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<title>Homeland</title>
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<description>This is Homeland RSS from FSM</description>
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<title>SAFE at HOME - Editor Bios</title>
<link>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.284/default.asp</link>
<description><![CDATA[Joan Harting BarhamJoan Harting Barham is a writer and editor who has spent more than two decades communicating to and with women--the prime audience for SAFE AT HOME--about their lives and their concerns. In New York City, she served as a Senior Editor at Glamour, Harper&#8217;s Bazaar and Elle magazines and in Toronto, where she currently lives with her husband, as Editor-in-Chief of Fashion magazine. Joan has interviewed such luminaries as First Lady Nancy Reagan, business titan Leonard Lauder and Oscar winner Anthony Hopkins. At this point in her long career as a lifestyle journalist, Joan reckons that security may be the most significant women&#8217;s lifestyle issue of our day.Amanda BowmanAmanda Bowman is the New York Director of the Center for Security Policy. From 2005 until the end of 2006, Amanda was the volunteer President of the Coalition for a Secure Driver&#8217;s License, a citizen activist group dedicated to making America&#8217;s "internal passport" secure against terrorism and identity theft.  She continues to be an active board member and spokesperson for the organization.  Amanda has over 20 years of experience in corporate and philanthropic and consumer public relations, as well as a specialty in managing policy issues and public affairs. Amanda is married to David Levy, M.D., who leads Global Health Strategy for Pricewaterhouse Coopers.  The couple have six children, one grandchild and two dalmatians.Carol A. TaberCarol A. Taber is president of the Family Security Foundation, Inc. (FSF), which she founded as a direct result of 9/11.  FSF&#8217;s website is FamilySecurityMatters.org. Because of FamilySecurityMatters.org, Ms. Taber was selected by the National Center for Policy Analysis&#8217;s profile of "The Woman of the Month," an initiative of the Center&#8217;s "Women in the Economy" project that explores the choices women make and how public policies impact those decisions.  The award cites the nominated woman&#8217;s unique contributions to the economy, public policy and society as a whole. Carol is a seasoned business executive with a distinguished 30-year career in publishing that has earned her numerous professional awards and honors, including Outstanding Woman in Business; World&#8217;s Who&#8217;s Who of Women; and induction into the National Academy of Women Achievers. She currently lives with her husband of 13 years, and works to protect America&#8217;s sovereignty and security for her three grandchildren who live nearby.]]></description>
<pubDate>Thu, 01 May 2008 00:00:00 EST</pubDate>
<guid>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.284/default.asp</guid>
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<item>
<title>Dr. Maureen McCarthy</title>
<link>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.286/default.asp</link>
<description><![CDATA[Dr. Maureen McCarthy is another example of the kind of top quality women the Department of Homeland Security has hired. We were amazed and deeply gratified to meet these exceptional women and to learn how vast the opportunities are for not only them, but for all women in government jobs. FSM asked Dr. McCarthy how she finds these women to hire and just what the horizons are for all women who work in service to their country....FSM: Tell us how you find good people to work at DHS'Maureen: We use a personal network. Actually in this town it&#39;s pretty easy, there are lots of networks. As I said, there&#39;s an underground of what I call the "young girls network" We have an affinity for each other, and so I certainly call upon my friends and ask for good people - but my male friends as well. Everybody&#39;s in the same business. Though I also use Triple A-S, I was a Triple A-S Fellow that&#39;s how I came to Washington originally, and Triple A-S is a fabulous network. FSM: Tell me about it.Maureen: American Association for the Advancement of Science. They have policy fellowships where they bring people in who are mid-career. It&#39;s the premier program of getting scientists into government. I was the first defense policy fellow and worked for the Secretary of Defense as an arms control advisor. And, through that network I have lots of connections to other women. It&#39;s also a very good network for getting scientists. I mean our challenge is not only getting women into the business, but I need technical women in the business. I need technical people in the business and so the recruiting is very difficult. But, there is an attitude change about the commitment to government service. It&#39;s shifted. Among the technical community, I&#39;ve seen more women are now interested in government service, post 9/11, than they were before. FSM: Oh, that&#39;s terrific. Are any scholarships offered'Maureen: One of the things we&#39;ve established is the scholarship fellows program where we give full tuition and grants to students at the undergraduate level and the graduate students in any discipline that&#39;s related for which they feel a personal tie to Homeland Security. And the good news with that program is that it&#39;s close to 50-50 male/female, and we&#39;re getting the students in, juniors and seniors, undergraduates and up to three years in graduate students. We have them do internships at one of our facilities and we&#39;ve had phenomenal success with that. We also have the International Science and Engineering Fair, so we give four fellowships to rising seniors from high school, 4 to 6 rising seniors from high school. They go through the science fair program for one-time fellowships into college. . FSM: That&#39;s so good for our mothers to know about.Maureen: And we do an orientation with the fellows every year in November; we have lots of different panels. And one of the panels that I insisted on last year was entitled "well behaved women rarely make history". FSM: Oh, that&#39;s wonderful... it must have been a fun panel too.Maureen: It was. And so we&#39;re drawing people out from the humanities, the social sciences, the physical sciences, the natural sciences. And that&#39;s made a big difference because you pull from all those places where the demography at the undergraduate level is better. FSM: Did you ever think you&#39;d leave the public sector to go to the private sector' Or have you always been in this'Maureen: I&#39;ve always been working for the government. I used to work for the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, a government-owned laboratory, and so I&#39;ve never actually worked in the private sector per se. I grew up in a highly technical family. My father&#39;s a physicist and my mother is a chemist. My sister&#39;s a PhD. environmental chemist and has her own consulting business. I grew up in a family where the gift from my father when you finished your PhD was a 25" string of perfect pearls. FSM: That&#39;s a prize well worth the effort.Maureen: Yes it is. And so I grew up in a family very focused on science. My mother was studying physics at Columbia during the war. So, being a scientist was a given in my life. And I do come from a family where science and the notion of public service was a way of life for us. My mother was President of the League of Women Voters. My sister was President of her League. I was President of my League. My father was on the school board for 23 years. So public service was just a way of life. FSM: So the driving force behind all of this was a family environment'Maureen: The driving force for me was really a very strong commitment to being able to make a difference. To apply the knowledge, the intellectual talents that I had earned, the understandings that I had in areas where I believed I could make a difference &ndash; for the country. And all along I&#39;ve felt that, and that&#39;s driven all of my career moves which have been varied - I&#39;ve lived all over the world. I did my postdoctoral work in Israel. I spent three years in Israel, and then moved back to Washington State and then moved here, very much driven by a commitment of making science and technical areas have an impact on society. FSM: Give us in laymen&#39;s terms what it is that you do here... the 30,000-foot view.Maureen: I manage research and development programs for Homeland Security that take place at our government laboratories. And those programs are focused on providing the technical support for the intelligence and the operations missions for the department. So we do the technical work to understand threats and understand what adversaries are capable of doing. We do the technical work to support deployment detector systems around the country - to protect the country from chemical, biological, radiological attacks. We provide technical expertise to support response operations, and so I work with the government laboratories to give that support to those missions. FSM: Okay, now give us some examples of the technical support - for any of those things you&#39;ve just enumerated.Maureen: Ok, in the technical areas, we focus on what we call building national resiliency, which means that since we&#39;re on the preparedness side, we look at building detection systems to have early warning for cities for potential environmental or biological releases. We look at protection systems around chemical plants, nuclear plants. We deploy detector systems at the borders for radiological activity, possible radiological nuclear materials. We also work on developing response plans and being able to give the technical input for if an event were to happen... how do we get in and model something&hellip;how do we understand... what clean-up technologies do we have... how fast can we get in and how rapidly could we