From a CNN article I found today with emphasis added:
The much-maligned, color-coded Homeland Security Advisory System is about to be consigned to the proverbial dustbin of history.
Not that anyone is really paying attention.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano is expected to announce Thursday that the almost 9-year-old threat alert system will go away in April. It will be replaced by the new National Terror Advisory System that will focus on specific threats in geographical areas, a department source said Wednesday.
The source did not provide details of the new system, which Napolitano will unveil at what the department is calling "the first annual 'State of America's Homeland Security' address" at George Washington University.
The top Democrat and Republican on the House Homeland Security Commission reacted positively to the news, although committee chairman Rep. Peter King, R-New York, reserved judgment on the specifics.
"Though the system served a valuable purpose in the terrible days and months following the terrorist attacks of September 11, it was clearly time for the current color-coded system to be replaced with a more targeted system," King said. "I know they have been working on this for a long time. It sounds to me like the changes they are proposing make sense. We will have to wait and see how they implement this new, more targeted system. I expect the biggest challenge for DHS will be balancing the need to provide useful and timely information with the need to protect sensitive information."
"The old color coded system taught Americans to be scared, not prepared," said ranking member Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Mississippi. "Each and every time the threat level was raised, very rarely did the public know the reason, how to proceed, or for how long to be on alert. I have raised concerns for years about the effectiveness of the system and have cited the need for improvements and transparency. Many in Congress felt the system was being used as a political scare tactic -- raising and lowering the threat levels when it best suited the Bush administration."
Allow me to translate this from State-speak: After 9/11 the color-coded system helped sustain the climate of fear the allowed us to start two wars, pass the Patriot Act so that we could have more power over the everyday activities of Americans, create the DHS and TSA to help enforce these new powers, and redistribute wealth from hard-working Americans to our cronies in the military-industrial complex. However, Americans have become inured to the old color-coded system and no longer bow down in fear as they used to. Therefore, we have created a new system which we hope will produce the desired Pavlovian response. This system will be based on geographical areas, and although we know most Americans are pretty bad a geography thanks to the public schools we created to indoctrinate them to worshipping the State, we do believe that they can recognize the continental United States. Thus, if we simply light up specific States with "warnings", we might induce the appropriate fear necessary to stop them from complaining about scanners and pat-downs, and just be the obedient sheep we want them to be. We plan to reveal the details of this system at an annual State of America's Homeland Security conference where we can announce new threats and create new hobgoblins each year. This is because we know that fear is the foundation of State power. However, if Americans refuse to fear the imaginary enemies we create for them, they will learn to fear real violence from their own government.
They're gonna replace it with a monochromatic threat advisory system, one that will constantly remain on the one color that (they hope) will best represent the sentiment of "brave" Americans:
YELLA!
Posted by: Cal | January 28, 2011 at 06:23 PM