were the only choice before him.

Romney hedged Friday on whether he would sign the House bill into law. "That's the kind of speculation that is getting the cart ahead of the horse," he said. "I'm going to have my own plan."

Many Republican activists are delighted by the rightward tack of their party and its presidential contenders.

If anything, "mainstream Republican leaders are pushing the party too far to the left," said Sid Dinerstein, GOP chairman in Palm Beach County, Fla. The House plan for Medicare is the only one that makes sense, he said, and GOP candidates "should become articulate and knowledgeable in talking about it."

'Wiggling all over the place'
Louisiana's Republican chairman, Roger F. Villere Jr., agrees.

"The conservative issues are the correct issues," he said. The presidential candidates should embrace the House stand, he said, and persuade voters they care more about saving Medicare than the Democrats do.

Some in Obama's camp, however, say the presidential contenders risk locking themselves into hard-right positions that won't play well when less ideological voters flock to the polls in November 2012.

Romney, Pawlenty, Gingrich and others "are wiggling all over the place" to appease staunch conservatives, said Bill Burton, Obama's former spokesman and now a Democratic fundraiser and advocate. Americans want strong, consistent leaders, he said, and the Republican contenders aren't filling the bill.

Obama, of course, has had his own inconsistencies, such as backing away from calls to increase payroll and income taxes on the wealthy.

Moreover, competitive Democratic primaries are usually the mirror image of GOP contests. Democratic candidates generally edge to the left to attract liberal activists before hewing back to the center for the general election.

This time, however, Obama has no primary opponents to worry about. That allows him to focus on the all-important independent voters, who swung the 2008 elections to Democrats, and the 2010 midterm elections to Republicans.

The latest Pew Research study suggests that independents, who "played a determinative role in the last three national elections," will have even more clout in 2012. They comprised 30 percent of the national electorate in 2005, Pew found. They now make up 37 percent.

Whoever survives the conservative-dominated Republican nominating process will have to address those independents' concerns quickly and adroitly.


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Sources: Barack Obama.com, Fox News, MSNBC, NY Times, Wikipedia, Youtube, Google Maps

Emirates Jet In JFK "No-Fly" Scare Is Released, False Match

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Emirates Jet Briefly Stopped At JFK In "No Fly" Scare


An Emirates airline jet that was briefly detained on a taxiway Thursday at New York's JFK airport was later allowed to leave for Dubai after officials checked the name of a passenger against the U.S. "no fly" list.

The passenger's name was found to be similar to one on the list, but not an exact match, officials said, describing the security scare as a "false alarm."

The pilots had requested permission to taxi for takeoff when Customs and Border Protection blocked the plane from taxiing.

The incident came days after a failed bomb attack on New York's Times Square that has heightened security concerns in America's most populous city.


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Sources: AP, MSNBC, Google Maps

Emirates Jet With "No-Fly" Passenger Halted At JFK

Emirates Jet Stopped At JFK Before Take-Off


U.S. Security Officials stopped an Emirates airline plane on a taxiway Thursday at New York's JFK airport in order to determine whether a passenger aboard is on the U.S. "no fly" list.

A senior government official told NBC News that Emirates Flight 204 was destined for Dubai.

The pilots had requested permission to taxi for takeoff when Customs and Border Protection blocked the plane from taxiing.

A federal official said there was a possible match between a passenger's name and a name on the no fly list.


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Sources: AP, MSNBC, Google Maps

Faisal Shahzad Charged With 5 Counts, Hated Sunlight

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Times Square Bomb Suspect "Didn't Like The Sunlight"


A suspect charged in the failed Times Square car bombing is a Pakistani who became a naturalized U.S. citizen in April 2009 and used to work as a financial analyst in Connecticut.

Faisal Shahzad, 30, most recently of Bridgeport, Connecticut, was arrested Monday night at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York as his flight to Dubai was about to take off, law enforcement officials said.