restore the infrastructure. So, very much focused on preparedness. FSM: Are you doing anything with schools'Maureen: Yes, we work at designing the architecture for the national scale but we do not deploy out to individual areas. That&#39;s the decision of the local communities. Also, states have grant programs. DHS puts out a lot of grant money to the states which is used in state and local areas. We help them prioritize techniques and we help them do critical infrastructure studies so we can help them judge what the most important assets are that they have to protect, and then how to balance their resources accordingly. We work with industry to put standards out, so that local communities can purchase equipment from industry that meets a certain set of standards that would work in the environments we think are applicable. So we do that front end of it, and then the local communities make the decisions as to where to prioritize their investments. FSM: What would your advice be to a mother if she wanted to bring some kind of detection or preparedness tool into her children&#39;s school in her community. Where should she start'Maureen: I think the outreach efforts the department has done have been in trying to give fundamental awareness of the issues that we&#39;re concerned about. Because bringing a detection system into the school is not the problem. You have to look at the totality of the issue. One of the big issues is resiliency, as opposed to response. So my advice that mothers need to think about is... how do we build a resiliency, how do we be prepared, not how do we respond after something happens. Because you will respond as well as you are prepared. So you need to understand, first, what the community views as the high risk areas. Second, what their emergency plans are. Third, who&#39;s involved in working with the emergency response communities and how do the communications work. The notion is that you have to build resiliency, you have to put your head in the mindset that whatever happens, I will survive and I will recover and we will come back together. And, that means there&#39;s a whole lot of preparation and thought process that goes on in understanding how your local community responds. And the better you know how your local community works, the better off you are. Because how things happen on a national scale is not going to matter to you at the time of an event. We&#39;re going to manage very much on the national scale. Your local community is going to manage what happens on a local scale. FSM: Are you involved in any way with the development of medicines that might combat the use of chemical or biological weapons'Maureen: No, actually the Department of Homeland Security is not formally involved in the development of medical counter measures. That&#39;s the responsibility of the Department of Health and Human Services. However we&#39;re partnered with them. What we do with them is we work on understanding and prioritizing what we think are the highest threats for which we have the greatest vulnerabilities and what are the areas that we need to put in for both stockpiling existing medical supplies and also for research and development for future countermeasures. So we work with them very closely to help them understand the whole front-end portion and do the prioritization. HHS has a huge responsibility both for maintaining the stockpile and acquiring the strategic national stockpile, and then also doing short and long-term research for medical counter measures. But inside of the department we&#39;re constantly tied at the hip with them, because in any potential attack with the exception of disrupting the cyber system, you&#39;re going to have public health impacts. And you could have public health impacts with cyber as well. So we work with them to understand not only the front end of what needs to be done, but also the back end of the response planning. So that may mean things like, how do the logistics work on moving medical supplies in the country if big parts of the country are out... if the electrical grid is down in California, can we move supplies' What kind of supplies do we need that require refrigeration or liquid nitrogen' What kind of thing can be stockpiled regionally that has long shelf life' We work very closely with them to understand if we need a multiple defense, do we need vaccines and anti-virals for a particular agent because you don&#39;t want to have a single line of defense' Is your current drug treatment time dependent' Does it have to be delivered in the first 15 minutes, or can it be on the shelf for six months' So we work with them to understand here&#39;s where we think the priorities are. We&#39;re focused in understanding catastrophic national scale events - which very often in the early stages we may not know if they&#39;re intentional or unintentional - but the disruptive force is much worse than what would happen with a naturally occurring event. FSM: What are the qualities of successful people who work in the public sector and why should women be interested in a career in government service'Maureen: I think probably the biggest attribute that women bring to the table is the ability for multi tasking and integration of lots of sources of information. We tend to think holistically much more, and that&#39;s an oversimplification and generalization, but it is the notion that you see the inter connectivity between public health and the development of a new material to detect nuclear materials. It&#39;s that ability to multi task, multi process. It&#39;s also, I think &ndash; and this isn&#39;t women over men &ndash; but I can tell you personally I have a deep commitment to protecting this country. That matters a lot to me. I am very committed to the country, to the government, and I believe that focusing my energy there is where I can really make a difference. And there&#39;s something very rewarding and satisfying about being able to feel that I&#39;m contributing in protecting the homeland. FSM: Please comment on the role of women in DHS today and national defense in general.Maureen: It&#39;s a great career for women, it really is. And it brings in a lot of disciplines that wouldn&#39;t normally work together. And there are lots of opportunities. In the defense world, there are some very specific technical disciplines that we draw upon. In the Homeland Security world, like I said, we need everybody from people who are trained in linguistics and social sciences and psychology, dynamic societal behavior, physicists, biologists, chemists and more. So for areas that normally you wouldn&#39;t necessarily have drawn women into government service - language studies, or psychology or sociology &ndash; we&#39;re pulling them in very fast. And so we&#39;re tapping into resources where the population of women is significant in that particular area. So there are wonderful opportunities. FSM: With 9/11, did that change any of your attitudes or did you always feel that way' Did you redouble your efforts or did it just underscore that you were right all along'Maureen: On 9/11 I was in the government. And at that time I was the chief scientist for the National Nuclear Security Administration so I was deeply seated in the national security business. Prior to that, I was responsible for the strategic nuclear stock pile work that the Department of Energy handled, so it was the development of nuclear weapons, non-proliferation programs and securing nuclear materials in the former Soviet Union. I&#39;d also led delegations to Moscow to negotiate and secure materials over there. So I was very much steeped in national security. What changed for me on 9/11 was... it came home. The world changed for all of us on 9/11. The work that I was doing became focused very much on protecting the homeland. I was asked to come over very early on to serve on the original transition team to set up the Department. So for me the focus was to turn from working on the strategic national security issues - which was very focused to working with our allies on the strategic nuclear deterrent, like working with the former Soviet Union on protecting the stockpile and materials - to focus on what we never really imagined we would ever be doing&hellip;which is fighting the war on our own soil. None of us, even those of us who worked on it day in and day out, ever thought it could possibly have happened here. And I&#39;ll tell you this, the one thing I remember about 9/11 - and most people say they remember the CNN coverage - I never saw CNN. I immediately went down into the emergency operations center. My boss had taken off on a flight 5 minutes before the first plane hit. So I was working with the team in the emergency operations center and I never saw the television screen. So I never saw anything, I just worked straight through the day. I remember coming out at about 8:00 at night and it was a spectacularly gorgeous evening and there was dead silence. It was the first time I walked out onto the streets after the crashes, walked out onto Independence Avenue; and I think one of the most startling moments was I stepped out on the street - and the city was empty, everyone was gone - and I saw an armored personal vehicle driving down Independence Avenue. I thought&hellip;the world has changed. I never imagined that I would see a military vehicle on the streets of Washington, DC. And I said, that&#39;s it, this is the war we will fight until we win and there was no changing after that. FSM: What do you think is the single greatest danger facing American families today' Like for instance, what do you think is the most likely kind of attack to happen here'Maureen: Those are two separate questions. I&#39;ll answer the first question first. The single biggest danger to the American family is apathy. That is the one thing that will degrade our ability to actually have national resiliency. It&#39;s not believing that it won&#39;t happen again because it hasn&#39;t happened in the last few years. That&#39;s the biggest danger. Ok' Now once I answer that question, any other scenario that I can come up with, whether they&#39;re likely or not likely, is almost irrelevant. What is important is that people understand that we&#39;re working in a dynamic right now where they have personal responsibility to protect themselves and to protect their families and to be connected to the communities in which they live, that they know how to connect to neighborhood watch groups, that&#39;s something people do. They have to understand that it is not the government&#39;s responsibility, it is their responsibility to understand what they need to do in the community. It doesn&#39;t mean that they have to think about it every day, all day long, like I do. But they have to understand how their community functions and they have an obligation as individuals and as part of the community, and hence as part of the nation, to be prepared. FSM: You have no idea how pleased I am to hear you say this because this is actually in our own mission&hellip;inspiring women to personal responsibility in terms of educating them that the government can&#39;t do it all but that they can protect their families by learning. That&#39;s what we&#39;re all about. What are your personal goals from this point on'Maureen: My personal goals affect the safety of our country and I have to tell you, I think I have the greatest job in government.]]></description>
