Is DHS overstepping its authority?

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After a recent lapse in security allowed Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab to carry an explosive device aboard a U.S. bound aircraft, the Transportation Security Administration created and distributed a security directive which was leaked to 2 bloggers.  Stephen Frischling and Chris Elliot, both travel bloggers received copies of the confidential TSA directive.  Two days later, agents of the TSA appeared at the homes of both men with subpoenas demanding to know their sources.  How far does the authority of DHS and the TSA extend?  Is the TSA overstepping their authority by sending agents to serve subpoenas and collect evidence and testimony?  Perhaps I’m confused, but this seems like the specific territory of the FBI.

When U.S. President George W. Bush created the Department of Homeland Security on Nov. 25, 2002, the goal was to improve communication and response time by bringing a host of government entities under one umbrella.  DHS integrates elements of government such as the Coast Guard and Border Patrol, but does not include agencies such as the FBI, CIA or NSA.  (though DHS does coordinate communication between these agencies in matters relating to terrorist threats)

The TSA is understandably concerned about leaks from within their ranks, but I think they need to look at the larger situation.  A bad decision was made in releasing the directive at all.  It’s obvious to even the casual reader that very little thought went into it’s creation.  The directive was a knee-jerk reaction to a situation caused by a lapse in intelligence.  In typical TSA fashion, the directive did very little to address the root of the problem and focused primarily on instilling fear and confusion in the minds of travelers.  DHS and the TSA would be better off putting their collective effort into fixing the problem that led to the intelligence failure.

Thoughts on hashtags

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After a recent Twitter-related faux pas, I realized something important about tags in social media.  Tags are meaningless unless other people accept them.  Even if you’ve used a tag for years, if nobody knows about it, its usefulness is very limited.  Different groups may make different tags for the same thing, but that’s ok.  One group may be using the tag for one thing, while another may be using it for something entirely different, or even just slightly different.  Multiple tags also may exist for the very same thing.  This can be frustrating for some people (myself included) who want to  enter a single tag and find most of the information related to that tag.  Twitter and it’s 140 character limit on posts/tweets tends to encourage the use of short acronym-like hashtags.  It’s relatively easy to anticipate keyword tags, but less so for acronyms.  For this reason it’s easy to miss out on a thread because you were off by one character.  The hope is that at least one of the people you follow will be interested in the same thread and will actually use the more widely accepted tag.  Unfortunately though, in this social media universe, there’s no such thing as a correct tag.  As one of my friends used to say, “Don’t ask, just accept.” 🙂

Post Summer

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Wow, it’s actually been over 2 months since the last time I posted here.  It’s been an insanely busy summer, but with the beginning of the Fall semester things are actually starting to calm down a bit.  Our daughter Lela is going to preschool for the first time which has allowed my wife and I to return to a normal schedule.  It’s been a little weird to be physically at work every day, but it’s been great to get back to the continuity of a regular 9-5 schedule.  Hopefully this will also allow me to give a little more attention to my blog.  (among other things)