Federal authorities had put him on a no-fly list earlier in the day, with investigators having determined that he had purchased the vehicle used in Saturday's failed bombing attempt, FBI Deputy Director John Pistole said Tuesday.

Customs and Border Protection agents reacted quickly to the name match and made the arrest, Pistole said.

Shahzad has been charged with five counts in connection with the case, according to documents filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in New York. According to the documents, he admitted to law enforcement officials that he attempted to detonate the bomb and that he recently received bomb-making training in the Waziristan region of Pakistan.

Also according to the complaint, Shahzad returned to the United States via a one-way ticket from Pakistan on February 3. He had told immigration officials upon his return that he had been visiting his parents in Pakistan for the previous five months, the complaint said.

Shahzad has a Karachi identification card, a sign of Pakistani residency, and his family is from northwestern Pakistan, according to Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik.

His father is a retired senior officer in the Pakistani Air Force, Shahzad's cousin, Kafayat Ali, said on Tuesday. The father, Bahar Ul Haq, a former air vice marshal, lives in the Peshawar suburb of Hayatabad in Pakistan.

Shahzad came to the United States and attended college, earning a bachelor's degree in computer applications and information systems from Connecticut's University of Bridgeport in 2000. He earned an MBA at the school in 2005.

He started working as a junior financial analyst for Affinion Media Group in Norwalk, Connecticut, in 2006, leaving voluntarily in June 2009, according to Affinion spokesman Michael Bush.

Before what the court document says was Shahzad's trip to Pakistan, he lived in Shelton, Connecticut. A woman who said she had lived next door to him in Shelton told CNN on Tuesday that the man she knew didn't say much and claimed to work on Wall Street in New York.

"He was quiet. He would wear all black and jog at night. He said he didn't like the sunlight," Brenda Thurman said.

She said Shahzad, his wife and two children and his wife's two sisters lived next to her for about three years, moving out in July 2009. People whom she believes were plainclothes law enforcement officers appeared to be staking out the house Monday, Thurman told CNN affiliate WTNH-TV.

The neighbor said she often saw Shahzad leaving the home in the morning and returning in the evening. She also saw him in his yard with his children, a boy and a girl, and the family usually wore traditional Muslim attire, she told WTNH-TV.

She said she never suspected he might be involved in a possible terror attack.

"I didn't think he was capable of doing something like that. ... I'm very shocked," she said.

Thurman said her daughter often played with Shahzad's daughter, but she herself didn't have much contact with the family.

Shahzad's wife spoke English, but was apparently so insecure about her language ability that she told people she did not, Thurman said.

"I never knew she spoke English until it was time for her to move," Thurman said.

Shahzad's wife told Thurman in July 2009 that the family was moving to Missouri. A few weeks after they left their home, the lender foreclosed on the property and changed the locks, the neighbor said.

At the Bridgeport residence where authorities say he lived most recently, agents with the FBI and local police, including members of a bomb squad, conducted a search, and investigators removed filled plastic bags.

Cell phone calls conducted for the purchase of the vehicle used in Saturday's bombing attempt helped lead police to the suspect, law enforcement sources said.

Sources said investigators got cell phone information from the daughter of the Nissan Pathfinder owner. She sold the vehicle to Shahzad on behalf of her father.

She had been talking on the phone to Shahzad in arranging the purchase of the SUV, which was advertised for sale on Craigslist.

The Nissan Pathfinder was parked in Times Square containing propane tanks, fertilizer and gasoline on Saturday night. After police retrieved the vehicle identification number of the Pathfinder, they located the registered owner of the vehicle.

The sources said the owner's daughter had met with Shahzad at a Stratford, Connecticut, grocery store, for the sale. Shahzad took the car for a test drive in the parking lot and bought the vehicle for $1,300 in cash.

Bridgeport is a working class city of 130,000 on Long Island Sound, 66 miles northeast of New York City. Per capita income there is 26 percent below the national average, and 27 percent of its residents are foreign-born, more than twice the national average, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.