<pubDate>Thu, 01 May 2008 00:00:00 EST</pubDate>
<guid>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.286/default.asp</guid>
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<item>
<title>Nuala O&#8217;Connor Kelly</title>
<link>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.287/default.asp</link>
<description><![CDATA[From her childhood in Belfast to her job at the Department of Homeland Security, Nuala O&#39;Connor Kelly has seen firsthand how important a vigorous, thoughtful, and conscientious counterterrorism program is to national security.  With her drive to protect both the security and the freedom of all Americans, O&#39;Connor Kelly is tirelessly working each day on the front lines of our national defense, keeping the United States safe for the generations to come.From Carol A. Taber, President, Family Security Matters: Since I&#39;ve become involved with our nation&#39;s security, I&#39;ve been impressed with the number and quality of women in very high positions serving our country in the quest of national security and homeland defense. Many of these women work at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), upon which we rely to keep our children and communities safe. Consequently, Family Security Matters decided to publish a series of interviews with these extraordinary women so that you might share in our joy of knowing them. Many of us probably never imagined such women would be working in this field, and especially at such high levels of importance and authority. But they are fully there and they are inspirational, hard working, tough and committed to ensuring that American families remain safe, even while enduring the threat under which we constantly live. We invite you to meet three shining examples of them. One such woman, DHS&#8217;s Chief Privacy Officer Nuala O&#8217;Connor Kelly, is a model of the kind of incredibly smart, accomplished and thoughtful person we instinctively want contributing to such an important national issue. With pictures of her adorable one-year-old baby (and adorable husband!) smiling back at her from her desktop, each day O&#8217;Connor Kelly deals with, and safeguards, one of the key issues facing our government: how can we keep our citizens safe while at the same time protect their rights to privacy, especially as privacy is itself such an integral part of America&#8217;s cherished freedoms. O&#8217;Connor Kelly, born in Belfast, Ireland and thus an observer as a child of how governments deal with terrorists &ndash; both good and bad &ndash; she brings a unique and highly valuable personal experience to her role at DHS. After visiting recently with this special woman in DHS&#8217;s new offices, I can&#8217;t imagine how our country could have found a more competent candidate for this job. Meeting, and listening to, Nuala O&#8217;Connor Kelly has restored my faith in any bureaucratic government&#8217;s ability to cut to the chase and hire only the very best qualified people, not merely the next bodies in line. What a gem she is! Come listen in on our revealing &ndash; and often comforting - conversation&hellip; -- CAT  FSM:   What attracted you to government work from a private sector where, presumably, one might be able to earn a higher salary or have better benefits' Nuala: Well, that&#8217;s true, and my husband is constantly reminding me that I could be making more money in the private sector, and I did; I&#8217;ve been very lucky in my career. But I&#8217;m a New Yorker and I grew up in the New York area. That really drew me to the Department of Homeland Security after 9/11. I was here in D.C. two and a half weeks when 9/11 happened and I didn&#8217;t know too many people, but all of my friends and all of my family were back in New York so it was very difficult. I had a brother-in-law who was actually in the World Trade Center, was injured, and he had four young children at the time. My sister could have been widowed like how many thousands of women in New York are, and it really made me want to help make sure this Government gets this issue right and that we protect our citizens, and particularly now as a new mom, protect our children, but that we do it in a way that also respects our freedom and our ability to move about the country with out too much government intrusion.  FSM: I saw a t-shirt outside your office that says &#8217;Privacy is Sacred&#8217;. You know that really moved me. Was that your idea' Nuala: No, it was a company that I did some work with in the private sector and it was their logo and it really stuck with me. You know people in the rest of the world think Americans don&#8217;t care about privacy because our laws are a little different, but the reality is that Americans care about it deeply and fundamentally, it&#8217;s part of our very way of life, the way so many of our forbearers came to this country to seek the kind of free and open society where they could be who they wanted to be and practice whatever religion they wanted to practice, and so I think it&#8217;s kind of in the core of our culture. We actually constrain our government a lot more than other parts of the world can constrain their government in their actions. But we have a very robust private sector that does marketing, and knows your name and address in order to send you catalogs and in the rest of world that&#8217;s actually verboten, inappropriate to contact people in that way. I think that it&#8217;s a value that is kind of inherent in our Constitution, it&#8217;s imbedded in our lives; it&#8217;s something we all take for granted. FSM: Regarding privacy, many people have been thinking, "I don&#8217;t care if we look into somebody&#8217;s records; if they are innocent, then they have nothing to hide." But that thinking may be changing. Nuala: That is part of our job here at the privacy office at Homeland - it&#8217;s just to make people think about the impact DHS is having and to help this department get its job done by saying, "how do we go about making the country safer in a way that is most respectful to the individual, that is the least intrusive but still achieves the mission'" For example, we have in the airports now a technology that is called the back scanner where you can walk through it and it can see all the metal and plastic and all the things that you&#8217;ve got hiding on your body. It helps to see every part of you in really intimate detail, and so we have to make these choices about how we use technology, how we use data and information about you in a way that&#8217;s appropriate and yet meaningful to making sure that you&#8217;re safer when you get on that airplane or go to that bus station or whatever.FSM: Is that technology definitely moving forward' Nuala: Well there were different versions of that technology, some of which are really less intrusive than others, so what we can do is make good choices. First, giving people a choice is really powerful because it allows them to be more in control. The airports are a perfect example because that&#8217;s where most people meet Homeland Security. Secretary Chertoff has said he believes that choice is what is going to make people feel that they can be in control of their information, their destiny and their data. Some people have great discomfort about being patted down by a total stranger at the airport but might feel OK about going through technology that revealed whether they had plastic or metal on their bodies. So how do we give people the most options, the biggest range of choices that they can preserve their dignity and go about ordinary situations'  FSM: Was there anything in your working in the private sector that prepared you for the public sector, or would you say that it was the reverse, that you get better prepared in the public sector ' Nuala: Oh, good question. I started out as a regular lawyer at a big law firm and that was great training, the very hard work of legal practice, the hard analysis and not cutting corners and not being lazy in my thinking. Then there was the really rigorous and disciplined training I got early in my career in the dot com world. I loved working for a high-tech company because the energy, the speed, the pace was unbelievable. The ability to get things done and make changes that affect people and educate within the organization is something that I hope we have brought here. I think this office is the first of its kind. We are really setting a precedent, which is exciting. I think that we bring an energy; I mean we really are passionate about what we do and have enthusiasm for what we do but it also very non-hierarchal. You know, everyone&#8217;s got his own project that he&#8217;s working on and every person feels a sense of ownership in his or her work so it&#8217;s truly a team environment and a very exciting environment. FSM: So it sounds like you have been able to take what you learned in the private sector and apply it here without anyone saying, &#8217;wait a minute we don&#8217;t do things that way.