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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: LindyBill who wrote (302937)	4/27/2009 10:52:36 PM
From: Ruffian	8 Recommendations Respond to of 793903

Obama Draws Scorn of Bush Officials for Tone on Terrorism Fight Bush-era critics contend that President Obama is losing sight of the threats against the homeland, reviving the mindset of the Clinton era when terrorism was treated more as a criminal offense than an act of war. FOXNews.com Monday, April 27, 2009 Right off the bat, President Obama made it clear that his administration would try a change in tone in the way the U.S. battles terrorism around the world. He announced during his first week on the job that he would shut down the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay within a year, keeping a campaign pledge. Then his administration stopped using the term "War on Terror," favoring instead "overseas contingency operation." Though the new administration is trying to recast the war and better define the legal bounds of its fight against extremism, it has along the way drawn the scorn of officials from the Bush administration. They contend that Obama is losing sight of the threats against the homeland, reviving the mindset of the Clinton era when terrorism was treated more as a criminal offense than an act of war. "One of the worst things we could do is start to act now as though the attack of 9/11 is a thing of the past and will never be repeated. That's just not true," former Vice President Dick Cheney recently told FOX News. He complained that dropping the term "War on Terror" suggests the country is no longer at war. "It's not just 'no more War on Terror,' according to (Homeland Security Secretary) Janet Napolitano. We don't have terrorist attacks anymore -- we have man-made disasters," said Marc Thiessen, George W. Bush's former speechwriter, referring to Napolitano's reluctance to use the words terrorist or terrorism. Juan Zarate, who served as Bush's deputy national security adviser for combating terrorism, also noted that closing Guantanamo will not be an easy task and that Bush wanted to do the same. "The problem that the Bush administration faced and that no doubt the Obama administration is facing is the fact that you have hardened, trained Al Qaeda-connected individuals who are in Guantanamo and there is not an easy solution as to where they should go or what process should attend to them," he said. Obama drew the most fire, though, for his decision this month to release top-secret memos about CIA interrogations and then open the door for potential prosecution of the lawyers who drafted them. "The decision to release these memos is quite literally the most irresponsible and dangerous thing an American president has done in his first 100 days," Thiessen said. "The information contained in these memos is the keys to how we interrogate and question terrorists." Obama said he decided to release the memos because so much of the information in them was public. But even Obama's national security critics give him credit for his first authorization of the use of force -- employed when pirates off the Somali coast were holding American ship Capt. Richard Phillips hostage. Obama's authorization allowed Navy snipers to take out three of the four pirates April 12 and take the fourth into custody. "I think he needs to be given credit and the administration needs to be given credit for allowing the professionals to do their job and to do it well," Zarate said. Analysts suggest Obama will earn the highest marks on national security when he heeds the advice of military commanders and intelligence officials -- and predict he'll do poorly when he allows political advisers to influence his decisions. FOX News' Mike Emanuel contributed to this report.

To: LindyBill who wrote (302937)	4/28/2009 3:20:50 AM
From: KLP	Respond to of 793903

How Bush Prepared for the Outbreak Tools developed in the last few years will help the Obama administration fight back. APRIL 28, 2009 By TEVI TROY online.wsj.com Swine flu has presented the Obama administration with its first major public-health crisis. Fortunately for the Obama team, the Bush administration developed new tools that will prove critical in meeting this challenge. Under President Bush, the federal government worked with manufacturers to accelerate vaccine development, stockpiled crucial antivirals like Tamiflu, war-gamed pandemic scenarios with senior officials, and increased the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) sample identification capabilities. These activities are bearing fruit today. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has already deployed 12.5 million courses of antivirals -- out of a total of 50 million -- to states and local agencies. In addition, CDC's new capacities have allowed Mexican officials to send flu samples to CDC for quick identification, a capability that did not exist a few years ago. Collaboration between the government and the private sector on vaccines -- which Mr. Bush and his HHS team actively encouraged -- could potentially allow manufacturers to shepherd a vaccine to market within four months of identifying the strain and getting the go-ahead from CDC or the World Health Organization. But new tools aside, top health officials must answer difficult questions about response efforts. One is when and where to deploy antivirals. The Bush administration considered a "forest fire" approach to pandemic outbreaks abroad. This strategy calls for sharing some of our precious supply of antivirals with a foreign country in order to stop a small flame from becoming a forest fire. The risk is that we have only a limited number of courses, and the use of antivirals increases the odds that the flu strain in question will become resistant to that antiviral. With 37.5 million courses remaining in the federal stockpile, the administration needs to think very carefully about how to use them. Another issue: Under the Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness (PREP) Act of 2006, the government has the authority to issue "Prep Act Declarations" granting liability protection to manufacturers whose products were used in public-health emergencies. This helps encourage manufacturers to develop countermeasures. The government issued a series of such declarations in 2007 and 2008. They protected the development and use of influenza vaccines and pandemic antivirals, as well as anthrax, smallpox and botulism products. The Obama administration should consider granting more of them -- if appropriate -- in the weeks ahead. A third policy question has to do with how to stop the spread of the disease both across borders and within countries. The administration has so far initiated "passive surveillance": Border guards are assessing if people entering the U.S. seem sick, but aren't actively stopping anyone. If things get worse, they may have to intensify border security. The Bush administration examined the question of closing the borders in certain circumstances but determined that it would probably be ineffective. Worse, it could lead other nations to retaliate by closing their own borders, which could hurt Americans traveling abroad. Another strategy, already in use to some degree in Mexico, is social distancing -- asking citizens to refrain from large social gatherings. During the 1918 influenza pandemic, St. Louis embraced such measures while Philadelphia eschewed them, and Philadelphia suffered a much higher death rate as a result. We are probably not yet at the point where such drastic measures are necessary, but senior officials had better start thinking about how they would address these questions. Most importantly, the federal government must figure out how to reassure a nervous public. It doesn't help that none of the 20 top officials at HHS has been confirmed. Some of them, like FDA commissioner-designate Dr. Margaret Hamburg, are experts in biopreparedness and could help reassure Americans. Alas, she and her potential future colleagues, including the new secretary of HHS, are still in limbo. They need to be in place and on the job. Mr. Troy, deputy secretary of Health and Human Services from 2007 to 2009, is a visiting senior fellow at the Hudson Institute

To: LindyBill who wrote (302937)	4/28/2009 6:49:29 AM
From: unclewest	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 793903

We get 36,000 deaths a year from our normal flu. EDITED below ******* The fatality rate, at least in Mexico seems quite high for the number of cases of Swine Flu reported. I think that is what is ringing the alarm bells. Transmission seems to be easy. This morning's local newspaper here states that NC State health authorities expect to report confirmed Swine Flu cases in NC today or NLT tomorrow. Suspected NC Swine Flu patients have been ordered to stay home. I am not surprised. Migrant farm workers have been coming back in and lots of locals went to Mexico for spring break. News of the Swine Flu first broke a week ago. I am reminded of the old story about doubling a penny everyday. On day 7 you have 64 pennies. We exceeded that yesterday with 82 Swine Flu cases confirmed in North America and Europe. If you continue the daily double, on day 21 you will have over 1 million pennies. ****************** This hit the net 20 minutes ago. edition.cnn.com By early Tuesday, the swine flu outbreak in Mexico was suspected in 152 deaths and more than 1,600 illnesses, its health minister told reporters.