Sources: CNN, MSNBC

TSA Allowed Faisal Shahzad To Board Plane, Like Umar Mutallab

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How Was Faisal Shahzad Able To Board Plane?


The Times Square bomb suspect was on the federal no-fly list and under surveillance but still managed to get aboard a jetliner bound for the United Arab Emirates, sources said Tuesday.

Faisal Shahzad had been under constant watch at his Bridgeport, Conn., home since 3 p.m. Monday and federal authorities had planned to arrest him there that evening, two people familiar with the investigation told The Associated Press. Authorities believe he decided to flee after being spooked by news reports that investigators were seeking a Pakistani suspect in Connecticut, one of the people said.

Shahzad somehow lost the investigators who were trailing him, the two people said. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the incident. It was unclear when Shahzad eluded investigators.

The night's events, gradually coming to light, also underscored the flaws in the nation's aviation security system, which despite its technologies, lists and information sharing, often comes down to someone making a right call.

A law enforcement official told NBC News that the Transportation Security Administration had alerted airlines, but the information hadn't yet gotten into airline systems. A senior U.S. official told NBC that if the system had worked properly, "He should have never been able to get on that airplane."

As federal agents closed in, Shahzad was aboard Emirates Flight 202. He reserved a ticket on the way to John F. Kennedy International Airport, paid cash on arrival and walked through security without being stopped.

By the time Customs and Border Protection officials spotted Shahzad's name on the passenger list and recognized him as the bombing suspect they were looking for, he was in his seat and the plane was preparing to leave the gate.

It didn't. At the last minute, the pilot was notified, the jetliner's door was opened and Shahzad was taken into custody.

After authorities pulled Shahzad off the plane, he admitted he was behind the crude Times Square car bomb, officials said. He also claimed to have been trained at a terror camp in Pakistan's lawless tribal region of Waziristan, according to court documents. That raised increased concern that the bombing was an international terror plot.

Not ‘in danger of losing him’

The Obama administration played down the fact that Shahzad had made it aboard the plane. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano would not talk about it, other than to say Customs officials prevented the plane from taking off. White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said the security system has fallback procedures in place for times like this, and they worked.

And Attorney General Eric Holder said he "was never in any fear that we were in danger of losing him."

It may be that the airline either never saw or ignored key information that would have kept Shahzad off the plane, a fact that dampened what was otherwise hailed as a fast, successful law enforcement operation.

The senior U.S. official who spoke to NBC News said Shahzad's name was put onto the no-fly list about 11 a.m. Monday morning, some 12 hours before he was taken into custody.

A law enforcement official told NBC that the TSA sent notifications to airlines but the "information had not yet been populated in the airline's system to the point of triggering an automated alert."

Missed chances

The official said Shahzad's name should have set off alarms throughout the ticketing and boarding process. The system should have been triggered when he purchased the ticket.

If he purchased the ticket before his name was placed on the list, then the airline and authorities should have been alerted when he got his boarding pass, either from an agent or one of the self-service kiosks.

That's especially true on an international flight because his passport would have been electronically scanned before he was issued a boarding pass. Even at the boarding gate, there are systems that alert TSA and customs officials to someone on the no-fly list attempting to board a flight.

When Emirates sold the ticket, it was working off an outdated list. Airline officials would have had to check a Web forum where updates are sent if it were to have flagged him. Because they did not, law enforcement officials were not aware of his travel plans until they received the passenger list 30 minutes before takeoff, the official said.

Jet didn't leave the gate

There was also some confusion over whether the plane left the gate and was recalled.

The law enforcement officer told NBC News that Shahzad boarded the plane and the door was closed, but the plane didn't leave the gate. The door was reopened and Shahzad was removed from the plane.

The plane was then cleared to leave the gate and did so. Moments later, officials thought better of it and decided they needed to rescreen passengers and cargo and brought the plane back, the law enforcement official told NBC.