&#8217; Nuala: Yes, there certainly is a little bit of that from people who have been in established government organizations for a long time and are used to doing things a certain way but Homeland, in particular, fosters that environment because it is only two years old. I was here the second week that we opened our doors, so there weren&#8217;t a lot of people around saying well we have always done it that way.   So, it was a great opportunity to actually create. FSM: Would you say, then, that DHS is different in that sense' I was shocked - more than surprised, shocked - at how many women seemed to be in very high positions at the DHS. Is that why' Nuala: I think so. There&#8217;s a new opportunity here and we were willing to take the best and the brightest, people who are willing to work really, really hard the first couple of years. So I think yes, maybe there were some doors open to a new structure that wasn&#8217;t here before. FSM: What is the structure, you said non-hierarchal' Now how does it function' Nuala: I mean my office is not hierarchal. There is a clear line of authority. The Secretary of Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff, obviously is our senior most leader, then there are cadres of under-secretaries that directly report to the Secretary. I am one, and there are a few other women at that level. There are a number of senior women who are not only lawyers but technical people, technologists and scientists. FSM: Tell me more. Nuala: We have some very, very senior women in our Science and Technology directory such as Dr. Maureen McCarthy.  FSM: Now why should women be interested in a career in government services' What does government service offer them' Nuala: I think the tradition has been that there is more stability in government than there is the private sector, meaning it&#8217;s not likely that Homeland Security is going to go out of business tomorrow; that is very unlikely. The government, because we are one of the largest employers in the world, has the luxury of programs like daycare and flexible work schedules. The salaries may be somewhat more limited than the private sector, but the rewards are far greater in some ways, and the stability and the other benefits are actually phenomenal. I have had a very good experience having a baby while working at a senior level in government. I had great support from my team, but I was able to come back on a somewhat flexible schedule at first, so I felt like the transition was entirely manageable. So I think that there are benefits to work life balance for women in government. Almost everyone on my team works at home one day a week or takes advantage of the flexible work schedule where they work four longer days and have the fifth day off, or something like that. I know that if people are motivated they are going to get their work done.FSM: How can our Government use and share data that has privacy guarantees and still have the data be useful' Nuala: Great question. I think the answer very largely is in good technology so we want to make sure that our government is using the best technology that&#8217;s out there to make sure that when we see that you are about to board a plane, that we know that is actually you and not somebody posing as you or pretending to be you. But, also we want to make sure that that data, once it is outside the government, is safe and secure&hellip;and that costs money, so we are putting a lot of investment into what technologies are best and most cost effective for the government. You know the joke I always say about government privacy is that we used to have our privacy protected by the inefficiency of our government because the IRS didn&#8217;t talk to the INS; that way we had privacy protection.   Well, President Bush has said over and over again that we don&#8217;t want an ineffective government. We want a limited, effective government, which is exactly right. We want to make sure we limit the focus and the amount of data that is being brought into the government, but make sure that it&#8217;s used effectively and that it is shared appropriately with our Federal partners: FBI, CIA, DOD, DHS, the various intelligence agencies. We want to make sure that when they know there is a bad guy that they share that information with all the other agencies. But, that they are not willy-nilly collecting data about you just because you went and got on an airplane.  FSM: With the privacy laws that are in place now versus ten years ago, would a privacy question being asked today be answered differently now than it was then, by law' Nuala: It&#8217;s a question of public expectation. People are growing in their concern, and they&#8217;re right to be aware and thoughtful about when they hand out their Social Security number, for instance, or to whom they give their telephone number in their ordinary course of business. I think twenty years ago, people used to have their Social Security numbers on their checks, and so we are all becoming more aware and that&#8217;s good. Identity theft is a huge problem in this country.   From Homeland&#8217;s perspective, we look at that as both potential funding for terrorists and also a great cover for people as they move about the country.  The way we teach our children to look both ways before they cross the street, we should also be teaching our children that you don&#8217;t answer the phone and say, "Mommy&#8217;s not home," or "let me give you my phone number." This is also about teaching your children the awareness of privacy. It&#8217;s not just don&#8217;t let a stranger touch you, or don&#8217;t go with that stranger, it&#8217;s also don&#8217;t let that stranger ask you questions about your mom and your dad. It&#8217;s safety and security. FSM: What law or laws would you like to see passed that would enable us to identify and arrest terrorists while protecting our citizens' Nuala: Well, I think that the President and the Congress have done a lot of that in Patriot 1 and Patriot 2. I would say that it&#8217;s good that every American has the right to question their government and be concerned about how our laws are used. The initial impetus for Patriot was to make equal the playing field between terrorist investigations and law enforcement investigations. The FBI and CIA could not do the same things in terms of looking to find terrorists that they could do in looking to find criminals, so it really was a leveling of the playing field. Now I think we should all be concerned when it impacts ordinary citizens in our own personal habits, like video rentals, or buying books on Amazon, or that kind of thing. I think the presumption is still very strongly in favor of the individual in this country, far more, actually, than in many parts of the world. Between the government and the individual, the presumption is that your data is your data; that your life is your life to control, and only when there is a reason of suspicion or a legal predicate does the government have the right to intrude on your life. I think that&#8217;s right and we want that now, the power just the way it is. FSM: During times of war do you think that we should be on a different footing in terms of privacy' Nuala: No. Very clearly, no. It&#8217;s good that we have this time, I think, of quiet after the storm of 9/11, to reflect on how we see our privacy because in times of crisis those principles are tested. But we are building privacy into Homeland Security every single day by making intelligent choices again about technology, about how we train our employees, about how much data we take in, in order to analyze it.  FSM: How do you enforce privacy across DHS' Nuala: We&#8217;ve got at headquarters about thirty to thirty-five people who work directly for me, a terrific staff of lawyers, of technologists, of education and training people, compliance people. They work with the Privacy and Freedom Information Act staff across the department so that&#8217;s another four-hundred and fifty people. We&#8217;ve got a big team and combined with this department next year, will spend something like forty to fifty million dollars on the Privacy and Freedom Information Act, keeping your data private but also letting you see what the government is doing.  What that means is, we require every new program, every new idea or department, to explain to the people through plain English what they are going to do with data, or what they going to do to help make them safe. And just through writing that document, through the process of asking questions&hellip;should we be doing this' Should we be buying this technology' Should we really be taking fingerprints from everyone who comes across our border' Is this the right thing to do' I think it we&#8217;ve made the program stronger and better, and more accurate and more focused on their targeted missions.  You know, inside we educate and train, we help people comply with the law and outside we bring in these concerns of the advocacy community and the public and we also criticize when appropriate.  FSM: Now, my last question. You had this wonderful thought earlier about teaching kids the privacy issue. Do you have any other suggestions for mothers' What they can do to help their children, to keep them more safe, to help their children to keep themselves safe' Nuala: We always think about physical safety, thinking about child molesters for instance, with "don&#8217;t let people touch you." But, it&#8217;s also what are the private parts of your data, your information, your family&#8217;s information or yourself' What&#8217;s your private stuff; your name, your address, and your telephone number. Whatever your family defines as your private stuff, that&#8217;s information you don&#8217;t have to give out just because someone asks you, "so what&#8217;s your name'" You don&#8217;t necessarily have to tell them if they are a stranger, or a policeman, or your teacher. You&#8217;ve got private stuff, you have every right to it, and it needs as much protection as your own physical body. That&#8217;s my key message to other mothers like myself.]]></description>
