Swampland - TIME.com » Blog Archive Panetta to CIA « This smells a bit of desperation. Leon Panetta is a terrific guy, a fine public servant–one of those people who reek of sanity and good judgment–but he doesn’t have much, if any, experience in spook world.

---

Washington Times - Obama faces Mexican drug war Add another pressing challenge to President-elect Barack Obama’s growing to-do list - tamping down a dramatic rise in violence and corruption that has overwhelmed the U.S.-Mexico border and spread an escalating turf fight between warring drug cartels into the United States.

---

Panetta's management skills can't be questioned. As White House chief of staff, he held one of the toughest management jobs around. But the man has no background whatsoever in intelligence.

---

Authorities are organizing what appears to be the largest security operation ever for an inauguration, bringing in thousands of extra police, agents and troops to handle crowds as President-elect Barack Obama is sworn in.

---

The terrorism threat to the United States over the next five years will be driven by instability in the Middle East and Africa, persistent challenges to border security and increasing Internet savvy, says a new intelligence assessment obtained by The Associated Press.

---

NTI: Global Security Newswire - India Provides Evidence of Mumbai Attackers’ Links to Pakistan India delivered material to Pakistan today describing how “elements in Pakistan” supported the late-November terrorist attacks in Mumbai, Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee announced (see GSN, Dec. 23, 2008). The information transfer followed weeks of complaints from Islamabad that its nuclear rival was [...]

---

President-elect Barack Obama has selected Leon E. Panetta, the former congressman and White House chief of staff, to take over the Central Intelligence Agency, an organization that Mr. Obama criticized during the campaign for using interrogation methods he decried as torture, Democratic officials said Monday.

---

Implementing new cargo-scanning regulations that have questionable security value and will assuredly disrupt the global supply chain and further undermine American commerce, jobs and the economy at large seems like a remarkably bad idea.

---

Four hooded men smashed in the door to the adobe home of an 80-year-old farmer here in November, handcuffing his frail wrists and driving him to a makeshift jail

---

Blagojevich’s Homeland Security access revoked :: CHICAGO SUN-TIMES :: Gov. Blagojevich Gov. Blagojevich’s access to classified federal security information was revoked by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security after he was charged last month with trying to sell a Senate seat to the highest bidder, officials confirmed Friday.

---

The State of Jihad: 2008 - The Long War Journal The past year has seen significant developments in the Long War. Pakistan teeters on a civil war and a potential war with India, after Taliban gains and an attack launched on Mumbai from within Pakistan. India has emerged as a central battlefield in the war. Iraq [...]

---

Ten resolutions the United States should adopt for 2009 to make the country safer.

---

Security Debrief contributor Michael Braun, former chief of DEA operations, discusses the spiraling drug violence in Mexico, and how it is impacting American communities, with the LA Time's Josh Meyer.

---

Homeland Security Today - news and analysis - Bush Never Recovered from Response to Katrina, Former Aides Say Three years ago, Hurricane Katrina and its chaotic aftermath produced a collage of indelible images. Among them was a photo of President Bush, viewing the devastation from the comfort of Air Force One as he jetted to Washington. Now, [...]

---

Security Debrief analyzes the Israeli Government's innovative use of Twitter to host a news conference on the conflict in Gaza as Israel and Hamas engage in a propaganda battle over the Internet.

---

If Janet Napolitano had her way, the nominee to head Homeland Security would take a two-track approach to solving America's illegal immigration problem. Enforcement, yes, says the Arizona governor, and also immigration "reform." She's unlikely to get her way – but she can turn that into a plus.

---

Social Media Takes Center Stage in Gaza War Israel is going for a more informative tactic with its coverage of the war its fighting against Hamas militants in Gaza, and its using social media as one of its main forms of increasing its transparency, reports Times Online. After receiving a great deal of flack from not [...]

---

YouTube, Twitter: Weapons in Israel’s Info War | Danger Room from Wired.com Days after sending aircraft to strike Hamas militants in Gaza, the Israeli government is launching a campaign to dominate the blogosphere. Among other things, the Israeli military has started its own YouTube channel to distribute footage of precision airstrikes. And as I type, the Israeli [...]

---

One of the most misunderstood programs at DHS has been the US-VISIT program. In some ways, US-VISIT has been a victim of its own success. It is now facing new opposition as the program attempts to expand the program. Where US-VISIT has drawn the most criticism, however, is usually a result of some aspect of the original blueprint going unfunded or getting bogged down by Congressional pushback. Thus the idea of a single “person-centric” biometric database for all visitors visiting or working in the U.S. remains unfulfilled.

---

Too many government agencies, particularly in the security realm, are missing opportunities provided by New Media. The suggestion that Facebook or Twitter -- despite their funky names -- is for college kids is as uninformed as it is tiresome. Not only are top corporations in the private sector actively engaged on these sites; so are terrorists and criminals. The Internet has indeed made the world flat; social media tools have made it paper thin.

---