Emirates did not return repeated calls for comments. Earlier in the day, the company issued a general statement saying it was cooperating with investigators and takes every precaution to ensure its passengers' safety.

The reliance on airlines to check government lists has been a known problem for years. The government has long planned to take over the responsibility for matching passengers to watch lists, but the transition has taken longer than expected. The new program is still in the test phase for domestic airlines and is still months away from beginning with international carriers.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs blamed the airline but emphasized a more positive bottom line: U.S. authorities did get Shahzad on the no-fly list and he never took off.

"There's a series of built-in redundancies, this being one of them," Gibbs said. "If there's a mistake by a carrier, it can be double-checked."


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Sources: MSNBC, Google Maps

Faisal Shahzad Tried To Leave U.S. After Times Square Terrorist Plot

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Times Square Bomb Suspect Nabbed At Airport


Authorities arrested a U.S. citizen in connection with the failed bombing attempt in New York's Times Square as he tried to leave the country, Attorney General Eric Holder said Tuesday.

Faisal Shahzad, 30, was arrested at 11:45 p.m. ET Monday night by Customs and Border Protection agents as he attempted to board an Emirates airlines flight to Dubai at New York's JFK airport, officials said.

"It is clear that the intent behind this terrorist act was to kill Americans," Holder said.

Shahzad, a naturalized U.S. citizen who was born in Pakistan, was accused of driving a car bomb into Times Square, authorities said. He will appear in Manhattan Federal Court later Tuesday.

A law enforcement official told news services Tuesday that Shahzad said he had no accomplices: "He's claimed to have acted alone, but these are things that have to be investigated."

Holder said the investigation was ongoing and that law enforcement officials had gathered "significant additional evidence." He urged Americans to remain vigilant.

"The American people should know that we are deploying every resource available and we will not rest until we have brought everyone responsible to justice," Holder said.

Trip to Pakistan

Earlier, officials told The Associated Press that the suspect recently returned from a trip to Pakistan, where he has a wife. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the case was at a sensitive stage.

Shahzad will face charges "for allegedly driving a car bomb into Times Square on the evening of May 1," according to a statement by U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara, FBI agent George Venizelos and New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly.

Emirates said in a statement that one passenger was stopped at the gate and a further two passengers were removed from on board the plane. It was unclear what happened to the other two.

"Full security procedures were activated including the deplaning of all passengers and a thorough screening of the aircraft, passengers and baggage," an Emirates spokesperson said in an e-mailed statement.

Shahzad was being held in New York and couldn't be contacted. He has a Shelton, Conn., address and a phone number listed there wasn't in service. Investigators were searching his home.

Law enforcement officials said Shahzad bought the SUV, a 1993 Nissan Pathfinder, that was parked in Times Square on Saturday from a person in Connecticut three weeks ago. NBC News reported he paid $1,300 in cash for the vehicle, which had been advertised on website Craigslist.

NBC News earlier reported the suspect's name was on an e-mail that was sent to the car's seller last month.

The website Politico, citing an unnamed senior official, reported that a number from disposable cell phone used by the buyer of the SUV had led to the suspect's arrest.

“They were able to basically get one phone number and by running it through a number of databases, figure out who they thought the guy was,” the official told Politico.

The suspect didn't still have the phone, the website reported, but agents were still able to locate the suspect.

In Bridgeport, the seller refused to answer questions put by the Times. "You can't interview her," said an unidentified man at the woman’s white clapboard house. "She already talked to the FBI."

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A man in his 40s who was seen in a security camera video apparently walking away from the SUV was initially a focus of the investigation.

But the New York police commissioner, Raymond W. Kelly, told the Times that while investigators still wanted to speak to that man, he might not be connected to the failed bombing. Paul J. Browne, a spokesman for the department, told the paper: "It may turn out that he was just somebody in the area, but not connected with the car bomb."