<pubDate>Thu, 01 May 2008 00:00:00 EST</pubDate>
<guid>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.287/default.asp</guid>
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<title>Laura Manning</title>
<link>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.288/default.asp</link>
<description><![CDATA[If ever I were asked what kind of person I&#39;d like to watch over my kids&#39; security, my answer would be: another mother. And so we have Laura Manning in charge...Deputy Director for Fusion (a process that links law enforcement and intelligence, created by Laura) and Production, Homeland Security Operations Center - better known among the in-crowd as the "Ops Center." I can now sleep at night...basically because neither she nor her staff does! It is fitting that Laura&#39;s stated goal on her resume is, "To Make A Difference"...and indeed, she has!FSM: Please comment on the role of women in DHS today, and in national defense in general; are there many women in positions of real authority and thus is it a good career for women'Laura: Since the beginning of the Department of Homeland Security there have been women in significant positions. Susan Neely, Janet Hale, Karen Morr, Karen Marmaud--all these women have been in senior leadership jobs, have real authority, and are respected for their work. My boss is a tough talking Marine General who some might not expect to be a strong supporter of women, but they would be wrong. He&#39;s given me great opportunities and is teaching me the leadership skills I need to move to my next challenges in management. Coming to DHS was one of the best career moves I ever made. FSM: Was your career path planned from the beginning'Laura: That question made me laugh out loud! I finished my PhD in 1985 and started as a Political Science College Professor. My specialty was Ocean Policy. I found a job as a fisheries lobbyist. I managed a biology lab. I taught an experiential government course. I worked for the CIA as a proliferation analyst. Now I&#39;m managing the Law Enforcement and Response side of the 24/7 Homeland Security Operations Center. I&#39;m afraid I kept doing things I wanted to do instead of things that are a linear progression. No one should take career advice from me if her primary goal is to get ahead and make lots of money. FSM: Did 9/11 change your attitudes and plans'Laura: You bet it did. I watched the attacks on TV like everyone else but we were talking with my office mate&#39;s brother who worked across the street from the World Trade Center. My now ex-husband works for DoD and frequented the Pentagon; we couldn&#39;t get in touch with him for hours. I volunteered the next week to be the CIA representative to the Vice President WMD National Preparedness Review because as a WMD analyst I knew what awful things bad guys could do to the US--even worse than what they had just done. We met with the Office of Homeland Security staff on their first day in office and within a few weeks we were rolled into their effort. I&#39;m hooked on this mission. As a mother this is the most valuable thing I can do for my kids&#39; physical security. For me it&#39;s personal. I believe we can make a difference. FSM: Tell us as much as you can about the Homeland Security Operations Center (HSOC). What should Americans know about its capabilities that will allow them to feel better protected than they do'Laura: On a daily basis, we collect terrorist related information from all available sources (Federal, State, Local & private sector) from across the US & pass the information on as raw data to appropriate agencies. Consequently, we attempt to identify terrorist threats to the US, such as:  Who or what is approaching the borders, attempting to cross the borders, or residing within the borders, that could bring harm to the US Daily, collect and fuse information from internal and external intelligence and law enforcement agencies Conduct initial screen and sort or incoming data prior to passing suspicious activities on for further analysis Regardless of how insignificant, all suspicious data is passed on for deeper analysis and shared with other agencies In the case of an actual incident, we act as the primary National level hub in Domestic Incident Management events for operational communications and information sharing. Importantly, we also act as the primary conduit to the White House and the Secretary for Domestic Situational Awareness during a catastrophic event within US. FSM: Tell us about the Fusion Process at DHS, and is this a process that would be endangered if the Patriot Act is not kept alive'Laura: The Patriot Act doesn&#39;t affect much of what I do. We don&#39;t have covert collectors. I gather data from law enforcement, observant citizens, corporate security&hellip;they are offering the information freely. We take suspicious activity reports from these kinds of sources and turn them into dots on a map. None of the dots is significant by itself, but when you look at them together co-located at one place or at a specific infrastructure, a pattern starts to appear. For HSOC that is fusion. At that point we hand it over to the analysts to figure out what it means. FSM: Is it possible to prepare for a nuclear attack' What should average citizens know and do to protect themselves and their families'Laura: The most likely "nuclear" attack would really be "radiological." Terrorists are extremely unlikely to get a nuke. We can prepare our families to respond sensibly to a radiological attack. It is all about not getting contaminated or getting decontaminated as soon as possible. To avoid contamination we will need to heed shelter in place warnings. Stop ventilation from bringing it in. If we are exposed we need to be aware of the direction of the wind and move up wind of the contamination. We need to be sensible if we believe we have gotten particles on our clothing. The goal is remove and bag the clothes and to get the contamination off by using soap and water. The real key is not to ingest or breathe it in--a scarf or bandana or shirt pulled over nose and mouth will do good things. It is pretty easy to scrub off your skin but very hard to scrub out of your lungs. Radiation isn&#39;t magic&hellip;we just need not to panic and to get away from the radiation to minimize the damage. FSM: What kind of education do young people need to advance in the field of national security'Laura: Good analytic skills. Protecting and preventing terrorism, or indeed in any intelligence area, is about taking the few puzzle pieces that you get and making a picture out of it. You neither want to miss the picture or get the wrong picture. To work on root causes of terror you need to understand many cultures that breed terror and which of the roots is more significant. It all boils down to analysis of what is knowable. FSM: What do you think is the single greatest danger facing American citizens today, meaning the most likely kind of attack to happen, knowing that anything could happen in reality' And how should mothers prepare their families for that kind of attack'Laura: I worry most about a biological attack. It is relatively easy, could cause serious illness and death, and would create the kind of fear that terrorism craves. My family has supplies packed in backpacks that includes food, a simple mask, maps, and a plan to meet in West Virginia at my father&#39;s cabin in case of an incident. Knowledge is power. Most of the diseases respond to antibiotics if caught early. FSM: Tell us about your current job. What personal goals of your own does it advance'Laura: I love my job. I&#39;m a mystery novel reader and love finding answers to questions. That is what I do all day. It is the first time in my professional career that I haven&#39;t been thinking about what to do next. I studied Public Administration and now am getting to set up the structure of this organization avoiding some of the problems other organizations have fallen into. I studied Civil Liberties and now am able to set up a system that both strives very hard to gather information about suspicious activities but on the other hand protects the privacy and first amendment rights of citizens. It is a hard balance to make but I feel strongly and am very vocal about how much we have failed if we defeat terrorism and create the Gestapo. I studied Politics and the political arena for this topic is very interesting, to say the least. FSM: Thank you Laura, it has been my pleasure to meet you.]]></description>
<pubDate>Thu, 01 May 2008 00:00:00 EST</pubDate>
<guid>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.288/default.asp</guid>
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<title>Safe at Home Interviews Debra Burlingame</title>
<link>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.282/default.asp</link>
