The Workday Liberal

Homeland security security evidently leaves a lot to be desired. Check out this story:

An envelope with suspicious powder was opened last fall at the headquarters. Daniels and other current and former guards said they were shocked when superiors carried it past the office of Secretary Michael Chertoff, took it outside and then shook it outside Chertoff's window without evacuating people nearby.

Which means that all a terrorist would have to do to take out the entire neighborhood that holds this complex is send it an envelope containing anthrax. Upon discovery the guards would obligingly take the contents outside and spread them about the neighborhood.

Of course when whistleblowers came forward with hair raising tales of lax security training and procedures at the homeland security complex, the Republican leadership in congress rose as one to perform their constitutional oversight roles and demand an investigation... right? Wrong!

"If the allegations brought forward by the whistleblowers are correct, they represent both a security threat and a waste of taxpayer dollars," Democratic Sens. Byron Dorgan of North Dakota and Ron Wyden of Oregon wrote to the agency's inspector general, seeking an investigation.

"It would be ironic, to say the least, if DHS were unable to secure its own headquarters," they wrote.

Of course it has to be Democrats sounding the alarm here.