A metal rifle cabinet placed in the SUV's cargo area was packed with fertilizer, but NYPD bomb experts believe it was not a type volatile enough to explode like the ammonium nitrate grade fertilizer used in previous terrorist bombings.

However, police said it could have produced "a significant fireball" and sprayed shrapnel with enough force to kill pedestrians and knock out windows.

Rube Goldberg contraption

James M. Cavanaugh, a former bomb expert with the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives who investigated car bombs and tracked the Unabomber, told The New York Times that the device and the way it was designed speak to a "grandiose purpose."

"I call this a Rube Goldberg contraption," Cavanaugh told the newspaper. "It's the 'swing-the-arm-with-the-shoe-that-hits-the-ball-and-knocks-over-a-stick-that-knocks-something-off-a-shelf' and it is all supposed to work."

He said that whoever made the bomb had "more desire than ability."

The Times also reported that Kevin B. Barry, an official with the International Association of Bomb Technicians and Investigators, said the attempted bomber had left many leads for detectives to follow.

“He was trying to cover his tracks, but he left more clues than a guy walking into a bank to rob it without a mask. This guy left everything here but his wallet," Barry said.

Chris Falkenberg, president of Insite Security, which works with Fortune 500 companies, said the device, as described by authorities, "doesn't differ much at all from 'The Anarchist Cookbook'" — the underground 1971 manual for homemade explosives.

He said revelations that the fertilizer used could not have exploded suggested "this is amateur hour. My kids could build a better bomb than this."

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg early Tuesday thanked law enforcement officials, saying that their "focused and swift efforts led to this arrest after only 48 hours of around-the-clock investigation. I hope their impressive work serves as a lesson to anyone who would do us harm."

A senior White House official said President Barack Obama was briefed six times yesterday about the investigation and was notified of Shahzad's arrest at 12:05 am Tuesday.

The Taliban in Pakistan said Sunday it planted the bomb to avenge the killing in April of al-Qaida's two top leaders in Iraq as well as U.S. interference in Muslim countries.

Some officials voiced skepticism about the claim. But former CIA analyst Bruce Riedel, who last year oversaw an Obama administration strategy review on Afghanistan and Pakistan, cautioned against dismissing a possible role by the Taliban.

"They have said they want to attack inside the United States," he said before the arrest was announced, adding there was "a very serious possibility" the incident involved "some Pakistani-American who has never built a car bomb before in his life but who is being coached either by phone or internet."

In Pakistan, Interior Minister Rehman Malik said authorities had not been formally asked for help in the probe. "When the request comes, we will cooperate with the U.S. government," he told the AP.

The location of the bomb suggests a number of possible targets. The SUV was parked near offices of Viacom Inc., which owns Comedy Central. The network recently aired an episode of the animated show "South Park" that the group Revolution Muslim had complained insulted the Prophet Muhammad by depicting him in a bear costume.


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JFK Airport "Child's Play", FAA Isn't Laughing

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JFK Tower Allowed A Kid To Direct Air Traffic


A child apparently directed pilots last month from the air traffic control center at John F. Kennedy Airport, one of the nation's busiest airports, according to audio clips. The Federal Aviation Administration said Wednesday that it was investigating.

"Pending the outcome of our investigation, the employees involved in this incident are not controlling air traffic," the FAA said in a statement. "This behavior is not acceptable and does not demonstrate the kind of professionalism expected from all FAA employees." The agency declined to comment beyond the statement.

Recordings from mid-February — during a weeklong winter break for many New York schoolchildren — were posted last month on a Web site for air traffic control-listening aficionados.

The child can be heard on the tape making five transmissions to pilots preparing for takeoff.

In one exchange, the child can be heard saying, "JetBlue 171 contact departure." The pilot responds: "Over to departure JetBlue 171, awesome job."

The child appears to be under an adult's supervision, because a male voice then comes on and says with a laugh, "That's what you get, guys, when the kids are out of school."