<description><![CDATA[Meet Debra Burlingame, our second profile in resilience.   We&#8217;d love to hear from you! At the end of this interview is information on how to get in touch with us regarding your thoughts about Safe at Home.Joan Harting Barham: Do you think you would be the committed, outspoken national security activist you are today if your brother had not piloted the hijacked American Airlines flight that crashed into the Pentagon on 9/11' DEBRA BURLINGAME: There is no question in my mind I would not. I got involved becauseI had to know what happened to my brother on that morning. He had a direct confrontation with the hijackers. He faced these guys without any back-up. So I felt this need to witness it for him, to be there for him in a way, after the fact. Then, driven by my dire sense that this could happen again, my involvement evolved very organically. JHB: What was your life like up to that time'  DB: Well, on the morning of 9/11 I was in Los Angeles. I had just moved there after spending all my adult life in New York. My parents had just died. My mother 10 months before 9/11, my dad less than two years before that. I&#8217;d been a producer at Court TV, but my job had been eliminated and my daughter had just left for college, so I felt it was really time to make a change in my life. I planned to start my own production company in L.A. When 9/11 happened, I had this deep need to get home to New York, which was wounded and hurt, to contribute, to do something. JHB: Since 9/11, you&#8217;ve tackled a lot of big issues. Let&#8217;s start literally at Ground Zero. Your opposition to the International Freedom Center, which was proposed for the site, has yielded tangible results in the September 11 Memorial Center under construction right now. Briefly, what was your objection to the original IFC plan'  DB: I felt that the International Freedom Center was going to distort the reality of 9/11. We felt it was going to politicize the events of 9/11 because the IFC founders were telling us it was going to be essentially a human rights museum which had nothing about 9/11 in it. There wasn&#8217;t going to be anything in it about terrorism. So we said: Wait a minute! Go ahead and do that, but don&#8217;t do that right on top of the place where all these people were torn to shreds. Please don&#8217;t do it there! And we won that battle. We won it decisively and now the focus of site will be the story of September 11. And the story will be courageous and raw. My hope for this museum is that when people come out, their lives will never quite be the same. They&#8217;ll view 9/11 and terrorism differently. People who experienced 9/11 from watching it on their televisions will be at the actual site. They&#8217;ll have a sense of the enormous scale of the destruction, both physically and emotionally &ndash; in every way.  JHB: You&#8217;ve written and spoken forcefully in favor of the NSA Terrorist Surveillance Act and the renewal of the Patriot Act. You&#8217;re a trained lawyer. How important is that fact to your ability to analyze these issues and to be heard on these issues' DB: My legal background has been helpful in virtually everything I&#8217;ve done because when I hear lawyers talking or debating the issues, I understand what they&#8217;re talking about. And I can see some of the holes in their arguments, see their strengths and weaknesses. For instance, the great discussion about FISA [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] warrants. I was able to call people I know who worked in the Justice Department in the 1990s and ask them to explain what the FISA application process was like. I learned that the process was so cumbersome and remains so cumbersome that the idea that you could have emergency warrants issued when you&#8217;re dealing with terrorists is just ridiculous. That was one of things I was trying to give the reader a feel for when I wrote the piece "Our Right To Security" for The Wall Street Journal [January 30, 2006]. JHB: You also worked for several years as an airline attendant. How did that experience inform your campaign against allowing political correctness to overwhelm the case of the imams ejected from the flight in Minneapolis in 2006'  DB: For seven years, I was a TWA flight attendant based at JFK. I know from my years of flying that frontline airline employees, the ones who interact with the passengers, are totally accustomed to dealing with a virtual United Nations on their airplanes. They&#8217;re sophisticated and knowledgeable when it comes to different types of passengers, from different cultural backgrounds, different religious backgrounds, different nationalities, ethnicities and so forth. They&#8217;re not easily rattled and they have a finely tuned sense of what is "normal behavior" and what is not. The airlines &ndash; and the government &ndash; should listen to them very closely. They&#8217;re incredibly valuable in terms of anti-terrorism, protecting this country, protecting aviation. JHB: Do you think it&#8217;s valuable to encourage the flying public to be vigilant'  DB: Not only do I think it&#8217;s valuable, I think it&#8217;s essential. It doesn&#8217;t matter what the government says, it doesn&#8217;t matter what laws we pass against racial profiling. You can&#8217;t outlaw common sense. You can&#8217;t outlaw someone&#8217;s sense of self-preservation. JHB: Beyond remaining alert at airports, what are the most important things ordinary civilians can do to keep America secure'  DB: Well, I&#8217;d say be like the young man who worked at Circuit City who saw videotapes of what he thought was terrorists training. He let the FBI know and they shut down that conspiracy. That young man knew he could be wrong. He was willing to risk ridicule and criticism &ndash; being called an Islamophobe. And he did something else that was really courageous: he went public. The FBI were perfectly happy to keep his identity under wraps but he decided it was important to tell the public, to be a role model, and encourage the public to do what he did. So he was doubly courageous. And so, if you have a gut instinct that something isn&#8217;t right, report that. And if you&#8217;re wrong, you&#8217;re wrong. But what if you&#8217;re right and you do nothing' JHB: You&#8217;ve also talked about being informed citizens. DB: That&#8217;s right. Americans need to be discerning consumers of news. I understand that people are busy taking care of their families and working hard every day. But with a little bit of whatever discretionary time you might have, be proactive in informing yourself about your world. That means going on the internet, discovering the news outlets that you find reliable in terms of truth and accuracy. And the only way to determine whether any given outlet&#8217;s analysis is accurate and reliable is to compare. I think the best thing people can do is to be skeptical about what they read in the newspaper, not rely on one source of information, not rely on the evening news network broadcasts. Choose and choose wisely. Don&#8217;t accept the mainstream media&#8217;s version of what your world is. Americans are smart. I always trust Americans to make the right choices when they have the correct information. You can be a more informed voter, for instance, if you&#8217;re not listening to platitudes, if you really know what the politicians&#8217; policies and positions are. And if they don&#8217;t have any &ndash; you&#8217;ll know that, too. JHB: In terms of maintaining vigilance these long years after 9/11, you&#8217;ve suggested that anger can be a potent antidote to complacency. Can you elaborate on that' DB: I think it&#8217;s perfectly understandable that, as years pass, we fall back into old habits. Also I think there&#8217;s something positive in viewing the world in an optimistic way and hoping for good things. Who can live in this world of terrorism 24/7' It&#8217;s not necessarily even a healthy thing. But I do think it&#8217;s very important that we don&#8217;t fool ourselves. My brother died. I have a daughter. She&#8217;s 25. Some day hopefully she&#8217;s going to get married and have a family. And I worry for her. I worry for her children. This war on terror is a long war. I do have anger about this. The trick is keeping that anger productive. But, yes, anger is a motivating force for me. And I think what they did on 9/11 should never cease to anger people. Never. It is an outrage. JHB: When it comes to national security and America&#8217;s resilience, what single thing would you most like the next President to do'  DB: In terms of policy and anti-terrorism tools, I think securing our borders. Remember, a President only has so much political capital. The question is how to spend it. And what kind of results will it yield. I think border security is something that will require spending political capital and I think the results will be significant.  The truth of the matter is: if we have proper identification in this country, not only will it make our country more secure in terms of terrorism, it will eliminate billions and billions of dollars lost because of identity fraud and identity theft. That&#8217;s a huge payoff, a huge boon to us in the war on terror. JHB: Finally, can you envision a time when you&#8217;ll return to life as a private citizen, as a Westchester housewife' DB: Every day I get up and hope for that. But I can&#8217;t envision it, to be honest. A year or so after 9/11, I started thinking in terms of "when this is over", "when I&#8217;ve finished this", the implication being that I&#8217;d get on with the rest of my life. But then, sometime last year, I suddenly realized there would never be any returning to normal for me, that I would never, ever be the person I was before. I realized that there was a permanent loss &ndash; not just in terms of my brother &ndash; but in terms of who I had been, and what my country had been before. And that was so deeply sad to me that I just put my head down and sobbed. One of my nephews was in the Peace Corps in Romania on 9/11. When he&#8217;d returned to U.S., he told me, "I came home to a different country. The country I left is gone." That made me so sad for him and for his generation, this young generation fighting this war on all these fronts for us. Yet I have great hope for them because I think they&#8217;re really tremendous. Debra Burlingame is the co-founder of the 9/11 Families for a Safe & Strong America website and is on the board of the National September 11 Memorial & Museum. She lives in Westchester with her husband, and has a grown daughter.  *We welcome feedback about the Safe at Home initiative. If you would like more information about Deborah Burlingame, or if you have any other comments regarding Safe at Home, please e-mail us at EditorialDirector@familysecuritymatters.org. For further information about Safe at Home, click here. Thank you!#  #Safe at Home Editor Joan Harting Barham is a writer and editor who has spent more than two decades communicating to and with women. In New York City, she served as a Senior Editor at Glamour, Harper&#8217;s Bazaar and Elle magazines and in Toronto, where she currently lives with her husband, as Editor-in-Chief of Fashion magazine. Joan has interviewed such luminaries as First Lady Nancy Reagan, business titan Leonard Lauder, and Oscar winner Anthony Hopkins. If you are a reporter or producer who is interested in receiving more information about this writer or this article, please email your request to pr@familysecuritymatters.org. Note &ndash; The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, views, and/or philosophy of The Family Security Foundation, Inc.Click here to support Family Security Matters]]></description>
