{"id":3060,"date":"2002-08-15T15:19:22","date_gmt":"2002-08-15T20:19:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/?p=3060"},"modified":"2002-08-15T15:19:22","modified_gmt":"2002-08-15T20:19:22","slug":"fight_or_flight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2002\/08\/15\/fight_or_flight.html","title":{"rendered":"Fight or flight"},"content":{"rendered":"

After 9\/11, the Feds decided to expand greatly on the Air Marshal program, which had been down to about 50 marshals. But in expanding the system to something close to 6,000 (in many cases at the expense of other federal law enforcement agencies), mismanagement and lowered standards have turned the program into a shambles<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Hiring standards for marshals added since Sept. 11 have been lowered dramatically, sources say. No longer must applicants pass a difficult marksmanship course that used to be the make-or-break test for the program. In addition, many new hires were given guns and badges and put aboard flights before extensive background checks were completed.
\nAt some of the agency’s more than 20 regional offices, the program has struggled to provide ammunition for shooting practice, sources say. Despite the undercover nature of the work, officials have implemented a dress code that marshals worry identifies them to terrorists. And scheduling has been haphazard: While some marshals have not flown for weeks at a time, sources say others are working 12- to 16-hour days and are falling asleep or getting sick aboard flights.
\n“This used to be an elite, great group. This used to be the baddest people you could find \u2014 war heroes,” says one marshal who joined the program just after the terrorist attacks. “Now they’ve turned this into a laughingstock.”<\/p>\n

There, now don’t you feel safer?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After 9\/11, the Feds decided to expand greatly on the Air Marshal program, which had been down to about 50 marshals. But in expanding the system to something close to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3060","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fourth-estate"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":528,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2001\/09\/25\/you_can_sit_nex.html","url_meta":{"origin":3060,"position":0},"title":"You can sit next to me any time","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 25-Sep-01 11:49am","format":false,"excerpt":"You can sit next to me any time An informative article from the Christian Science Monitor on the Sky Marshals program....","rel":"","context":"In "Homeland Security"","block_context":{"text":"Homeland Security","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/homeland-security"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6890,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/12\/09\/perhaps_a_nice.html","url_meta":{"origin":3060,"position":1},"title":"Perhaps a nice outfit with concentric circles on the back?","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 9-Dec-04 9:43am","format":false,"excerpt":"Um, isn't the idea of plainclothes air marshals riding on flights to keep the flights safe, by being invisible to potential terrorists\/hijackers until they strike (or by creating a level...","rel":"","context":"In "Homeland Security"","block_context":{"text":"Homeland Security","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/homeland-security"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9344,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2006\/07\/24\/im_sure_that_if.html","url_meta":{"origin":3060,"position":2},"title":"“I’m sure that if you are looking for it, you’ll see something”","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 24-Jul-06 12:46pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Great news!\u00a0 The Federal Air Marshal service is so sure that there are evil terrorists out there photographing our airplanes that their management is twisting arms to make sure the...","rel":"","context":"In "Homeland Security"","block_context":{"text":"Homeland Security","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/homeland-security"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":43161,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/06\/20\/to-protect-serve-and-lie-to.html","url_meta":{"origin":3060,"position":3},"title":"To Protect, Serve, and Lie To","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 20-Jun-14 1:06pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Yeah, yeah, I'm sure there are all sorts of pragmatic reasons one can think of why the use of Stingray cell phone location devices might have been kept secret for some period of time.But the secret's out. People -- including (gasp) criminals know they exist.So why are local law enforcement\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5722,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/07\/28\/con_numbers.html","url_meta":{"origin":3060,"position":4},"title":"Con numbers","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 28-Jul-04 8:26am","format":false,"excerpt":"Preliminary reports I'm reading indicate the SDCC broke 100k this year (after breaking 75k last year, to much amazement). There were 46k on Saturday alone, and the fire marshals were...","rel":"","context":"In "Comics & Comic Books"","block_context":{"text":"Comics & Comic Books","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media\/media-comics"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1450,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2002\/01\/04\/but_not_too_dea.html","url_meta":{"origin":3060,"position":5},"title":"… But not too deadly","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 4-Jan-02 10:38am","format":false,"excerpt":"There is an increasing market for frangible bullets -- ones which will stop someone, but not create a blow-through or riccochet hazard. Immediate possible application: arming air marshals. Our bullet...","rel":"","context":"In "Homeland Security"","block_context":{"text":"Homeland Security","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/homeland-security"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3060","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3060"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3060\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3060"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3060"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3060"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}