In another exchange, the youngster clears another plane for takeoff, and says, "Adios, amigo." The pilot responds in kind.

The FAA said the control tower is a highly secure area for air traffic controllers, supervisory staff and airport employees with a need to be there. FAA spokesman Jim Peters said children of the tower's employees are allowed to visit but would need to get approval from the FAA first.

The union representing air traffic controllers condemned the workers' behavior.

"It is not indicative of the highest professional standards that controllers set for themselves and exceed each and everyday in the advancement of aviation safety," the National Air Traffic Controllers Association said in a statement.


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What's Next For The Kennedy Political Legacy & The Spirit of Camelot? Is It Gone Forever?

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(Sen. Ted Kennedy endorses than Sen. Barack Obama on the campaign trail.)



(Will Sen Ted Kennedy's death be the end of a Political Era?)

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(In one of his final personal interviews, Sen. Ted Kennedy talks with Bigthink.com about his childhood, his brothers, and his life in politics.)

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(Remembering Ted Kennedy)

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(The DNC's tribute to Sen Ted Kennedy.)



With Sen. Edward Kennedy’s death comes not only the end of a political dynasty, but also of one of the most enduring — and cherished — American myths. Camelot is no more.

The myth was so powerful that it transcended generations. Unlike many allusions to the 1960s, it needs no explanation to those who don’t remember that time.

John F. Kennedy, the eldest brother, was King Arthur, and wife Jackie his Guinevere. Bobby, the second brother, was Lancelot, defender of the powerless and, it is said, secretly in love with the queen.

And then there was the youngest of them all: Teddy, in whom the best and the worst of everything Kennedy seemed to come together.

It was he who would ultimately become this Camelot’s Galahad. Though far from perfect and nowhere near a man of great virtue, Edward M. Kennedy was the knight who ultimately set for himself a quest. Its object was no less momentous than the Holy Grail itself: universal health care.

Embracing the Legend

If the analogy is imperfect, it is only because of the myth to which it is attached. The Camelot of legend never existed, except in the minds of people who needed there to be such a place. It and the people in it were always what we wanted — and needed — them to be.

This is why the myth is so powerful. Camelot was nothing more or less than a reflection of the Garden of Eden, that perfect place inhabited by perfect people in some bygone age when such places and such people existed.

Ted Kennedy undoubtedly understood that. He certainly embraced it, idolizing his older brothers, fully believing that there was a happily-ever-after that men could forge, if only they were bold enough to do so.

And in the end, Ted Kennedy also came closer to the myth than his brothers ever could. For that, he could thank the one gift his brothers never had: the opportunity to live his life to its natural end.

An ailing Arthur

John F. Kennedy may have been president when “Camelot” was a hit on Broadway, but he was no King Arthur. Arthur was virtuous and pure, a powerful warrior glowing with health. JFK only looked the part.

His greatest virtue was his movie-star good looks, which projected the image of other virtues that we willingly ascribed to him. In real life, he was, as Mae West said of herself, “as pure as the driven slush.”

Physically, he looked the part of the warrior who had survived the destruction of PT 109 in the Pacific theater during World War II and had swum to safety dragging one of his injured crewmen with him. But in reality, according to his biographer, Robert Dallek, he was a physical wreck. The newsreels showed him playing touch football on the White House lawn. They did not show the massive doses of medications that allowed him to do so.

To get through the days, Kennedy took, “steroids for his Addison's disease, pain-killers for his back, antispasmodics for his colitis, antibiotics for urinary-tract infections, antihistamines for allergies and, on at least one occasion, an antipsychotic (though only for two days) for a severe mood change that Jackie Kennedy believed had been brought on by the antihistamines,” Dallek wrote. At times, the hero of America’s Camelot reportedly could not even put on his own shoes and socks.

As president, JFK was inspirational. He also nearly plunged the world into nuclear war. But none of it mattered. In 20th-century America, as in every other culture from the birth of civilization, image trumps reality.