<pubDate>Wed, 30 Apr 2008 00:00:00 EST</pubDate>
<guid>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.282/default.asp</guid>
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<title>How do You Propose Americans Stay Safe at Home?</title>
<link>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.283/default.asp</link>
<description><![CDATA[The Editors This week, FamilySecurityMatters.org launched our year-long Safe at Home initiative. While national security should be at the top of the priority list for our elected leaders and other public servants, there is much that the average citizen can do to create a safe environment for not only his family, but also his community. Reader response to our first in the series has been terrific, with many of you writing to us at editorialdirector@familysecuritymatters.org to let us know not only how our series inspires you, but also with a few ideas as to what we as citizens can do to make ourselves and our society a safer, more secure place to live, work, and raise our families.As we learned in our first interview with Stephen Flynn, self-reliance is important: We need to talk about the civic virtue of essentially taking care of ourselves, becoming more self-reliant. That is, when things go wrong, there aren&#8217;t going to be enough professionals to go round and they need to help the people most in danger first. The rest of us should be self-sufficient enough that we can ride out three days, so we&#8217;re not part of the problem. Our history is rich with stories of independence and self-reliance exhibited by our forefathers. Whether it was cutting the apron strings of England, tilling the soil in the Midwest, or traveling across the nation in covered wagons for the greener pastures of the West, Americans have always had a "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" attitude that made us different from our European cousins, whose existences were often contingent upon the fatuous whims of their monarchs. Unfortunately, many young people today know little, if anything, about such stories because they are no longer being taught in school. Have we, as Americans, forgotten our independent streak' Do we really want the government to "take care of us" in every way' Or do we still value the words immortalized in our Declaration of Independence: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. -- That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed&hellip; And so it remains up to us &ndash; are we up to the task'How about you' Do you have a story you&#8217;d like to share about how you took the initiative to create a safer environment for your family or your community' We&#8217;d like to hear about it! Please send your stories to editorialdirector@familysecuritymatters.org. The most inspiring one chosen by our panel of judges will be published on FamilySecurityMatters.org, and the winner will also receive the item of his choice from our exclusive FamilySecurityMatters.org gear. To be considered for publication, all submissions must be received by February 29, 2008.* A safe America begins at home. Let&#8217;s get to work! *The published winning entry will become the copyrighted property of FamilySecurityMatters.org.]]></description>
<pubDate>Wed, 30 Apr 2008 00:00:00 EST</pubDate>
<guid>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.283/default.asp</guid>
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<title>Meet The Heroes Next Door</title>
<link>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.251/default.asp</link>
<description><![CDATA[Americans Making a DifferenceAt FSM, we hope to motivate all Americans to find their particular talents that may help protect the safety and security of the United States. That&#39;s why it&#39;s so important our readers are informed about the issues and have the tools to make a difference. Still, we know it&#39;s always helpful to have an example. So we have profiled some of our neighbors who have already taken amazing proactive steps to change our country. When you read their stories, we think you&#39;ll understand just how powerful an ordinary American with an extraordinary dream can be.Linda StratingAfter 9/11, Linda Strating knew she needed to do something to help defend her country from the terrorist threat it faced. But with a lifetime of experience in university administration, rather than the military, intelligence, or government, finding an outlet for her desire to serve was difficult. Now she proves that all Americans truly do have a role to play in our nation&#39;s defense as she works to recruit new students to the Institute of World Politics, a graduate school dedicated to training the next generation of capable and responsible national leaders. Read Complete StoryDebra BurlingameTo the uninformed observer, Debra Burlingame might look like an activist. She has been a very public face of the 9/11 victims&#39; survivors. She has willingly engaged some rather intimidating enemies, from the New York intelligentsia to the Pentagon, in high-profile arguments which she has generally won. She is an active and vocal member of the World Trade Center Memorial Foundation Board of Directors. Op-eds about and by her have appeared in numerous national publications. But despite all of this activity, she still shuns the title of "activist". To Burlingame, her new public role is simply her duty to her country, making her a citizen and nothing more. Read Complete StoryDo You Know A Hero Next Door' Send your ideas to Nancy@FamilySecurityMatters.Org]]></description>
<pubDate>Tue, 29 Apr 2008 00:00:00 EST</pubDate>
<guid>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.251/default.asp</guid>
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<title>Linda Strating: Placing A Priority on Service</title>
<link>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.252/default.asp</link>
<description><![CDATA[Linda Strating: Placing A Priority on Service Like it did for so many Americans, 9/11 changed Linda Strating. In her Washington, DC office, she was only miles from the Pentagon and if a plane had struck the White House, she would have been in its direct path. As she sought shelter in her building&#8217;s basement alongside her coworkers, her thoughts were on her daughter in New York City. Though they had spoken soon after the attack, the uncertainty and horror of what had happened would cause Linda to worry until she knew her daughter was home safely. There in that basement, while the world around her changed in the blink of an eye, Linda&#8217;s priorities began to shift as well.As a child in a military family, Linda learned about service at an early age. Her father&#8217;s dedication to his country and his work taught her the importance of citizenship and the role every individual could play in protecting and improving the country. As she visited his grave in Arlington Cemetery, while the Pentagon still lay in smoldering ruins before her, she was reminded of the lessons he had taught her and she knew it was time for her life to take a different turn. She moved quickly north to be with her daughter and figure out her next move. Unfortunately, all the obvious avenues for national service seemed closed to her. She made phone calls and visited websites, considering a career change into the military or intelligence fields, but found that she never quite met the necessary criteria. She lacked the language skills, the training, or the experience. Sometimes she was not young enough, while at other times she could not meet the physical requirements. Frustrated, she kept working as a university administrator in New Jersey while her eagerness to serve her country went unfulfilled for several years. Finally, though, an advertisement for a job back in Washington caught her eye and, within weeks, she found herself returning to DC. The job was as Director of Marketing and Recruitment at the Institute of World Politics. The position was nothing new; Linda had worked as a college administrator for much of her career, in recruitment, marketing, and alumni relations, among other fields. But this school&#8217;s mission was different than anything she had known. IWP is a graduate school dedicated to training responsible and capable leaders in all areas of national security and foreign affairs. While graduate programs in international affairs are common, Linda was drawn to IWP&#8217;s unique curriculum and its focus on a multidimensional approach to statecraft, cultivating not only its students&#8217; capacity to use the instruments of national power but also the moral framework necessary to use them in a responsible manner. To Linda, IWP was the answer to a prayer; there she could finally use her skills and experience to further a cause she believed could change the country and the world. After years spent searching for her niche, Linda had found a way in which she could serve her country and live up to the standards of service she had strived to reach for so long. Like many Americans, she could not imagine resting idle after 9/11. With her country and her family under attack, she needed an outlet for her energy and ability. But she had to get creative. Most people do not have the training and the experience to work in intelligence, the military, or diplomacy, but this does not mean they do not have a role to play in America&#8217;s future security. Making the United States of tomorrow safer than the United States of today requires a comprehensive effort that demands the highest standards of excellence and expertise in a very broad range of subjects. Today, Linda believes she is playing an integral role in training future peacemakers. IWP&#8217;s students go on to serve in all those fields that Americans automatically associate with national security. They work for the State Department, the Defense Department, the CIA, and so many other government agencies. By identifying promising students and encouraging IWP&#8217;s mission, Linda Strating is helping to cultivate a renewable supply of diplomats, generals, and intelligence officers. She is happy in the knowledge that she is doing her part to serve her country in her own unique way and to live up to the standards her father set for her years ago. Linda found a job that only she could do and is dedicated to doing it as well as possible, for the good of her country, her community, and her daughter, for the years to come.]]></description>