It is no different today. Humans have never been very good at letting the facts get in the way of a good story. And the story of the Kennedys is more than good; it is great, the stuff that myths are made of.

This is a family that Aeschylus and Sophocles and Homer would have written about, a family that Norse poets would have immortalized in sagas, a family that medieval troubadours would have sung about, a family that Shakespeare would have devoted a trilogy to, a family that America transformed into a vision of its ideal self.

Expectations and excess

Teddy was the kid brother of that family, the youngest kid who was faced with the Everest of expectations established by his three older brothers.

Joseph Jr. had died heroically as a pilot defending London against the Nazi blitz. Jack, the second-oldest, became the embodiment of the Camelot myth that would follow the family to the present. Bobby, the third brother, was the brilliant orator and idealist who was on his way to the White House in 1968 when he was cut down by an assassin’s bullet.

It was a lot to live up to. It was both a curse and a blessing that Teddy alone among the brothers lived out his natural life. It was a curse because the reality of his personal life became public at Chappaquiddick, when Mary Jo Kopechne, a young campaign worker, died, and the famous senator neglected for nine hours to tell anyone about it.

There was more. After his unsuccessful challenge to incumbent President Jimmy Carter in 1980, Ted Kennedy outraged his Catholic base by divorcing his wife, Joan.

Much of the 1980s seemed to be a blur of excess, of public drunkenness and lechery. In a Greek tragedy, that would have been the last act: a great man brought down by his own excesses, due to the original sin of hubris.

Remorse and Redemption

But life doesn’t always imitate art. In the 1990s, Ted Kennedy met his second wife, Vicki, and finally became what the Kennedy myth had always held him and his brothers to be.

His redemption began with a very public confession of his own sins. In a remarkable 1991 speech at Harvard, the senior senator from Massachusetts did something that we were not accustomed to seeing our political heroes do: He admitted to being less than what he seemed.

“I recognize my own shortcomings, the faults and the conduct of my private life,” he said in the distinctive Kennedy accent. “I realize that I alone am responsible for them, and I am the one who must confront them.”

In an interview with NBC News the following year, he explained that speech, saying, “I owed them some explanation, or at least the recognition that I understood.”

That would be what ultimately set Ted Kennedy apart, and what transformed him into a man who would be eulogized as one of the greatest senators in American history. Unlike so many others, Ted Kennedy proved by his actions that he really did understand.

His legislative resume is a towering testament to his ideals. And in those ideals, he was always consistent. His brother Bobby had swung from the right to the left of the political scale, and Jack had been a centrist and a political pragmatist. But Ted was consistent for four decades in his defense of the least of us, in his belief in the common man and woman.

Repentance and Respect

It takes more than age to become known as a statesman. Strom Thurmond served forever in the Senate without ever being accused of such a thing. Ted Kennedy didn’t have that distinction given to him. He earned it.

He would give a lot of credit to his second wife, Vicki, in whom he found a soul mate and an inner peace that had been lacking in his life. He told NBC that those later years were “a different plateau of my life; a different chapter of my life.”

In the end, there would be a final bit of Kennedy tragedy in his death. It could not be said that he died too young; at 77, he had lived as full a life as anyone could hope for. It was rife with imperfection, but that proves nothing except that he was human. Much as the mythmakers would have us believe otherwise, there are none of us who are perfect, none of us who are without sin.

What made him heroic to many in the end was that he accepted his sins, repented, and fulfilled his vow to do better. By his final days, he was as respected a man on both sides of the aisle as is ever likely to be found in Washington, D.C.

Yet still he died too soon. The great dream of his career, the Holy Grail that this knight of Camelot spent a lifetime seeking, had been to see universal health care in the United States. And at just the moment that that goal was finally coming into sight, a moment when his leadership and intellect were most desperately needed, he died.

The finish line of a lifelong race had been in sight. He never reached it.

Sophocles and Shakespeare could have done something with that. So could have Lerner and Loewe.


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