<pubDate>Tue, 29 Apr 2008 00:00:00 EST</pubDate>
<guid>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.252/default.asp</guid>
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<title>Debra Burlingame, Working to Preserve the Historical Integrity of Ground Zero.</title>
<link>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.253/default.asp</link>
<description><![CDATA[Debra Burlingame, Working to Preserve the Historical Integrity of Ground Zero.To the uninformed observer, Debra Burlingame might look like an activist. She has been a very public face of the 9/11 victims&#39; survivors. She has willingly engaged some rather intimidating enemies, from the New York intelligentsia to the Pentagon, in high-profile arguments which she has generally won. She is an active and vocal member of the World Trade Center Memorial Foundation Board of Directors. Op-eds about and by her have appeared in numerous national publications. But despite all of this activity, she still shuns the title of "activist". To Burlingame, her new public role is simply her duty to her country, making her a citizen and nothing more.Of course, Burlingame&#39;s concept of citizenship would make most Americans weak with preemptive exhaustion. But she has never been one to believe that the United States requires only a passive presence, rather than an active commitment. Growing up, she remembers learning the lesson that all of her blessings and comforts were the result of good fortune, not her own effort. She knew that her American citizenship was a great gift and she eventually understood that, if not properly safeguarded, American security and the American way of life could ultimately crumble. Her brother, Chic, inspired her as well, with his commitment to public service, forged through his work as a Navy fighter pilot, and his ever-present willingness to give of his own time and energy to help solve problems that came his way. But even with this sense of civic duty, Burlingame has lived most of her life as a private citizen. Ultimately, it was her brother and his lifelong example of duty fulfilled that moved her to assume a more public role. For on 9/11, the commercial plane that Chic Burlingame piloted was hijacked and flown into the Pentagon. When Debra Burlingame and her surviving brothers, always close, were confronted by the unthinkable realities of that day, they soon realized that they could not remain silent. She knew that Chic&#39;s sense of honor and his oft-stated commitment to protect those passengers on his plane at all costs would have caused him to resist the terrorists&#39; actions as long as possible. She hoped that spreading the word about his character would not only preserve his memory but also offer some comfort to other grieving families. And so she and her brothers gave interviews and spoke about their brother, even as they worked through their own pain.As the months passed, Burlingame began to notice a common thread in most of the public statements of 9/11 families. The family members that appeared most often in newspapers and over the air all shared decidedly hostile views of the United States&#39; counterterrorism effort. She knew firsthand, however, that many, if not most, of the other 9/11 families did not agree with these statements and in fact supported American counterterrorist programs, abroad and at home. And so she helped organize these like-minded families to give their views a voice in the media. The resulting group, 9/11 Families for a Safe and Secure America (www.911familiesforamerica.org ), offered a microphone through which the thousands of like-minded family members could communicate with each other and with the country. After helping to organize and publicize this opposing view of 9/11 families, a new challenge came Burlingame&#39;s way. As the plans for rebuilding Ground Zero in New York City were unveiled, Burlingame was astonished to find the inclusion of an International Freedom Center that eclipsed the 9/11 memorial in both size and scope. Rather than dedicating space and resources to the heroes and victims of 9/11, the International Freedom Center would be an epic, multicultural monument dedicated to exposing the crimes perpetrated by oppressive groups throughout history. While she believed the stories of Native Americans driven from their homelands and of life in the Jim Crow South were important, she and many others were outraged that they would occupy the hallowed ground where so many had fallen. The attacks of 9/11 were attacks upon the innocent civilians of the United States and rather than remembering their lives and honoring their deaths, the International Freedom Center would highlight the injustices perpetrated by the United States against oppressed groups throughout its history.As a result, Burlingame and like-minded family members launched a campaign to redesign Ground Zero to give greater attention and respect to the sacrifices of the lives lost on 9/11. When she was named to the World Trade Center Memorial Foundation Board of Directors, many people thought she would be a quiet voice to lend support and legitimacy to whatever plan was chosen. Instead she became a fierce advocate for a design that would honor the victims of 9/11, free from a political agenda or partisan bias. Her efforts ultimately succeeded as the original vision of the International Freedom Center was scrapped in favor of a design more in line with her vision.Despite her obvious accomplishments, Debra Burlingame resists placing herself in the spotlight. So many people in the public eye have assumed these roles in search of prestige or publicity, rather than as an honest response to a perceived need. Burlingame is not one of these individuals. Following the tragedy of 9/11, she saw a clear public need that she had the capacity to fill. That need has changed over time, from her initial desire to have people know the character of her brother to her most recent campaign for a respectful 9/11 memorial at Ground Zero. But through all of her work, a single factor has remained constant. She has always clung to her conviction that American citizenship demands an active commitment to solving problems as they arise and to taking responsibility for those solutions within reach of the individual. While she believes activists too often seek only to tear down policies or structures they perceive as unjust, she has followed her vision of citizenship, in which it is not enough to simply point out problems without offering a solution. Most people in Burlingame&#39;s shoes would have understandably withdrawn from the public eye following such a tragedy. Certainly, no one would find it strange for such a person to deal privately with grief and shun the spotlight. But her unique perspective and background allowed her to act positively to effect much-needed changes. While she had no prior experience in politics or advocacy, her convictions and commitment helped facilitate her transformation from at-home mom into a very public person. After watching the noble example of her brother Chic, she understood her personal responsibility to solve those problems within her grasp. By turning her experiences, her skills, and her character to a new challenge, Debra Burlingame has become an effective voice for the 9/11 families in the American war on terror and helped to preserve the authentic memory of 9/11 for future generations. And as new challenges arise, from the growing controversy over the awareness within the military&#39;s Able Danger unit of the 9/11 terrorists to the continuing debate over the ultimate reconstruction of Ground Zero, she will undoubtedly remain a positive force in the maintenance of an honest record of 9/11.]]></description>
<pubDate>Tue, 29 Apr 2008 00:00:00 EST</pubDate>
<guid>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.253/default.asp</guid>
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<title>FAQ</title>
<link>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.238/default.asp</link>
<description><![CDATA[1. What can I do to help protect my family and community'  2. What is the Patriot Act and does it threaten my civil liberties'  3. The United States has its own problems, with the economy, health care, and education. Shouldn&#39;t we take care of our own people before we worry about those who are half a world away'  4. Where can I find out how to contact my representatives and senators and how can I find their voting records on specific issues'  5. Is the United States safer from terrorism than on 9/11']]></description>
<pubDate>Fri, 18 Apr 2008 00:00:00 EST</pubDate>
<guid>http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/homeland/pageID.238/default.asp</guid>
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